List of former sovereign states

This page lists sovereign states, countries, nations, or empires that ceased to exist as political entities sometime after 1453, grouped geographically and by constitutional nature.

To be included here, a polity must have claimed statehood and either: This is not a list for all variant governments of a state, nor is it a list of variations of countries' official long form name.

For purposes of this list, the cutoff between medieval and early modern states is the fall of Constantinople in 1453.

Not recognised by other nations, these effectively were puppet states and were re-incorporated in 1994.

These nations declared themselves independent, but failed to achieve it in fact or did not seek permanent independence and were either re-incorporated into the mother country or incorporated into another country.