Editing State (polity) (section)

===Ancient Eurasia===
{{See also|Mesopotamia|Ancient Egypt|Indus Valley Civilization|Yellow River civilization}}

[[Mesopotamia]] is generally considered to be the location of the earliest [[civilization]] or [[complex society]], meaning that it contained [[cities]], full-time [[division of labor]], social concentration of wealth into [[capital (economics)|capital]], [[income inequality|unequal distribution of wealth]], ruling classes, community ties based on residency rather than [[kinship]], long distance [[trade]], [[monument]]al [[architecture]], standardized forms of [[art]] and culture, writing, and [[mathematics]] and [[science]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Mann, Michael|title=The sources of social power: A history of power from the beginning to A. D. 1760, Volume 1|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=1986|isbn=978-0-521-31349-0|chapter=The emergence of stratification, states, and multi-power-actor civilization in Mesopotamia|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=eA23bY_bIsoC&pg=PA73|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160425020841/https://books.google.com/books?id=eA23bY_bIsoC&pg=PA73|archive-date=25 April 2016|url-status=live}}</ref><ref name="Wang-2021">{{Cite journal|last=Wang|first=Yuhua|date=2021|title=State-in-Society 2.0: Toward Fourth-Generation Theories of the State|url=https://www.ingentaconnect.com/content/cuny/cp/pre-prints/content-jcpo_54108;jsessionid=635ms3i1ubui8.x-ic-live-01|journal=Comparative Politics|volume=54|pages=175–198|language=en|doi=10.5129/001041521x16184035797221|s2cid=235847848}}</ref> It was the world's first [[literate]] civilization, and formed the first sets of written [[laws]].<ref>{{cite book|author=Yoffee, Norman|title=State formation and political legitimacy|publisher=Transaction Publishers|year=1988|isbn=978-0-88738-161-4|editor=Cohen, Ronald|page=95|chapter=Context and Authority in Early Mesopotamian Law|editor2=Toland, Judith D.|chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=mgDBG5zu1xYC&pg=PA95|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160501185152/https://books.google.com/books?id=mgDBG5zu1xYC&pg=PA95|archive-date=1 May 2016|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|author=Yoffee, Norman|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=azE1vmdmZSIC&pg=PA102|title=Myths of the archaic state: evolution of the earliest cities, states and civilizations|publisher=Cambridge University Press|year=2005|isbn=978-0-521-81837-7|page=102|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110511124320/http://books.google.com/books?id=azE1vmdmZSIC&pg=PA102|archive-date=11 May 2011|url-status=live}}</ref> Bronze metallurgy spread within Afro-Eurasia from {{circa|3000 BC}}, leading to a [[Military Revolution|military revolution]] in the use of bronze weaponry, which facilitated the rise of states.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Turchin |first1=Peter |last2=Whitehouse |first2=Harvey |last3=Gavrilets |first3=Sergey |last4=Hoyer |first4=Daniel |last5=François |first5=Pieter |last6=Bennett |first6=James S. |last7=Feeney |first7=Kevin C. |last8=Peregrine |first8=Peter |last9=Feinman |first9=Gary |last10=Korotayev |first10=Andrey |last11=Kradin |first11=Nikolay |date=2022 |title=Disentangling the evolutionary drivers of social complexity: A comprehensive test of hypotheses |journal=Science Advances |volume=8 |issue=25 |pages=eabn3517 |doi=10.1126/sciadv.abn3517 |pmid=35749491 |pmc=9232109 |bibcode=2022SciA....8N3517T |s2cid=250022526 }}</ref>