The Hang He River gave birth to a Chinese civilization which was mostly isolated from the other parts of the world. This early Chinese civilization was located far from the Egyptian civilization that formed along the Nile River. Despite the distance, these two civilizations made almost identical advancements that shaped their daily life and cultures, and shared similar ideas in ruling their societies.
China and Egypt cultures are alike because both civilizations made similar advancements in writing, technology, and architecture, and believe in a polytheistic religion; however, each violation possesses different religious ideas that influence their respective social structures differently. Their political structures have similar monarchies that rule with religious power, but the pharaohs effective rule in Egypt sustained much longer than the Shank dynasty ruled by Chinese kings.
Many aspects of Chinese and Egyptian culture such as their writing, religion, technology, and idea of social structures were similar to each other. The Chinese writing was based on ideographs, and much like the Egyptian hieroglyphics, many of the characters were simple castigators as well. These two systems of writing are both currently decipherable, and provided both civilizations an easy way to record their history. Much of their writing was dedicated to religious rituals or ceremonies. Egypt and China civilizations both held polytheistic religious views.
Many Egyptian gods were gods of nature such as Ra: the sun god, or Yam: the God of the Sea. Likewise, some of the most important Chinese gods included You-hang: the sky god, Fen Pop Pop: a wind god, and Lei-Gung: a god of thunder and lightning. Aside from their similarities of religion, hey both separately made technological advancements that improved daily life such as mathematical concepts, complex irrigation systems, and a calendar to record divisions of time. Each civilization and similar social structures based on wealth.
The rich people such as rulers were on the top. The middle class was usually made up of nobles, merchants, artisans, scholars, and craftsmen. Finally, the lowest class contained the poorest civilians which were usually laborers, farmers, and servants. With such key similarities that defined their cultures, the two civilizations must have ad to develop some differences from each other as well. The daily life of Egyptians and Chinese varied immensely. Residents of the Egyptian civilization preferred to live in luxury, while the Chinese settled down with a simpler lifestyle.
In Egypt, the pharaohs godlike status led to the construction of magnificent tombs for themselves, known as pyramids. In China, they lacked the resources to build such extravagant houses and monuments. Instead, the Chinese chose to live in simple houses made of mud. Furthermore, the origin of Egyptian and Chinese writing systems were completely different. Egyptian hieroglyphics were believed to be invented by the god Tooth; whereas China’s writing progressed from knotted ropes, to scratches of lines, and finally towards the invention of ideographic symbols.
Egypt writing system emphasized the importance in their religion, while China’s writing served a less prominent role in religious, and served a greater purpose in influencing later cultures that surrounded East Asia. Although both civilizations were polytheistic, they did not share the same religious rituals and beliefs. Egyptians believed that in the tripartite, one should be mummified and surrounded by luxurious riches. The Chinese buried their dead as well, but many corpses were cremated and definitely not mummified.
Egyptian art was colorful and vibrant which decorated tombs, palaces and furnishings, while Chinese art was based on nature and varied from pottery and paintings. Compared to Egypt bustling trade civilization, China had very limited trade due to its isolation. This led to a slight variation in the Egyptian social structure. Due to the Egypt dependence on trade, merchants were placed higher in the social structure pyramid. China, however, believed that peasants held a more important ole in society, and therefore peasants in China were valued more than merchants.
Although China did not have the many luxuries that Egypt did, both civilizations chose to live their lifestyle in comfort and satisfaction. The Hang He River valley civilization and the Nile River valley civilization both had similar monarchical governments whose rulers enhanced their rule with religious power. Both the Egyptian pharaohs and Shank kings claimed to be chosen by their gods to rule over their respective lands. The kings and pharaohs were chosen in similar ways for the two civilizations. The Shank kings were chosen through blood nine, meaning the father would choose a son or male predecessor in the family to inherit the throne.
Similarly in Egypt, the pharaoh would choose who was to proceed him after he died, always being a family member. The pharaohs took it one step further by marrying their sisters to keep the blood-line pure. The Egyptian and Chinese civilizations were prone to attacks from barbarians, which often led to autocratic tyranny by the monarch. An autocratic form of government usually provided a strong central government as well. Perhaps this was a necessary evil to uphold these early civilizations from being easily invaded. Although China and Egypt agreed to these monarchical governments, they were not necessarily the same.
Both civilizations had the same type of ruling system with a monarch who has complete power, but they also had many distinctive differences. For example, Egyptian pharaohs ruled for a longer period of time compared to the emperors. Most Chinese emperors ruled for an average span often years. However, several of the Shank dynasty emperors stood out and ruled for a longer amount of time such as Emperor Tat Www (75 years) or Emperor Www Ding (95 years). Nonetheless, many Chinese emperors ruled for less than three years such as Emperor Way Being and Emperor Ixia Gin.
Egyptian pharaohs had a more consistent tendency to rule longer. Egyptian pharaohs ruled for an average of forty years. This included the early pharaohs: Den, Deja, Enterer, and Horror-Aha. The stable ruling of Egyptian pharaohs compared to the switching of dynasties in China, demonstrated Egypt unity through their religious leader. Egypt and China made similar achievements in many areas such as writing, technology, and architecture. However, the two civilizations held separate religious views that gave each civilization a unique social structure.
Egyptian pharaohs maintained a longer and more effective rule than the Chinese emperors. The political structures of the two civilizations were both made up of similar monarchies that ruled with religious power and were made up of family ties. Although both civilizations had their times of flourishing and deterioration, they both eventually began to steadily decline by 1000 B. C. E. Despite China and Egypt differences, both to the civilizations’ cultures and political structures provided inventions and intellectual concepts that would spread to other parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa.
