Although they existed more than a millennium apart, the great civilizations of New Kingdom Egypt (ca. 1548�86 BCE) and Han dynasty China (206 BCE�0 CE) shared intriguing similarities. Both were centered around major, flood-prone rivers縯he Nile and the Yellow River縜nd established complex hydraulic systems to manage their power. Both spread their territories across vast empires that were controlled through warfare and diplomacy and underwent periods of radical reform led by charismatic rulers縯he 縣eretic king� Akhenaten and the vilified reformer Wang Mang. Universal justice was dispensed through courts, and each empire was administered by bureaucracies staffed by highly trained scribes who held special status. Egypt and China each developed elaborate conceptions of an afterlife world and created games of fate that facilitated access to these realms.This groundbreaking volume offers an innovative comparison of these two civilizations. Through a combination of textual, art historical, and archaeological analyses, Ancient Egypt and Early China reveals shared structural traits of each civilization as well as distinctive features.