Think about the kingdoms of the Iron Age. These kingdoms rose and fell within a few centuries. What general factors (including particular people) do you think led to the rise and fall of these kingdoms?

The Iron Age is the last period of Prehistory before the beginning of History with the invention of writing. It was considered in the first millennium BC. For example, in the first Chinese Empire that began with the unification of China by Qin Shi Huang. This ended five centuries of feudal wars that ravaged the Zhou dynasty. Its short dynasty is characterized because it introduced a centralized government under the system of absolute monarchy. When the Qin were overthrown the Han dynasty, Confucianism was implanted as the ideology of the State.

Explanation:

The short Qin dynasty was led by the Emperor of China. He abolished feudalism and divided his empire into 36 provinces each governed by 3 governors, one of which was military. He built communication networks between the different municipalities of the empire and introduced measures of standardization of units of all kinds, such as the monetary one. The country became governed by a code of laws. The most significant reform was the unification of writing.

When the Qin were defeated, Confucianism was implanted. The Han dynasty finished when the empire was divided into the Three Kingdoms (Wei, Shu and Wu) and later between the Southern and Northern Dynasties, thus beginning a time of disunity, a period of continuous wars until the Sui dynasty began to beat his rivals.