An agricultural economy and its accompanying Neolithic communities emerged in South and East Asia some time after 7000 B.C.E. Eventually some of the Neolithic villages further evolved into urban societies. In the third millennium B.C.E., the Dravidian people of India developed the Harappan society in the Indus River valley; not long thereafter, the Xia dynasty emerged in the Yellow river valley to organize public life in China. Both of these cultures were agriculturally based, had complex central governments, and featured large and wealthy urban centers. Coinciding with the decline of the Harappan society, large numbers of Indo-European migrants called Aryans were moving into India from central Asia beginning around 1900 B.C.E.

After a period of turmoil the Aryan and Dravidian cultures merged to create a distinctive Indian society. In China, meanwhile, the collapse of the Xia dynasty was followed by even more complex political organizations under the Shang and Zhou dynasties. Under their rule, China developed sophisticated technologies and highly stratified societies along the banks of the Yellow and Yangtze Rivers.

The early societies of South Asia featured

• Regional states with kingship (rajas) as the most common form of government.
• The caste system, a complex social class system that served as a vehicle for imparting a powerful sense of group identity, as a stabilizing influence in Indian society, and as a foundation for the religious belief system.
• A distinctive set of religious beliefs encompassing the doctrines of samsara and karma along with the notion of a universal soul, or Brahman.

The early societies of East Asia featured

• The belief in the principle that the emperor was granted the power to rule through "the mandate of heaven." Thus the emperor, known as the son of heaven, served as a crucial link between the heavenly powers and the people on earth.
• The extended family as the primary institution of society. The patriarchal head of the family wielded tremendous power and shouldered great responsibilities. It was his job to see that appropriate religious rituals were observed in the worship of the family's departed ancestors. Those ancestors were believed to have control over the living family's well-being.
• A writing system that spread widely throughout China and still persists in its basic form, although modified through time. Consequently Chinese society has experienced a virtually uninterrupted literary tradition.