Empire ancient city-states of the Levant. Circa 1500 BC in China rose the Shang Empire which was succeeded by the Zhou Empire circa 1100 BC. Both surpassed in territory their contemporary Near Eastern empires. The Zhou Empire dissolved in 770 BC into feudal multi-state system which lasted for five and a half centuries until the universal conquest of Qin in 221 BC. The first empire comparable to Rome in organization was the Neo-Assyrian Empire (916–612 BC). The Median Empire was the first empire within the territory of Persia. By the 6th century BC, after having allied with the Babylonians to defeat
The empire on which the sun never sets in all the Asian Subcontinents, and islands in the Atlantic, Indian and Pacific oceans. However, it was under his son Philip III of Spain that the Spanish Empire acquired its largest extension. Philip III and his son Philip IV of Spain were also kings of Portugal among other territories besides Spain, which made both of them the rulers of the greatest extension on earth of all time, simply by joining the global territories of Spain and Portugal empires account for more extension than any other king has ever ruled. In 1585, Giovanni Battista Guarini wrote "Il pastor fido" to mark