This volume provides a study of the evolutionary process of ancient civilizations, stressing the comparison between theoretical principles and relevant historical and archaeological evidence. For this reason, the study focusses on the origin, development and collapse of the first stage of the ‘Central Civilization’, which was the result of the merger of two primeval civilizations, Mesopotamia and Egypt, during the ‘Near Eastern phase’ of this Central Civilisation. This merger seems to have been the result of the political expansion of an imperial entity coming from Mesopotamia under the aegis of the so-called Neo-Assyrian Empire from 1000 BC to 600 BC – better known as the Pax Assyriaca – although the process of full integration with Egypt seems to have been concluded, according to the archaeological records, only by the successor empires of Assyria circa 430 BC.