The classical period was the decline of river valley civilizations. During this era world history was shaped by the rise of several large civilizations that grew from areas where the earlier civilizations thrived. In these two civilizations they had similarities and differences in methods of political control in Imperial Rome and Han China. They were both the same that they had a central ruler but, the way they kept their citizens and the way they had their personal conflicts were a lot more different which means they had more differences than similarities in their political methods of government in these two civilizations.