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The Zhou Dynasty (1046-256 BCE) was among the most culturally significant of the early Chinese dynasties and the longest lasting of any in China's history. It is divided into two periods: Western Zhou (1046-771 BCE) and Eastern Zhou (771-256 BCE). It followed the Shang Dynasty (c. 1600-1046 BCE), whose cultural contributions it developed, and preceded the Qin Dynasty(221-206 BCE, pronounced “chin”) which gave China its name. Among the Shang concepts developed by the Zhou was the Mandate of Heaven – the belief in the monarch and ruling house as divinely appointed – which would inform Chinese politics for centuries afterwards and which the House of Zhou invoked to depose and replace the Shang.
The Western Zhou period saw the rise of decentralized state with a social hierarchy corresponding to European feudalism in which land was owned by a noble, honor-bound to the king who had granted it, and was worked by peasants. Western Zhou fell just before the era known as the Spring and Autumn Period (c. 772-476 BCE), named for the state chronicles of the time (the Spring and Autumn Annals) notable for its advances in music, poetry, and philosophy, especially the development of the Confucian, Taoist, Mohist, and Legalist schools of thought.