An early Bronze Age urban civilization of the central plain, centred on the walled city at Zhengzhou, whose mass-produced ritual bronzes and rapid expansion carried the first Chinese state horizon far beyond its Erlitou predecessor.
The Erligang horizon contracted after about 1400 BC as its centre shifted north-east; the later Shang capital at Anyang succeeded it as the dominant power of the central plain.
Its early chapters cover the Erligang/early Shang horizon and the Zhengzhou city in detail.
The standard archaeological synthesis for the Erlitou-to-Erligang Bronze Age transition.