Locat­ed in the Yangtze Riv­er Basin on the south-east­­ern coast of the coun­try, the archae­o­log­i­cal ruins of Liangzhu (about 3,300–2,300 BCE) reveal an ear­ly region­al state with a uni­fied belief sys­tem based on rice cul­ti­va­tion in Late Neolith­ic Chi­na. The prop­er­ty is com­posed of four areas — the Area of Yaoshan Site, the Area of High-dam at the Mouth of the Val­ley, the Area of Low-dam on the Plain and the Area of City Site. These ruins are an out­stand­ing exam­ple of ear­ly urban civ­i­liza­tion expressed in earth­en mon­u­ments, urban plan­ning, a water con­ser­va­tion sys­tem and a social hier­ar­chy expressed in dif­fer­en­ti­at­ed buri­als in ceme­ter­ies with­in the prop­er­ty.