Royalty is almost as old as civilization itself.
The invention of farming 10,000 years ago meant that people didn’t have to roam the land looking for food. They could settle down. Great cities grew in Mesopotamia (now Iraq), Egypt, and other fertile areas. Leaders rose to rule these city-states. Their power grew. They gave themselves a fancy new title—king—and decided that all their relatives were nobles. Family ties became the fast track to power.
But who was the first royal? Every royal family had to begin somewhere, sometime. Some “fortunate soldier” must have been the first king or queen. No one knows just who the very first king or queen was, or where. But Egyptian ruling families were among the first in recorded history. The earliest one started about 3100 B.C.
