We need to define "older". All areas are old, but it is history that can make one area seem old. Of course I am ignoring Africa, the oldest of all in Human History.

I think this thread is referring to record keeping. In Europe and especially in the mid-east, when an area was conquered, seems the trend was to destroy written records.

I think when that happened in China, a lot written records survived, so it has the appearance of being older.