In a previous post, a question was asked about the comparative size of armies between the Romans and medieval European powers, and why the Romans were able to fields so much larger forces at a time than the medieval kings would have been able to. The post was excellently answered by u/FlavivsAetivs though he did make a comment that stuck with a few users and myself:

The Feudal system comes out of Chinese and Iranian feudalism...

Could someone expand upon this? I am less interested in the day to day of feudalism, and more of the spread of feudalism as a way to for a society to function. Did it originate in the east and the practice was adopted in Europe, or did it just develop naturally in Europe on its own accord without even knowing of the eastern versions?

Then, as a bonus question, were there alternative systems that we are aware of that could have supplanted feudalism earlier than the 1500s? I know this is highly hypothetical but I am also interested if there were mainstream competition to the feudal way of life.