I would assert that NATO was perhaps the first alliance of its kind..
..and almost all prior alliances of approaching the the territorial extent of NATO were more similar to the Warsaw Pact in spirit than NATO.
NATO and Warsaw Pact however had in common that they were each a large geographic "chunk". This was a new feature in western history. Large globs of neighbors allied to each other, and not because they were simply under a common imperial occupation.
The pattern of alliances for most European history had always prior been the "striped" pattern. In this pattern (represented by the Triple Entente, the WWII Grand Alliance, the anti-Napoleonic coalitions, the 7 Years War alignments, and 30 years war alignments) generally next door neighbors to each other were enemies, and the neighbors of their enemies on the other side "the neighbors' neighbors" were the allies.
So historically - France and England usually opposed each other. France was usually against whoever was dominant in Germany (HRE & Prussia) France was usually allied with Sweden, Poland and the Ottoman Empire on the other side of Germany. France and Russia were only firmly drawn together after the partitions of Poland and unification of Germany put them in the "stripe" to the immediate west and east of Germany.
Or - American-Russian relations with each other being better in the middle 19th century than either ones relations with France.
Since WWII the "striped" alliance pattern has been a thing of the past. However, they have remained a usual M.O. in much of the rest of the world. For instance, Syrian-Iranian cooperation, especially against Saddam Hussein's Iraq. Or Indian and Afghan overtures to each other combined with enmity against Pakistan. Soviet-Indian-Vietnamese cold war collaboration against China, etc.
What could have resulted an earlier historic replacement of striped alliance patterns, with enduring "chunky" alliances, several countries deep, including many sovereign yet neighboring countries choosing to be allied for decades.
Or would chunky alliances at any point before 1945 have merely been an example or empire versus empire, or Warsaw Pact versus Warsaw Pact?