1177BC - The Year Civilization Collapsed

Summary

Map of the Near East:

Preface to the Revised Edition

Collapse is fundamentally a sudden, pronounced loss of an established level of sociopolitical complexity - p. xvii, Joseph Tainter

What happened in 1177BC is what we would consider a “collapse”. Many civilizations in the world at the time (the late Bronze Age) all fell at around the same period. It wasn’t the collapse of just one civilization, it was the collapsed of the world - it was the collapse of a stable international system.

Parallels: Bronze Age to Present Times

The history of 1177BC is important because it reminds us of our current times.

We live in an interconnected and globalized world (“a stable international system”), where no one country is truly independent of others. This is exactly how the late bronze age was. Political turmoil in one area could drastically impact a region thousands of miles away - this is both true today and during the bronze age.

The desire for oil today is similar to the desire for tin in the bronze age.

• today, the US government is concerned over getting enough oil for their country at a fair cost
• in the bronze age, the kings of the various empires were concerned over getting enough tin to make bronze weapons, tools, etc
• tin largely came from Badakhshan, Afghanistan, and so it would travel from there into the middle east, and then into the wider world including Greece. This is similar to oil today and how it largely comes from the middle east

Today, the entire world is faced with loads of problems: climate change, famine, war, social fragmentation, disease, etc. These were the same factors impacting the civilizations of 1177BC.

Prologue - The Collapse of Civilizations: 1177BC

The Sea Peoples

• The people who supposedly caused the collapse of various civilizations are called the “Sea Peoples”.
• we don’t know where they came from - could’ve been Italy, or Sicily, or the Aegean, or Anatolia, could be anywhere really
  • no ancient site has been identified with them
• The Egyptians referred to them with many names: Peleset, Tjekker, Shekelesh, Shardana, Danuna, Weshesh
  • it’s accurate to look at these as 6 distinct groups of Sea Peoples
• They did not have a distinct look, some wore skullcaps, some feathered headdresses, some no hats at all. They did not have a uniform, they wore various clothing
  • this suggests that they were actually a very diverse people spanning across different cultures
• They did not all come in 1177BC, rather they came in waves across a large period of time
• what we know about the Sea Peoples comes almost solely from the Egyptians as they themselves left no writing
• nobody could put up any resistance - Hittites, Mycenaeans, Canaanites, Cypriots, etc, all fell to them

Who were they?

• Some scholars say the Danuna are the Danaans from the Aegean, the Shekelesh are from Sicily and the Shardana are from Sardinia
  • the names sound the same + the Egyptians said these people are from the sea (islands)
  • this opinion is not widely accepted
• the opposing view is that the Shekelesh and Shardana came from the eastern Mediterranean and only settled in Sicily and Sardinia after being defeated by the Egyptians, giving those places their names
  • again, this opinion has issues. Ramses the Third tells us that the survivors of these attacks were settled within Egypt… if that’s the case, how did they go to Sicily and Sardinia afterwards?
• of all 6 groups, only the Peleset have been confidently identified: the Philistines.
  • as per the Bible, they came from Crete

Ramses the Third’s Mortuary Temple

• while we don’t know the exact origin or motivation of the Sea Peoples, what we do know comes from Ramses the Third’s temple. There are carvings of the names and faces of the Sea Peoples all around the temple.
• the armor, weapons, clothing, boats, oxcarts, are all clearly visible in these carvings and have been studied extensively
• the very large sea and land battle pictured in Ramses’s Mortuary Temple happened around 1177BC. The Egyptians won.
• Although Ramses won, the Egyptian Empire never truly recovered and Ramses kingdom was the height of Egyptian power until a few hundred years later when Pharaoh Shoshenq/Shishak founded the 22nd dynasty and restored Egyptian glory
• it’s important to note that Ramses was the only power in the region to resist the Sea Peoples invasion

Merneptah vs the Sea Peoples

• 30 years earlier in 1207BC, the Pharaoh Merneptah also documented an invasion by the Sea Peoples
• the invaders are named as Shardana, Shekelesh, Eqwesh, Lukka, and Teresh
• collectively the 5 groups are identified as “northerners coming from all lands” while the Shardana, Shekelesh, and Eqwesh are specifically “countries of the sea”
  • this further supports Shardana and Shekelesh being identified as Sardinia and Sicily
• the Eqwesh are commonly thought to be the Danuna of the Aegean, as identified by Homer
• the Lukka are commonly thought to be the Lycians of Turkey
• the Teresh are thought to be the Etruscans of Italy
• the battle took place in Libya and Merneptah won

The Demise of the Bronze Age Civilizations

• within a century of 1177BC, basically all the powers in the Aegean and Near East collapsed
• terror was definitely present amongst these civilizations, as we can see from a clay tablet inscribed with a letter from the King of Ugarit in Syria to the King of Cyprus
  • basically the Ugarit king was saying the Sea Peoples are ravaging his cities and was asking the Cypriot for assistance
• it’s important to note two things
  • not all the destruction that occurred was from the Sea Peoples
  • the collapse didn’t happen overnight, it happened across an entire century
• we don’t know the full truth of why or how the bronze age civilizations of the Aegean and the Near East collapsed, but what we can say for sure is that the Sea Peoples are not fully to blame.
• one hypothesis even states that the Sea Peoples fled their homes for the same reasons causing the collapse among the bronze age civilizations, and that the bronze age civilizations were already in decline, allowing the Sea Peoples to defeat them with ease
• what’s the authors view on all this?
  • the Sea Peoples were certainly responsible for some of the destruction. But what truly caused the collapse of civilization was the perfect blend of terrible events: climate change causing draught and famines, earthquakes, internal rebellions, and “systems collapse”

In order to truly understand how all these Bronze Age civilizations collapsed, we must being three centuries earlier: 15th century BC.

Chapter 1. Act 1 - Of Arms and the Man: The Fifteenth Century BC

The Backdrop

NOTE: this specific sub-heading is my own creation

• The Hyksos were a foreign group who invaded and controlled Egypt from 1720 to 1550BC
• their capital was Avaris, also called Peru-nefer
• in 1477BC, the Pharaoh Thutmose III (post-Hyksos collapse), ordered the construction of a big palace in Peru-nefer
• the Pharaoh hired Minoan artists from Crete to create elaborate paintings on the walls of the palace
• the same style of paintings were also found in palaces in Canaan, Turkey, and Syria
• this reveals a lot to us, namely the internationalized nature of the world at that time that began to coalesce in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Aegean

Harkening Back to the Hyksos

• the Hyksos were Semitic people originating in Canaan
• Semitic people were involved in trade in Egypt since at least the 19th century BC
• how did they win? Likely due to superior weapons and tech.
  • they had bows that could shoot farther
  • they had horse-drawn chariots which did not exist in Egypt

Flashback: Mesopotamia and the Minoans

• the Minoans of Crete had interactions with Near Eastern civilizations long before they interacted with the Egyptians
  • we can see Minoan-manufactured objects in Mesopotamia around the 18th century BC
• Minoan good were valued in Mesopotamia for two reasons:
  • the craftmanship and materials were great
  • “distance value”: they came from far away, thus have inherent value because they were rare to have

Discovery and Overview of the Minoans

• The Minoans ruled Crete from 3000BC all the way to 1200BC (i.e. 1177BC)
  • they likely originated in Anatolia
• in 1450BC the Myceneans from Greece invaded, so they were under foreign rule from that time to the end (1200BC)
• we don’t know what they called themselves - Minoan is just the term scholars gave them
• Near Eastern artifacts have been found on Crete, including Egyptians and Mesopotamian items
  • this proves to us that the Minoans were involved in both the import and export business

Back to Egypt

• it was during Hatshepsut’s reign in the 15th century BC where we can see Aegean peoples depicted on wall paintings, including Minoans, thus proving there was direct contact between Egyptians and Minoans
• we also see Minoan royalty depicted attending some sort of Egyptian event, signifying friendly relations between the two civilizations

Hatshepsut and Thutmose III

• Hatshepsut was a female pharaoh who was the first in the 18th dynasty to begin international contacts with other civilizations
• she ruled as a man, taking a man’s name and wearing man’s traditional clothing. This made sense considering female pharaohs were rare
• she ruled after her husband, Thutmose II, died. She ruled for 20 years. Her husband’s son with a harem girl then ruled after her. He was called Thutmose III.
• both Hatshepsut and Thutmose III sent trade delegations all over as far as Ethiopia and Anatolia

Egypt and Canaan at the Battle of Megiddo, 1479BC

• Hatshepsut died in 1480BC from Cancer. Thutmose III quickly took power
• he immediately went to war with the Canaanite chiefs who rebelled when Hatshepsut died
  • this battle is known as Battle of Megiddo, or Biblical Armageddon
• upon reaching the city of Megiddo, he laid siege with lasted 7 months. Eventually the city succumbed
• in WW1, general Edmund Allenby also applied this same strategy and won the Battle of Megiddo against the Germans and Ottomans

Egypt and Mitanni

• Thutmose III also went to war against the Kingdom of Mitanni that rose up in around 1500BC
  • he went to war because he suspected they were involved in the Canaanite rebellions that took place in the first year of Thutmose’s rule
• Thutmose’s grandfather went to war against the Mitanni decades prior to prevent them from getting too big
• the Mitanni were Indo-Europeans who settled in northern Syria and ruled over the Semitic Hurrian people
  • 90% of their population were Hurrian. The Mitanni were the 10% ruling elite
  • the Mitanni were masters at training horses and chariot riding
• the Egyptians won the war, but 15-20 years later the Mitanni rose up again and started to expand their territory, taking Assyrian lands
• less than a century later, the pharaoh Amenhotep III married two Mitannian princesses, indicting relations between the two civilizations were cordial

The Assuwa Rebellion in Anatolia

• The Assuwa civilization in Anatolia launched a rebellion against the Hittite Empire of central Anatolia
• the rebellion was defeated by the Hittite king Tudhaliya
• in the 90s, a sword was found with an inscription describing the rebellion.
  • This was the first artifact ever found associated with this rebellion in history. The rebellion was already known, but only via ancient clay tablets describing the events
• this rebellion is important and may signify early “internationalism” so the next few sections are going to focus on this

Excursus: Discovery and Overview of the Hittites

• the Hittites ruled Anatolia for much of the 2nd millennium BC, yet were largely unknown to us until 200 years ago
• they were Indo-European
• Hittites are sporadically mentioned in the Old Testament
  • King Solomon had Hittite wives
  • King David’s wife Bathsheba was first married to Uriah the Hittite
• the OT mentions them as living in Canaan among the Hivites, Amorites, and Jebusites, eventually succumbing to the Israelites
• in 1879, Assyriologist A. H. Sayce announced that the Hittites were not located in Canaan but rather Anatolia
  • this was accepted by the wider community due to the evidence and still accepted today
• the Hittites likely expanded into Syria/Canaan and survived even after the Hittite empire collapsed, which is why the Bible mentions them as a people living in Canaan
• the name they called themselves was Neshites or Neshians, named after the city of Nesha
• they were in Nesha for 200 years as a local Indo-European dynasty before their king Hattusili I established his capital in Hattusa in 1650BC
• Hittite history is grouped into 2 phases
  • the Old Kingdom (1650-1500BC): famous kings like Mursili came in this time. Mursili was known as the king who led his army 1000km to Babylon in 1595BC, defeated them, and left rathern than occupying it, essentially conducting history’s first ever “drive-by shooting”
  • the Hittite Empire (1500BC-1180BC): they rose to their greatest heights during this time and were toe-to-toe with the Egyptian empire
    • this is the time we are concerned about

The Assuwa Rebellion and the Ahhiyawa Question

• the Assuwa were a coalition of renegade states in the Hittite Empire at around 1430BC
• the Hittite king Tudhaliya defeated the Assuwa and declared them a vassal. Shortly after, the Assuwa rebelled again so Tudhaliya destroyed them for good.
• the Assuwa legacy lives on in the name “Asia” and the story of the Trojan Wars as the names Wilusiya and Taruisa bear a resemblance to the city of Troy (Ilios)
  • Wilusiya and Taruisa are 2 of the states within the Assuwa confederation
• in some of the tablets discovered the recount the rebellion, a mysterious group called “Ahhiyawa” are mentioned - we now know them to be from mainland Greece, the Mycenaeans
  • they helped the Assuwa against the Hittites

Discovery and Overview of the Myceneans

• archeologists discovered the Mycenaean civilization in the late 1800s
• using archeology and textual evidence, we know the Mycenaean civilization began in the 17th century BC (1700 - 1600BC)
• scholars refer to the times the Mycenaeans were in existence as “Late Helladic (LH)” period
  • LH I and II = 17th - 15th centuries BC
  • LH III A = 14th century
  • LH III B = 13th
  • LH III C = 12th century BC
• the Mycenaeans took over Crete in sometime in the 14th century BC
  • along with controlling the land, they controlled the trade routes to Egypt and the Near East.
  • this allowed the Mycenaeans to partake in world trade
  • they had this control until the end of the Bronze Age (1200BC / “1177BC”)
• the Egyptians called them Tanaja, while the Hittites called them Ahhiyawa, and the Canaanites called them Hiyawa
  • lots of Mycenaean vases and vessels were found in those areas dating to the 14th - 12th centuries BC

An Early Trojan War?

• the Trojan War, a war between the Greeks/Achaeans and the Anatolians, took place in the 12th century, but we know of many other conflicts between these groups before then.
  • Homer wrote about it, we have archeological evidence, etc.
  • example: Assuwa Rebellion

A Small Fraction

• it’s important to note that archeology only reveals a small glimpse into reality.
• Think about all the perishable goods that we can’t dig up, all the raw materials used to make other things, etc.
• the trade happening between the Near East, Egypt, and the Aegean was huge, it was done on a mass-scale, but archeology can only reveal to us a tiny sliver of it.
• the Minoan-style paintings inside an Egyptian palace tells us so much: international contact, trade, and influence was ubiquitous all around the Mediterranean world in the 15th century
• to sum up the 15th century (this chapter):
  • international contract and trade was flourishing
  • the Mycenaeans and Minoans of the Aegean were well established
  • the Hittites of Anatolia were also well established
  • the Hyksos were evicted from Egypt
  • the Egyptians had begun the 18th dynasty and the New Kingdom period
• the 15th century layed the groundwork of the Bronze Age golden age, the 14th century (next chapter)
• in the 14th century we see Egypt establish themselves as a great power for the rest of the bronze age along with the Hittites, Assyrians, Babylonians/Kassites, Mitannians, Minoans, Mycenaeans, and Cypriots

Chapter 2. Act II - An (Aegean) Affair to Remember: The Fourteenth Century BC

The Aegean List of Amenhotep III

• there are statues found that contain a list of people and kingdoms known to the Egyptians. These were built during the 14th century at the time of Amenhotep III
  • the depictions suggest the Egyptians conquered and controlled these people, but this was likely propaganda or a ‘desire’ of the Pharaoh to eventually conquer them
• we see the usual names there like the Nubians, Hittites, Assyrians, etc, but we also see a bunch of new names, scholars calls this the “Aegean List”
  • we see names like Mycenae, Nauplion, Knossos, Kydonia, and Kythera
  • 15 names total. 13 of which were never mentioned before or after this time in Egyptian record
• the two names already familiar were Keftiu (Crete) and Tanaja (mainland Greece)
  • these names appeared a century earlier during Hatshepsut and Thutmose’s time
• In Amenhotep’s list, Keftiu and Tanaja are used as titles with the other 13 names beneath them
• the list of 15:
  • after Keftiu and Tanaja comes various Minoan cities on Crete:
    • Knossos, Amnisos, Phaistos, Kydonia
    • all of these either house palaces or is an important port city (Amnisos)
  • Kythera comes next, an island between Crete and Greece
  • next comes cities of Mycenae:
    • Nauplion, Messenia, Thebes
  • then comes more cities of Crete, including Amnisos again
• the list looks like a travel itinerary
  • the Egyptians would’ve stopped at Crete, then Kythera, then mainland Greece, then on the way home they would’ve stopped at Crete again
  • there is debate if this is true. We know Minoans and Mycenaeans came to the Near East, but did Egyptians go to the Aegean? Was this actually a travel itinerary? The author does seem to think so.
• the strongest evidence that suggests that Egyptians travelled to the Aegean is the presence of objects with the royal name of Amenhotep III and his wife buried at sites around the Aegean and Crete. 4 out of 6 sites where the objects were found were also in Amenhotep’s statue list.
  • furthermore, these Amenhotep objects were found NOWHERE else outside of Egypt, they are unique to the Aegean.
• during the 14th century, we see an equal amount of Egyptian, Canaanite, and Cypriot goods in the Aegean, indicting that Egypt no longer had dominance on this trade route as they likely did in the 15th century
• at the end of the 14th century, we see a dramatic shift in importation to the Aegean
  • importation to Crete decreases dramatically while imports to mainland Greece increase
  • this may be linked to the destruction of Knossos on Crete in 1350BC and to a Mycenaean takeover of the trade routes to Egypt and the Near East

The Amarna Archives

• in 1887 there was a clay-inscribed archive found in the ancient city of Akhetaten. This city was built by Amenhotep III’s son, Akhenaten, who made it his capital
• Akhenaten was known to the world as the only pharaoh to bring some form of [[Ancient Egypt#Short Moment of Monotheism[ 12]|monotheism to his empire]]
  • once he took power, he began the “Amarna Revolution” which saw the closure of many templates of other gods, the priest class being weakened, and more power to the Pharaoh
  • his people could only worship him, and he in turn worshipped the one and only god, Aten
• Akhenaten also continued the practices of his forebears, namely international trade and contact
  • the Amarna letters/archives document his diplomatic relations with other empires
• these letters were written in Akkadian which was the diplomatic lingua franca at the time
• many of these letters describe pleas of help from the Canaanites, which were vessels of the Egyptians, while letters between Egypt and other great powers like Babylon, Assyria, Mitanni, and Hittites contained more high-level diplomacy and gift exchanges, etc

Greeting-Gifts and Family Relations

• much of the contact between empires involved gift exchanges between kings
• gifts included things like gold ornaments and jewelry, horses, chariots, and attendants (i.e. slaves)
• in these letters, the kings often referred to each other as ‘brother’ or ‘father/son’, thus establishing ‘trade partnerships’
• in the absence of real family relations, there was a need to create imaginary family relationships to ensure friendly trading.
  • One king of Amurru said to the king of Ugarit: “my brothers, look: I and you, we are brothers. Sons of a single man, we are brothers. Why should we not be on good terms with each other? Whatever desire you will write to me, I will satisfy it… we form a unit.”
• not all kings felt the same way about this. One king of Hittites write to another, “why should I write to you in terms of brotherhood? Are we sons of the same mother?”
• Egyptians almost always used the term ‘brother’, while Hittites preferred ‘father/son’ depending on age/seniority
• sometimes the family relationship was real, as in the case of Mitanni king Tushratta and Amenhotep III
  • Amenhotep was married to Tushratta’s sister and daughter, making Tushratta his faither-in-law and brother-in-law
  • in one letter, Tushratta writes “say to the king of Egypt, my brother, my son-in-law”
  • Akhenaten inherited his fathers wives, including Tushratta’s daughter, making Tushratta the father-in-law to two different Egyptian Pharaohs
• Amenhotep III partook in diplomatic marriage a lot. He was married to:
  • Hittite king Tushratta’s sister and daughter
  • Hittite king Shuttarna II’s daughter
  • the daughters of Babylonian Kassite kings Kurigalzu and Kadashman
  • the daughter of king Tarkhundaradu of Arzawa (Anatolia)

Gold, Fool’s Gold, and High Level Trade

• Egypt was a sought after trading partner due to their Nubian gold mines. Many foreign kings would write to the Pharaohs asking for gold in a way as if they were asking for eggs or milks, because they knew Egypt had an abundance of gold
• the gold shipments being sent from Egypt were frequently robbed along the way
• this high level gold trade between empires was mainly just a front. Behind the scenes, other things like food, clothing, and the “staples of life” were being traded between merchants and diplomatic
• additionally, the trade of ideas and innovation also took place
  • imagine this: you are a merchant in 14th century Egypt who has just arrived in Crete. At night you go to the local tavern and mingle with the locals.
  • it’s safe to say that the exchange of ideas, stories, myths, innovations, thoughts, etc, took place in this manner
  • this is likely why we can find similarities between the Epic of Gilgamesh and Homer’s Iliad and Odyssey, and between the Hittite Myth of Kumarbi and Hesiod’s Theogony
• these trade caravans often included doctors, architects, masons, and sculptors, who would offer their services to different kings and empires, which is why we can find Aegean style paintings in Egypt, Israel, Turkey, etc

Rise of Alashiya and Assyria

• during the reign of Akhenaten, Alashiya (Cyprus) and Assyria started to grow in power and played a role in the international scene
• Alashiya was the foremost exporter of raw copper to the entire Aegean and Near East
• Assyria started to rise after defeating the Mitanni a century earlier. They also inter-married with the Babylon empire
• we now have all the major players of the Late Bronze Age on stage:
  • Assyria, Alashiya (Cyprus), Hittites, Egyptians, Mitannians, Kassites/Babylonians, Canaanites, Minoans, and Mycenaeans

Nefertiti and King Tut

• Nefertiti was the wife of Akhenaten
• King Tut was the son of Akhenaten and his full sister (most likely). He assumed the throne at age 8 and died at age 18, likely natural causes. He had lots of health problems, likely due to being the product of incest
• King Tut’s tomb was discovered in the early 1900s. It was already looted like most discovered tombs, but still many artifacts were found. Likely these were gifts from the Egyptian priests because King Tut reversed his father’s “monotheism” religion and gave power back to the priests
• King Tut left a widow, his sister-queen Ankhsenamen. This is where the strange diplomatic episode of Hittite King Suppiluliuma I and the Zannanza Affair begins

Suppiluliuma and the Zannanza Affair

• Suppiluliuma’s father (Tudhaliya) led a very weak Hittite Empire, but together, father and son, they reconquered all of Anatolia and once again became a superpower
• Suppiluliuma reigned for 30 years, eventually dying of a plague brought by Egyptian prisoners of war.
  • this plague killed off much of the royal family and Hittite population
• Suppiluliuma’s son, Mursili (who became the next king) said this was the God’s vengeance for the murder of Tudhaliya the Younger, who should’ve become the next king after his father Tudhaliya died, but instead the younger son, Suppiluliuma, became king
  • it’s not clear that Suppiluliuma was involved in this murder, but he surely benefited from it
• Suppiluliuma, during his 30 year reign, launched many campaigns. Notable he sacked the capital of the Mitanni Empire and subjugated them
• Suppiluliuma was married to a Babylonian princess, and he married off his daughter to the son of the Mitanni king, who was his vessel. That said, the most interesting marriage linked to his reign was the “Zannanza Affair”, a marriage that never even happened

The Zannanza Affair

• after King Tut died, his widow sister-queen Ankhsenamen sent a letter to Suppiluliuma asking for one of his sons in marriage. This was strange because Egyptian female royalty were never allowed to marry foreigners.
• this was both in offer of marriage and a proposal to become next king of Egypt to whichever son married her
• Suppiluliuma doubted the letter and sent a messenger in person who came back to Anatolia with an envoy from Ankhsenamen herself confirming the message
• Suppiluliuma picks his fourth out of five sons to send to Egypt. His name was Zannanza It was a safe bet since he still had his suspicions
• on the way there, the caravan was attacked and Zannanza was killed. No one knows who did it, but the Egyptian throne went to a man named Ay, who married Ankhsenamen. Ay clearly benefited from Zannanza dying so maybe he planned it
• Suppiluliuma was furious over this and sent an army to attack Egyptian territory. The prisoners he brought back brought a plague with them and Suppiluliuma died along with many of his family members.

Hittites and Mycenaeans

• one anomaly we see in both Hittite lands and Myceneans lands is the lack of goods/items from each other found. We can find many Canaanite, Egyptian, and Cypriot exports in these lands, but Mycenae had very little Hittite items and vice-versa
• the likeliest reason for this was a trade embargo launched against Mycenae because of Mycenaean encouragement of anti-Hittite activity in Anatolia
  • it could also be because of an anti-Hittite treaty signed between Egypt and the Aegean.

Chapter 3. Act III - Fighting for Gods and Country: The Thirteenth Century BC

• in the 1960s a shipwreck was found off the coast of Turkey. This was called the Gelidonya wreck. The Archeologist working on it said it was a Canaanite ship heading to the Aegean for trade. This was dated at around 1200BC.
  • most experts doubted his findings, claiming that there was no contact between the Near East and the Aegean back then.
• in the 1980s, another shipwreck was found: The Uluburun Ship, dated 100 years earlier to 1300BC

The Uluburun Ship

• experts believe this ship to have originated in Egypt or Canaan on route to the Aegean
• this put the doubters in silence. We now had 2 examples of trade between the Near East and the Aegean. A third one was also found later. The Uluburun is the most important because it was the largest, wealthiest, and most excavated shipwreck of the three
• we don’t know the owner of the ship
  • it could’ve been Canaanites or Egyptians, or it could’ve been Myceneans who sent a ship to the Near East that then sank on the return voyage along with lots of Near Eastern goods
• there were items from all over the region on the ship
  • Cypriot copper
  • Afghan/Badakhshan tin and lapis lazuli
  • ebony logs from Nubia
  • raw glass from Mesopotamia
  • Canaanite storage jars
  • pottery from Cyprus and Canaan
  • scarabs from Egypt
  • swords from Greece and Italy
  • scepter-mace from the Balkans
  • a gold item from Egypt that had Nefertiti’s name on it
• the ship was dated to around 1300BC
• this ship proves that we were living in a “global age” at the time, perhaps the world first ever “global age”

Sinaranu of Ugarit

• Sinaranu was a wealthy merchant from Ugarit. He sent a ship from Syria to Crete, and back again.
• We have a clay tablet indicting the king of Ugarit exempted this ship from paying any taxes
• this dates to 1260BC
• this proves to us trade between Crete and Syria was certainly happening at this time

The Battle of Qadesh and its Aftermath

• Ugarit was a vassal of the Hittites at the time of Sinaranu’s ship
  • in the previous century, Suppiluliuma made them a vassal
  • The Hittites controlled as far south as Qadesh in southern Syria
• the Battle of Qadesh happened between the Hittites and the Egyptians
  • this is perhaps the first instance of misinformation being used as a confusion tactic in war
  • the Egyptians captured 2 POWs who intentionally gave wrong info, causing the Egyptians to fall for an ambush and almost losing the war
• eventually the war was a stalemate and they signed a peace treaty
• in addition to the treaty, Egyptian king Ramses married the daughter of the Hittite king Hattusili
• it’s likely that the Hittites and Egyptians signed the treaty because they had to turn their attention elsewhere
  • The Hittites had the Trojan War
  • The Egyptians had the Hebrew Exodus

The Trojan War

• during the Qadesh War, the Hittites were busy on a second front in western Anatolia (the Trojan War)
• the point of the Trojan War was to contain a rebellion that was being supported by the Mycenaeans
• the man who started this rebellion was named Piyamaradu. He started in the Miletus region in western Anatolia.
  • it is said he defeated a Hittite vassal king in the region then started his rebellion
• around this same time, 1280BC, Hittite king Muwattalli II signed a mutual defense treaty with the king of Wilusa, a region in northwestern Anatolia. King of Wilusa was Alaksandu.
  • scholars believe Wilusa to be the Hittite name for Troy / Troad region
  • the Greeks also called it Ilios, which used to be spelled Wilios before “W” was dropped out of the Greek alphabet
• after Muwattalli, Hattusili III (king mentioned earlier) ruled the Hittite Empire and the rebellion was still happening

The Traditional Story of the Trojan War

• King Priam ruled the city of Troy (Wilusa). He had a son named Paris (called Alexander by Homer) who sailed from Troy to mainland Greece on a diplomatic mission to visit the Spartan Mycenaean king Menelaus.
• Paris fell in love with Menelaus’s wife, Helen. Helen sailed back to Troy with Paris
  • per the Trojans, Helen went by choice
  • per the Spartans, Helen was taken by force
• Menelaus convinced his brother Agamemnon, king of Mycenae and leader of all Greeks, to go to war with Troy.
• 50k soldiers and 10 years later, Greece won and got Helen back. Troy was ransacked and most inhabitants killed.

• so is this story/war real? Did it really take place?
  • for a long time no one knew if this was a true story, then in the mid 19th century archeologists discovered the site of Troy in Turkey, or rather, they discovered multiple sites they suspected to be Troy
  • on top of that, the Wilusan king that the Hittites signed a treaty with was named Alaksandu. The Wilusan king that Sparta went to war with was named Alexander. Those names are practically identical.
  • many archaeologists believe this to be real due to the evidence
• one archaeologist, Blegen, disagreed and said Troy was destroyed not by the Myceneans but rather earthquakes
  • lots of archaeological evidence to support this
  • we see similar signs of natural destruction on sites across the Aegean
• Blegen believed another site called Troy VIIA was the likely site of Priam’s Troy. This city was destroyed in around 1180BC. Perhaps the “Sea Peoples” destroyed it rather than the Myceneans

Foreign Contacts and the Greek Mainland in the 13th Century BC

• at around 1250BC, defensive measures in Greece were taking place
  • huge fortification walls were built
  • underground tunnel system for a water source was built
  • the famous Lion Gate was built
• it makes sense these were defensive measures, but perhaps they were simply a showing-off of power and strength?
• similar architecture and measures were taking place in Hittite lands too at around the same time
  • we don’t know who influenced who, but some sort of influence certainly took place
• Mycenae took over the Minoan trade routes at around this time and trade was flourishing
• because of trading, we can see some loan words in the Greek language at the time:
  • “sesame”, in Linear B (Mycenae) we see “sasama”, which came from Ugaritic “ssmn”, Akkadian “sammassammu”, and Hurrian “sumisumi”
  • we also see lots of Egyptian and Canaanite names in these Mycenean tablets written in Linear B

The Exodus and the Israelite Conquest

• it must be noted the story of Exodus is very hard to prove or substantiate using ancient texts (other than the Bible) and the archeological record
• the Bible places the Exodus at around 1450BC, but we know this to be false. There is zero sign of Israelites in Canaan at or around that time (even throughout the 1300s we don’t see them in Canaan)
• it’s more accurate to say the Exodus happened at around 1250BC, which makes sense from a historical and archeological point of view
  • this makes sense because it takes place during Ramses II reign, who completed the Biblical cities of Pithom and Rameses
  • it corresponds to the destruction of many cities in Canaan which allows the Israelites to conquer it after their 40 year desert wandering
  • it’s before 1207BC, which is the date “Israel” is first written down outside of the Bible (Pharaoh Merneptah’s inscription where he claims to have conquered Israel)
• historical or archeological evidence for the Egyptian 10 plagues or parting of the Red Sea described in the Bible is practically non-existent, despite lots of effort to find these things
• The Bible also claims destruction of Canaanite cities when the Israelites came to conquer, but we do not see this.
  • rather, we see the destruction of Megiddo and Machish take place much later, around 1130BC
• overall, the question of whether or not the Hebrew Exodus was a myth/legend or fact is still debated today
• in reality, there could’ve been numerous ways the Israelites settled in Canaan including:
  • they took advantage of the havoc caused by the Sea Peoples to move in and control the region
  • they were part of the larger group of Canaanites and so were already living there
  • they moved in peacefully over many centuries
  • all three of these contradict the Biblical account, which would suggest the Biblical story was invented centuries later
• what we can say with certainty is that by the end of the 13th century BC (late 1200s BC), the Israelites were a distinct group in Canaan along with the Philistines and the Phoenicians, all 3 of which rose up after the destruction of the Canaanite civilization at the end of the late Bronze Age
  • the Israelites are one of the groups of people to join the “new world order”, emerging out of the “1177BC” destruction

Hittites, Assyrians, Amurru, and Ahhiyawa

• near the end of the 13the century, the Hittites were at war with the Assyrians.
  • near the beginning of that century, the Assyrians managed to extend their borders all the way to Anatolia (Hittite territory) after defeating the subjugating the Mitannians
• the Assyrian warrior king Tukulti-Ninurta I (ruled 1244-1208BC) conquered Babylon and installed a puppet king by 1225BC. Shortly after, the Elamites from Iran overthrew the puppet Babylonian king
• the Assyrians under Tukulti also defeated the Hittites under Tudhaliya IV
• all of this is to say that the Assyrians were undoubtedly a great power in the Near East at the end of the Bronze Age
• The Hittites and the Assyrians had a lot of conflict in this century
  • not just outright war, but also via diplomacy
  • the Hittites established a treaty with the Syrian king of Amurru that stated the Assyrians must be viewed as enemies, no merchants shall go to their land, and a trade embargo must be put in place against the Assyrians
• in the same treaty between Tudhaliya IV of the Hittites and the king of Amurru, Tudhaliya mentions the other kings that are on the same rank as him: king of Babylonia, Assyria, Egypt, and Ahhiyawa (Mycenae), but in the clay tablet itself the king of Ahhiyawa is crossed off
  • this indicates this tablet was a rough draft of the treaty, but most importantly it indicates that around that time the Myceneans lost power
  • furthermore, Tudhaliya’s father, Hattusili III called the king of Ahhiyawa a “Great King” and a “brother”, so the loss of power of the Myceneans must have been a recent thing
• another letter makes clear that western Anatolia was no longer under Mycenean control but rather under Hittite control. This could’ve made the Hittites view the Myceneans as a weaker empire.
• there could’ve also been another reason for the Myceneans losing power, something that happened on the Greek mainland, which will be investigated in the next chapter

The Hittite Invasion of Cyprus

• Cyprus was known in the Near East as the largest exporter of copper, an important component used to make Bronze.
• Tudhaliya IV attacked and conquered Cyprus during his reign. His son, Suppiluliuma II also conquered Cyprus.
  • we don’t know why they did it. Could’ve been to simply control copper. Or has to do with the appearance of the Sea Peoples. Or has to do with a drought impacting Hittite lands at the time.
  • it’s also unclear why Suppiluliuma had to reconquer Cyprus after his father already did.
• Suppiluliuma II reigned during the collapse of the Hittite Empire. Based on evidence from the documents dating to his time, we see growing instability, unrest, and distrust within his empire.
  • or rather the empire felt ‘unease’ due to what was soon to come

The Point Iria and Cape Gelidonya Shipwrecks

• the Point Iria shipwreck was excavated in 1993 near mainland Mycenae. It was a ship from Cyprus. Dates to 1200BC
  • this tells us that trade between Mycenae and Cyprus was still ongoing despite Hittite incursions
• at around the same time, another ship sank near where the Uluburun ship sank a century earlier. It sank near Cape Gelidonya in southwestern Turkey
  • this ship was previously thought to be Canaanite in origin, but new evidence suggests it was actually Cypriot in origin
• these shipwrecks tell us one main thing: trade was still ongoing at the end of the 13th century despite the imminent “world order” collapse

Chapter 4. Act IV - The End of an Era: The Twelfth Century BC

• this is the beginning of the end
• whereas the 13th, 14th, and 15th centuries were marked by friendly international trade, the 12th century is where we see destruction

The Discovery of Ugarit and Minet El-Beida

• Ugarit was discovered in 1929 in Syria via the discovery of a tomb in Minet El-Beida
• what was discovered was a port city on the Syrian coast. This was a thriving commercial city which was suddenly destroyed and abandoned at the beginning of the 12th century BC
• archeologists also discovered texts written in Akkadian, Hittite, Egyptian, and an unknown language
  • this unknown language was deciphered and named Ugaritic
• in the following years, many more Ugaritic texts have been found which tell us about Ugarit lifestyle, religion, myth, history, etc
  • we learned that they worshipped a pantheon including El and Baal
  • we learned that their last king was Ammurapi who ruled in the first decade of the 12th century (right before the destruction)
  • we learned that they had dynastic marriages with the Hittites and Amurru kingdoms

Economic and Commercial Connections of Ugarit and Its Merchants

• Ugarit was truly an international trading hub. They had connections with everybody in the Near East and Aegean
• Ugarit was likely a vassal of the Egyptians at first (14th century and before) then became a vassal of the Hittites after that until their destruction
• archeologists have found lots of clay tablets written in various languages inside the houses of Ugaritic merchants
  • these tablets document trade/mercantile activities
• all of this is to say that lots of mercantile activity as taking place at the beginning of the 12th century

Destructions in North Syria

• based on these discovered tablets/texts, we know that life was flourishing up until the final moment. Trade was not impacted, the sea routes were not blocked, literally no sign of danger was present
• somewhere around 1190-1185BC, Ugarit was destroyed violently and was abandoned.
  • it remained unoccupied until the Persians took it 650 years later
• the excavators of the site document that there was “evidence of destruction and fire throughout the city, including collapsed walls, burnt pise plaster, and heads of ashes” - p. 106
  • there was also lots of arrowheads found, indicating a human cause of destruction rather than an act of God
• elsewhere in the region at the same time we see similar signs of destruction as well as tablets talking about the presence of enemies. Some of these locations include:
  • Emar (inland Syria)
  • Ras Bassit (northern border of Ugarit)
  • Ras Ibn Hani (southern border of Ugarit)
  • Tell Tweini (harbor town of Gibala within the kingdom of Ugarit)
  • Tell Kazel (region of Amurru)
    • in Tell Kazel, we see signs of immigrants from the Aegean, which could indicate that the Sea Peoples destroyed various places in the Aegean prompting some people to immigrate to safer lands
• in should be noted that most experts consider the Sea Peoples to be the cause of destruction of the above sites

Destructions in Southern Canaan

• during the same period, we see lots of destruction in Canaan (south Syria, Jordan, Israel)
• most of the destruction here is attributed to earthquakes, but can be argued as having a human cause as well
• we’ll look into 2 sites that have the most evidence of destruction: Megiddo and Lachish

Megiddo

• archeologists have discovered 2 palaces that were destroyed
  • the first destroyed sometime between 1250-1200
  • the second in 1130BC
• however, another opinion states that these were the same palaces, albeit 2 story, and there was only a single destruction in 1130BC
• but is 1130BC really the correct date of the second destruction (or only destruction)?
  • there are 2 objects found that can help us date the destruction of the site.
  • the first is a ivory pen case inscribed with the name of Ramses III. This means the destruction could’ve happened at around 1177BC or later
  • the second object had the name of Ramses VI inscribed on it who ruled in 1141-1133BC.
  • based on this, scholars place the date as 1130BC
• it’s very likely the second object was placed there deliberately well after the destruction as it wasn’t found in the sealed archeological site
  • therefore the dating of 1130BC is questionable
• another opinion dates the first destruction occurred in 1177BC, which falls in line with the rest of the Near East. Likely culprits were the Sea Peoples, or possible another group like the Israelites.

Lachish

• there are also 2 destructions that took place here: Stratum VII and Stratum VI cities
• Stratum VII is thought to have been destroyed by a fire in 1200BC
• Stratum VI was built on top of Stratum VII and was bigger and more prosperous
• in Stratum VI objects of Ramses III have been found. Since he took the throne in 1184BC, that year is the earliest possible time of destruction of Stratum VI
• furthermore, the archeologist working on the excavation thought he had found a scarab of Ramses VI, which made him date the destruction even later to 1130BC, but he admitted the name was not clear (it could’ve been Ramses III)
• so just like Megiddo, we don’t know exactly when or who caused the Lachish destructions
• it’s possible it was the Sea Peoples, in which case the destruction must’ve happened earlier (1150 or earlier), it could’ve also been an earthquake as some signs in the archeological record point to that, yet we also see signs of pillaging and looting indicating human involvement. The evidence is clearly very messy…

The Philistine Pentapolis

• the Philistine Pentapolis is composed of 5 major Philistine sites: Ashkelon, Ashdod, Ekron, Gath, and Gaza
• at the end of the Bronze Age, Ekron and Ashdod were violently destroyed and a new culture seems to have replaced the old one: we see brand new pottery, bathtubs, kitchenware, architecture, etc.
  • this new culture was the Philistines. They replaced the Canaanites.
• in Ashkelon we can see a peaceful change in the culture, with the Philistines again replacing the Canaanites.
  • we’ve only excavated a limited part, so maybe the ‘violent’ areas are still hidden
• Larry Stager of Harvard said that the Philistines destroyed indigenous cities and supplanted them with their own in all territories they conquered.
• opposing evidence suggests that this idea of “violent Philistines” may actually be wrong. This is to be discussed in the next chapter.

Destructions in Mesopotamia

• much of the destruction in Mesopotamia, like in Babylon, was a result of the invading Persian Elamites, not the Sea Peoples or any other mysterious causes
• the Elamites played a minor role in the internal Bronze Age world, but they did inter-marry frequently with the Babylonians
• in 1158BC the king of Elam Shutruk-Nahhunte invaded Babylon, capturing the city, and overthrowing the Kassites. He placed his son on the Babylonian throne.
• why did the Elamites do this despite having a somewhat good relationship with the Kassites (they intermarried afterall)
  • likely it was due to the fact that the Elamites knew the Near East was undergoing a period of strain and weakness due to the Sea Peoples (or whoever else) and the Kassites would have no allies to turn to. It was “now to never”.
  • Shutruk’s son and grandson continued the military expeditions knowing full well that the powers of the Near East at that point were all destroyed or severely weakened.

Destructions in Anatolia

• the destructions throughout Anatolia at this time have classically been attributed to the Sea Peoples, albeit with little to nor evidence. In truth, the causes are very hard to discern, just like with all the previous destructions in this chapter.

Hattusa

• Hattusa was the capital of the Hittite Empire and is one of the best known cases of a destroyed city just after 1200BC
• the Sea Peoples are often blamed due to the words of Ramses III, “no land could stand before their arms, from Khatte…”.
  • the issue here is we don’t know if Khatte means Hattusa or the Hittite Empire in general
• based on Ramses statement, we place the destruction to 1190-1180BC, but we simply don’t know how accurate his statement was
• another opinion by scholars states that another enemy, the Kashka (Kaskia), who lived in northeast Anatolia, were the likely cause of destruction in Hattusa
  • they had sacked the city earlier just before the battle of Qadesh
  • it makes more sense than the Sea Peoples theory because Hattusa is very far away from the sea on either side. Did the Sea Peoples really walk all that distance and destroy a city with massive fortifications?
• based on the archeological record, we know that only public buildings were destroyed like palaces and temples. These places were emptied out then burned, rather than looted.
  • the domestic areas of the city show no sign of destruction
  • one scholar suggests that the city was destroyed after it was already abandoned
• there are 3 other cities destroyed at around the same time near Hattusa: Alaca Hoyuk, Alishar, and Masat Hoyuk
  • all were destroyed by fire just like Hattusa
• Mersin, Tarsus, and Karaoglan in Anatolia were all destroyed too.
• we don’t know exactly who caused these various destructions. Could’ve been Sea Peoples, Kashka, or someone else.
• sites further west in Anatolia were largely untouched from destruction
• overall, most cities in Anatolia seemed to have been simply abandoned rather than destroyed

Troy

• the one site in the west destroyed by fire was Troy
• the destruction dates to 1190-1180BC
• the city was original destroyed in an earthquake in the 1300s BC, but was rebuilt later
• most scholars are of the opinion that the final destruction was as a result of war as we found arrowheads embedded inside walls
• bodies have also been found. Some showing signs of burns.
• Overall it seems as though Troy was under siege and eventually lost
• due to the date, we cannot say the Myceneans were the cause, i.e. this was not the Trojan War as told by Homer. As the Myceneans were busy being attacked on their homeland, unless the reason they were being attacked was because their warriors were busy attacking Troy?
• it’s likely the Sea Peoples were responsible for this as Ramses III’s statement also confirms this

Destruction on the Greek Mainland

• at around the same time, the Greek mainland was also under attack
• there’s consensus that around 1225-1190BC the Greek mainland suffered destruction at many sites including Mycenae, Tiryns, Midea, Pylos, and Thebes
• some other cities were abandoned without destruction like Argolid and Corinthia
• a lot of this destruction was caused by fire
• some scholars believe that the destruction was not sudden, but rather was a result of slow collapse starting in 1250BC

Pylos

• the destruction of the palace dates to 1180BC and was caused undoubtedly by fire as the fire damage in the archeological record is very apparent. Shortly after, the city was abandoned
• some tablets were found written in Linear B stating that there were “watchers of the sea” in place during the final years of the city. Could the guards of the city have been watching out for the Sea Peoples?
  • it’s unclear what “watchers of the sea” means. We simply don’t have the evidence
• we can’t say for certain if the destruction was a result of humans or nature. It could’ve been climate change as we shall see below

Mycenae

• Mycenae suffered destruction due to earthquake in 1250BC
• they suffered a second destruction in 1190BC, effectively ending them as a major power
• the destruction was… fire. As we’ve seen in many destructions previously.
• evidence indicates that Mycenae had a gradual decline. Even after the fire people still lived in the city. But overtime is declined. An invasion or other dramatic event likely did NOT take place here.

Tiryns

• destruction in this city date to 1200BC, likely was an earthquake
• the city was not fully destroyed and continued to be inhabited for a few more decades, with some parts being rebuilt

Destruction in Cyprus

• the Sea Peoples were long to blame for the disruptions on Cyprus around 1200BC
• one expert, Karageorghis, says that refugees from Mycenae came into Cyprus after their empire back on Greece collapsed. They reached Cyprus around 1225BC.
  • he says these Myceneans caused the destruction of various Cypriot sites
• Myceneans also built their own military outpost on the western coast near the end of the 13th century
  • this was then destroyed by a second influx of settlers from the Aegean around 1190BC who established permanent residency on Cyprus
• in reality, there is no way to determine who caused the destructions in 1225 or 1190BC
• it’s possible that the Hittites caused the destruction in 1225BC as we see letters stating that from the Hittites themselves
• new evidence shows that there was no destruction in 1225BC, but rather it dates to 1190-1174BC
  • another Hittite attacked took place under Suppiluliuma II who reigned starting in 1207BC
  • this evidence was accepted by Karageorghis who revised his original theory
• there is some evidence of earthquakes happening at these sites
• new evidence also shows that there was no destruction, but rather the city was abandoned sometime between 1190 and 1170
• furthermore, the original idea of Karageorghis that the Myceneans came and colonized is unfounded. The culture that arose in Cyprus was a mix of Levantine, Cypriot, and Aegean. We simply do not see Mycenean dominance in any aspect of culture.
• one site in the area, Hala Sultan Tekke, does show clear signs of war, but we don’t know who.
• to sum up, we know there was no destruction before 1200BC, but we also do not know who did the destruction after that.
  • Regardless, Cyprus survived all this and was flourishing in the 12th and 11th centuries

Fighting in Egypt and the Harem Conspiracy

• the Egyptians defeated the first wave of Sea Peoples in 1207BC
• things took a turn for the worst during Ramses III’s reign starting in 1184BC
  • he fought against the Libyans in 1179 and 1173BC
  • he fought against the Sea Peoples in 1176BC
  • in 1155BC, he was assassinated
• the assassination was known as the Harem Conspiracy
• a minor queen in Ramses harem wanted her son to succeed Ramses, so she was accused of assassinating Ramses. She along with her son were executed along with many other officials.
• later analysis proves that Ramses throat was slashed and a white garment was placed on his throat to hide the wound as he was being mummified
• Ramses III’s son, the one who was involved with the conspiracy, was also found with Ramses body, although his body was improperly mummified, further proving his status as a guilty prince
• with Ramses III’s death, the Egyptian New Kingdom forever lost its power and the 20th dynasty would end in 1070BC, with none of the following pharaohs ever accomplishing anything great

Ramses III mummy. The white garment is clearly visible.

Summation

• it’s clear that there was widespread destruction
• what is not clear is who did it
• following the destructions, we see a specific pottery style named Mycenean IIIC1b found all over the Near East. This pottery, although named Mycenean, was made in Cyprus and the eastern Mediterranean
• overall, putting all the blame on the Sea Peoples is simply wrong. There were many causes of the destruction, ranging from natural earthquakes and wars caused by other people
  • the Sea Peoples could’ve also been victims, as we shall see in the next chapter

Chapter 5: A “Perfect Storm” of Calamities?

• although most scholars attributed the Bronze Age collapse to the Sea Peoples, there is by no means a consensus on the matter
• we’re going to discuss each hypothesis one by one

Earthquakes

• distinguishing between destruction via earthquakes vs warfare is relatively easy using archeology
  • signs of earthquakes include crushed skeletons, reinforced walls, collapsed walls, bodies found under debris, walls leaning at impossible angles, etc
  • signs of warfare include weapons and arrowheads scattered around the site including lodged into walls
• from 1225 to 1175BC there is strong evidence of earthquakes impacting the Aegean and the Near East
  • in the Aegean we see Mycenae, Thebes, Pylos, Kynos, etc, all impacted
  • in the Near East we see Hattusa, Ugarit, Ashdod, Akko, Enkomi (Cyprus), etc
• many of these sites were reoccupied and rebuilt after the earthquakes impacting them, therefore earthquakes was not the sole cause of the Bronze Age collapse
  • many cities never regained their strength after the earthquake, but they also didn’t totally collapse
• therefore, all though earthquakes contributed to the weakening of the Bronze Age civilizations, it didn’t cause a total international collapse that we see in the 12th century

Internal Rebellion

• rebellion can start out of the poverty that natural disasters (like earthquakes, famine, etc) bring
  • often these things impact the poor/peasant class
• some experts believe the destruction in Hazor in Canaan was due to rebellion
  • this is because we simply do not see signs of external warfare nor natural disasters
  • at the same time, the evidence for rebellion is scarce
• overall, based on archeology, it’s very hard to tell if a certain destruction was caused by rebellion. There are simply no clear signs, unlike earthquakes or warfare
• due to lack of evidence, this was likely not a cause for the Bronze Age collapse

(Possible) Invaders and the Collapse of International Trade

• the Bronze Age world heavily relied on international trade. Things like copper, tin, gold, glass, wood, was all traded and entire kingdoms relied on the trade system
• a disruption to this trade, potentially by a foreign invader, could’ve easily caused kingdoms to collapse
• the question is, who could those invaders be? The Sea Peoples?
• we have documents from Ugarit telling us that they were attacked by maritime invaders
• Ugarit especially was heavily dependent on the international trade, so some experts believe that the collapse of the international trade could’ve caused the total collapse of the Ugarit Kingdom
  • this applies to the entire eastern Mediterranean, who were all very dependent on the international trade system and were most attractive to invaders
• we have clay tablets from Ugarit telling us of “enemy ships”. These ships would’ve been threatening the international trade that Ugarit was so dependent on
  • letters from Cyprus claim that these enemy ships were actually Ugarit people themselves!
• soon after, Ugarit was completely destroyed by warfare and fire. It was never reoccupied.
  • some say that the collapse of the international trade system is what caused Ugarit to truly be destroyed and explains why it was never reinhabited.
• but did the collapse of trade cause Ugarit’s collapse? Probably not
  • we have evidence indicating that trade was still going strong up until the VERY END of the kingdom of Ugarit. This means that the destruction was sudden and not a gradual decline. If it was the collapse of trade, we would’ve saw a gradual decline in the kingdom.
  • therefore Ugarit was likely destroyed due to warfare from the enemy ships / maritime peoples.

Decentralization and the Rise of the Private Merchant

• the Bronze Age economy was very centralized. Large empires controlled all the trade. It was in the hands of the government.
• The succeeding Iron Age became more decentralized. Entrepreneurship rose, and smaller city-states emerged in place of large empires
• some have posited that the collapse of the Bronze Age was the result of decentralization and that the Sea Peoples represented the introduction of a new economic paradigm: that of decentralization
• although this hypothesis holds some merit, it’s inaccurate to say that this caused the collapse of the Bronze Age. We have very clear evidence of war, fires, etc, causing various Bronze Age cities to fall.
• what we can say is that out of the chaos of the Bronze Age collapse, the new paradigm of decentralization was allowed to come in and take over
  • “out of chaos comes opportunity” - p. 143

Was it the Sea Peoples and Where Did They Go?

• it should be noted that the Sea Peoples also travelled by land
• a Ugaritic letter mentions the Shikila people, who can be identified with the Shekelesh people found in the Egyptian writings
  • the Shikila are mentioned as “living on ships”
  • this is regarded as the only mention of the Sea Peoples by name other than the Egyptian records. All other mention of them just say “enemy ships”
• overall, the Sea Peoples are often blamed for the various destructions, but this is an over-simplified way of looking at things
  • example: we know that most of the Hittite/Anatolian cities were destroyed due to internal factors rather than external
• lots of the attribution to Sea Peoples are mere guesses
  • an important point to note is that we cannot assume that the people who inhabited a destroyed site were the same people who destroyed it
  • ex: peoples A destroyed X city. Then X was abandoned. Then peoples B came in and inhabited it. This is entirely possible.
• the Sea Peoples are commonly thought to have settled down along the Levantine coastal cities. The migration of these people was a long process, starting in 1207BC lasting until possible 1130BC
  • they then settled in Philistia and established major centers at Ashdod, Ashkelon, etc.
  • These are the people the Bible calls the Philistines
  • they can be identified with their Aegean-derived cultural features
• so were these Philistines/Sea Peoples just Mycenaeans who fled their region?
  • likely not. We don’t see any Linear B tablets or any other Mycenean signs in the Levant where these people settled.
  • likely these people were from the more humbler culture, maybe farmers, that came shortly after the wealthy Mycenean culture
• so did they destroy the cities of the Levant?
  • they were people looking for a new home, who were opportunists and took advantage of the chaos of the Bronze Age collapse, they didn’t cause the destruction
  • we have evidence of inter-marriage and cultural mixing
  • we also don’t see much violence in the Philistine cities
  • these people had mixed Canaanite and Aegean cultural elements
  • furthermore, we have DNA evidence of some infants who died there. Their DNA shows about 25-50% southern European DNA (likely from Crete, or potentially Sardinia or Spain), with the rest being Canaanite
  • this DNA evidence shows us these kids were direct descendants of the Philistine migrants who mated with the local Canaanites
• so to sum up:
  • Philistines/Sea Peoples were likely a group of Aegean peoples who were primarily refugees
  • they were likely not “violent invaders”, or at least not entirely
  • they mixed with the local Canaanite population and their children were basically 50% Greek and 50% Canaanite
  • they likely did NOT cause the collapse of the Bronze Age civilization, at least not all by themselves

Disease

• Ramses V ruled in 1140BC. His and most of his family died of smallpox
  • the ones who buried them were given a month’s leave at the expense of the Pharaoh. Additionally, the burial site (Valley of Kings) were closed off from visitors for 6 months
  • this might be the world’s first textually attested quarantine
• as mentioned earlier, the Hittites had a disease outbreak in the 14th century, killing King Suppiluliuma and many in his family
  • the evacuation of Hattusa in 1200BC could’ve been a second outbreak of the disease per some scholars, but evidence is lacking
• overall, there isn’t evidence of widespread epidemics causing the Bronze Age collapse

Climate Change, Drought, and Famine

• one hypothesis states that droughts in northern Europe may have caused people to migrate south and east, causing those people to then move elsewhere too
• there was one drought in northern Italy where we have evidence of a massive exodus of the population into southern Italy, Sicily, and the Aegean
  • this would’ve caused the Aegean people to then migrate into the Near East
• once archaeologist in the 60s said that the Mycenean civilization collapsed because of a long drought. He based this on the fact that the population dropped massively around the end of the Bronze Age
• famine is hard to prove via archeological evidence, but we can look at textual evidence. We have lots of tablets and letters of correspondence between Bronze Age kings talking about famine
  • in many cases the Hittites are requesting grain from the Egyptians and Ugarits
  • the various Ugarit cities also had famine and were requesting help from others.
  • many of these famines were occurring near the end of the Bronze Age
• from all the evidence gathered so far, we can see that Ugarit was hit by many calamities near the end of the Bronze Age, including quakes, famine, drought, invaders, etc.
• Rough timeline of the final decades of the Ugarit Kingdom:
  1. thriving international trade with other kingdoms
  2. earthquakes damage many cities, but does not cause total destruction
  3. Ugarit sends grain to help the Hittites
  4. famine descends on Ugarit
  5. Egypt sends aid to Ugarit
  6. Enemy ships are spotted
  7. Enemy overruns Ras Ibn Hani and threatens Ugarit
  8. Ugarit is destroyed in battle. It is not reoccupied for centuries
• we don’t know why this climate change / drought happened, but it turned a thriving land into a semidesert
• so far this was just archeological evidence. We now have new evidence coming from research investigating ancient pollen, isotopic signatures in lakes, and oxygen isotope from stalagmites and mineral deposits, all in the Near East and the Aegean
  • this evidence shows with a high level of certainty that there was a drought in the region lasting 150-300 years starting in 1200BC. Rather, it was a “megadrought”, since it impacted a large region and lasted a long time
  • this megadrought is called the “3.2 ka BP event” in scientific literature
    • ka = kilo-annum
    • BP = before present
  • deep-dive into the evidence of these pollen and other studies on pages 158 - 162. There are too many technical details so I did not summarize any of it except for what is above.
• there is debate on what caused the drought
  • theories range from volcano eruption, minimal solar output, increase in ice-rafted debris, and so on
• to sum up: famine and drought was likely the PRIMARY CAUSE of the Bronze Age collapse, but NOT the TOTAL cause
  • i.e. famine and drought caused people to starve, which cased people to rebel (internal rebellions discussed above in many places), which also caused people to attack other kingdoms and cities (external attacks), which overall created international security problems
• we can see a parallel in our times: in 2011 Syria, the country was hit by a drought causing farmers to rise up, which added fuel to the already burning flame of the “Arab Spring”, which finally blew up in Spring 2011.
  • the drought didn’t cause it, but it added fuel to the fire
• no single factor could’ve caused the Bronze Age collapse alone. Rather it was a multitude of factors. Each factor only made the others worse.
  • this is the “multiplier effect”
  • prolonged drought + famine exacerbated the other stressors (war, rebellion, etc)
  • a society can recover from a 10 year drought, but a 300 year drought? The people are not even given any time to recover. Whole generations come and go in that time. By the time the drought is over, the original civilization may not even exist
• there was also the “domino effect”, a disruption in one part of the interconnected system causes a disruption elsewhere
  • we must remember society was global back then, every kingdom in the Aegean and the Near East relied on the international trade system. Once that collapsed, they were all impacted.
  • it was a “perfect storm of calamities”
• all that said, the flourishing cultures and peoples of the Bronze Age - the Myceneans, Minoans, Hittites, Assyrians. Kassites/Babylonians, Cypriots, Mitannians, Canaanites, and Egyptians - simply could not survive the weight of so many different stressors all at the same time

Chapter 6: Sea Peoples, Systems Collapse, and Complexity Theory

• Colin Renfrew of Cambridge University talked about the Bronze Age collapse in terms of catastrophe theory: “the failure of a minor element started a chain reaction that reverberated on a greater and greater scale, until finally the whole structure was brought to collapse” - p. 167
• Renfrew says that the Bronze Age collapse was a systematic failure, that involved both a domino and a multiplier effect, that even such a globalized society such as the Bronze Age could not recover
• there are 4 general features of systems collapse according to Renfrew
  1. collapse of the central administrative organization
  2. disappearance of the traditional elite class
  3. collapse of the centralized economy
  4. settlement shift and population decline
  • furthermore:
    • it could take centuries for all 4 items to manifest
    • there is no single, obvious cause of the collapse
    • in the aftermath, there would be the transition to a lower level of sociopolitical integration
    • development of “romantic” Dark Age myths about the previous period
• this concept as outlined by Renfrew perfectly matches the Bronze Age collapse in the Near East/Aegean, but it can also be applied to the collapse of the Maya, Old Kingdom Egypt, and the Indus Valley Civilization
  • an example of a “myth” or story would be Homer’s Trojan War
• so why 1177BC?
  • it was the year of the second invasion of the Sea Peoples against Egypt
  • it’s just a convenient date. Similar to how we say 476 AD was the year of the end of the western Roman Empire
• “Collapse is fundamentally a sudden, pronounced loss of an established level of sociopolitical complexity” - p. 169-170, Joseph Tainter. This quote was mentioned at the very beginning of the book too.
• ‘transition’ has also been mentioned before. Collapse and transition are two sides of the same coin.
  • some empires fell and never came back, such as the Myceneans and Minoans. They were replaced by an entirely different civilization
  • some empires fell, but came back centuries later in some form, such as the Neo-Hittite city-states in northern Syria and Neo-Assyrian Empire
  • some empires adapted, like the Cypriots and Egyptians
  • some empires were replaced by small city-states, like the Canaanites, who were replaced by the small Iron Age kingdoms/city-states of the Israelites, Aramaeans, Philistines, etc
  • therefore, many empires collapsed and many ‘transitioned’ into something else, often a smaller state

A Review of Possibilities and Complexity Theory

• debate around the Bronze Age collapse still wage on today. There is no consensus on the matter
• the problem that has been discussed throughout the book can be summarized as follows:
  1. we had many civilizations flourishing in the 15th-13th centuries BC in the Aegean and Near East who were all independent yet consistently interacted via trade
  2. it’s clear many cities were destroyed and civilization in the entire region came to an end around 1177BC
  3. there is no clear proof as to who or what caused these disasters which caused the Bronze Age collapse
• there are lots of possibilities that could’ve contributed to the collapse, but none on their own could’ve done so. The following is a summary of these causes:
  1. invaders from the Aegean, western Anatolia, or Cyprus (or all of them), came in and destroyed various Levantine cities. Some were reinhabited while others not.
  2. earthquakes, but most societies can recover from these. It usually doesn’t cause total collapse
  3. famine and drought, but again most societies can recover from these. It usually doesn’t cause total collapse
  4. internal rebellion, but the evidence of this even happening is not conclusive. Again, most societies can recover from internal revolt.
  5. international trade routes cut off or severely impacted, but the evidence is unclear on how widespread or how impactful this truly was for the various kingdoms who relied on international trade
• as mentioned, the likely scenario was a systems collapse caused by a series of events linked together via a multiplier effect, each factor amplifying other factors. Earthquake alone is nothing, but earthquake while dealing with drought, then being invaded is not something you can easily recover from
  • then, the domino effect ensued: the collapse of one civilization would lead to collapse of others given how globalized the world was at the time
• even “systems collapse” as described above may be too simplistic of an answer. We must take a look at “complexity theory” as a way to further understand the Bronze Age collapse
• complexity theory = the study of a complex system or systems, with the goal of explaining the phenomena which emerge from a collection of interacting objects
  • complexity theory is used to solve problems ranging from traffic jams, stock market crashes, illnesses like cancer, wars, etc
• the system that involves a “collection of interacting objects” in this case would be the various civilizations during the Bronze Age
• the ‘system’ is also usually “alive”, meaning it evolves in a nontrivial and complicated way
• the ‘system’ is also ‘open’ meaning it can be influenced by its environments (like the stock market)
  • during the Bronze Age, an event that happened in one kingdom often impacted regions thousands of miles away, i.e. it was an ‘open’ system
  • these factors are things like earthquakes, famine, invaders, trade routes being cut, rebellions, etc
• the ‘system’ must also exhibit phenomena that are “surprising and may be extreme… anything can happen and if you wait long enough, it generally will”
  • every civilization eventually experiences collapse, typically for similar reasons too
  • that said, even for the Bronze Age collapse, it would’ve been difficult to predict this or to predict they would all collapse around the same time, even with full knowledge of each civilization
  • as an analogy, knowing the make and model of every car on the road is useless to predict traffic jams
• furthermore, as the interaction between objects increases, and the degree of interdependence increases, keeping the entire system stable is difficult because changes in one part can destabilize the entire system
  • so if the Bronze Age world truly was as interconnected as the evidence suggests, then changes such as the Hittites having internal rebellion can severely destabilize the entire system and cause other kingdoms to also suffer
• The Bronze Age collapse was not a blazing apocalypse, although in some places like Ugarit it may have been, it’s better to view the Bronze Age collapse as a gradual disintegration of areas that were once in contact with each other
  • some places like Mycenae would’ve become isolated and diminished, which would’ve amplified whatever problems they were already facing like drought
• it’s similar to what the world faced with Covid-19
  • an outbreak in a city in China led the whole world to shutdown. 30 million people in the US filed for unemployment (the most since the Great Depression) because of being let go from their jobs. The entire economy basically came to a halt.
• overall, the way to explain the Bronze Age Collapse is by employing complexity theory, which takes catastrophe theory and systems collapse one step further
• it’s important to note that we still do NOT know all the variables that could’ve contributed to the Bronze Age collapse
  • it happened 3000+ years ago. The only variables we know of are things that can survive for that time, things in the archeological record, etc.
  • it’s possible there were literally 100+ variables that contributed to the collapse of the Bronze Age
  • furthermore, we don’t know which variables were the critical ones
• the issue with using complexity theory to explain the Bronze Age collapse is that we simply don’t know all the details right now. We don’t know everything about the Bronze Age civilizations, the evidence is 3000+ years old, etc. There’s a lot of unknowns.
  • the complexity theory states that the collapse of the system cannot be predicted even with full knowledge of the details. We’re lacking full knowledge currently.
• that said, the complexity theory is still a good enough framework to understand the Bronze Age collapse
• as mentioned there are lots of unknowns
  • did the Bronze Age civilizations know a collapse was coming?
  • did they make any large efforts to prevent it (besides sending grain to each other)?
  • did the sages warn the leaders? Did the leaders ignore them?
• better understanding the Bronze Age collapse will help us understand our current times, especially as we face more and more Covid-19 level events

Epilogue: The Aftermath

• the world simply never recovered. Many cities that were once flourishing never again became inhabited, at least not for several centuries, or even an entire millennia (as in the case of Pylos, Greece)
• the fall of the Bronze Age and the start of the Iron Age had these defining traits:
  • a significantly reduced population
  • smaller city-states / smaller kingdoms
  • the extinction of cuneiform writing
  • a significant decline in international relationships and trade (globalization was no more)
• history in a gist is just the rise and fall of civilizations and empires.
  • an empire rises, then it falls, and a new empire(s) takes its place. Rinse and repeat.
• the US financial crisis of 2008 can be compared to the Bronze Age collapse in some ways
  • as the president of the World Bank said, “the global financial system may have reached a tipping point”
  • we live in a complex world. Which also means it can become destabilized very quickly.
• the current crises in the middle east can also be compared to the Bronze Age collapse
  • internal rebellion, refugee crisis, etc, all of this happened during the Bronze Age too leading up to the collapse

What If?

• what if the Bronze Age never came to an end? What if civilization continued and technological advancements continued to be made?
• We’ll never know how the world would be today if that were the case
• the reality is that the world did come to an end as a result of the Bronze Age collapse. We essentially had to start from scratch in terms of development and innovation. But it wasn’t all that bad, out of the chaos the world came up with fresh innovations like the alphabet, monotheism, and democracy
• at the end of the day, we must recognize that the world today also has a plethora of problems. Covid-19, climate change, civil wars, outright war, etc. These are the same factors that destroyed civilization in the past. If we don’t tread carefully, we may experience the same fate

Main Idea of the Book

This book is about the Bronze Age collapse. It investigates why and how it collapsed. Although this is a still unsolved problem, the book goes in depth into all the possible factors that could’ve caused the collapse. The book also highlights in various parts, how this is all relevant to us in modern times.