Did anyone benefit from the Afro-Eurasian Bronze Age Collapse?

The Procession of the Trojan Horse in Troy by Giovanni Domenico Tiepolo c. 1760 CE

Yes, the ancient Northwestern Semitic people of the Levant including Canaanites, Assyrians and Arameans benefitted from the Bronze Age Collapse.

Also, Nilotic peoples like the Nubians and Cushitic people to the south of Egypt, especially in places like Kerma, Napata and Meroe benefitted from Egypt’s power vacuum at the beginning of the Third Intermediate Period when Egypt was split between Upper Egypt led by the High Priest of Amun at Thebes and Lower Egypt led by Pharaoh Smendes.

Along with the Nubians and Cushites, the ancient Southern Europeans like the Mycenaeans, Etruscans, Thracians, Phrygians and Illyrians benefited from the power vacuum left by the Hittites in Anatolia.

On top of all of that, there were the Libyans, including the Meshwesh, who profited by hiring, aiding and accompanying many of the Sea Peoples during their invasions and conquests.

(Above) A 2005 photograph of silver and gold inlay found on a Mycenaean bronze dagger portraying a lion hunt scene c. 16th century BCE. The dagger was found in Athens, Greece and is currently housed at the National Historical Museum in Athens. Although the Bronze Age Collapse was an armageddon for the Mycenaeans, their Greek descendants after them did manage to establish footholds, trading posts and colonies in Anatolia, Illyria, Cyprus, Southern Italy, the Iberian Peninsula and Crete as well as establish strong ties with Egypt, Libya and Canaan.

As the Thutmosid dynasty ended and Pharaoh Horemheb adopted the Ramesid line as his successors to the throne, the Eastern Mediterranean, West Asian, North African and Southeastern European region boiled over. This furor continued until the Battle of Kadesh in 1274 BCE, just outside of the modern day borders of The Republic of Lebanon. The battle ended in a stalemate. Both the Egyptian King Rameses II and the Hittite King Ḫattušili III signed a peace treaty in the aftermath of the Battle.

(Above) A replica of the Hittite version of the Eternal Treaty, also known as the Egyptian-Hittite Kadesh Peace Treaty between kings Ḫattušili III and Rameses II. The treaty was duplicated in 1970 by Şadi Çalık, a Turkish sculptor and lecturer at the Istanbul College of Fine Arts. The original was found in central Anatolia in 1906. The replica was gifted by Istanbul College on behalf of Turkey to the United Nations and is housed in its Conference Building. The Original is housed at the Archaeological Museum in Istanbul.¹

It was after this period, from the death of King Rameses II in 1213 BCE to about 1155 BCE at the assassination of King Rameses III, that the ancient Mediterranean World was to collapse into ruin.

(Above) A photograph from the University of Chicago’s Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures’ archives taken at the Great North Wall of the Great Hall of the Great Temple at Abu Simbel. The relief c. 1264 BCE – 1244 BCE portrays the Levantine city of Kadesh under the rule of the Hittites being used as a garrison for Hittite soldiers.²

Starting with the Battle of Kadesh in 1276 BCE, the Poem of Pentaur, from the Kadesh hieroglyphic Inscriptions in Karnak, Egypt, describe that a people called the Sherden who could possibly be tied to Nuragic Sardinians, were the bodyguards of Pharaoh Rameses II. According to the poem, the Sherden were quote unquote “under his (Rameses’) captivity”. Rameses brought the Sherden together to devise his master strategies for the ensuing battle.

(Above) Another photograph from the University of Chicago’s Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures’ archives. It shows the Lower Row of the Great North Wall of the Great Temple at Abu Simbel. The relief, c. 1257 BCE, portrays the the Egyptian Pharaoh, King Rameses II, presiding over the Egyptian Council of War regarding the Battle of Kadesh. Notice the retinue of Sherden bodyguards under Rameses, wearing horned, seemingly Nuragic helmets with a circular or bulblike protrusion in the middle, wielding long swords and circular shields among other foreign and native bodyguards as Shasu spies are routed out and beaten with batons off to the side.³

Fighting on the Hittite side were men from Karkisha, possibly linked in Classical Greek times to the Carians or people of Caria in Western Anatolia.

The Carians were a Luwian people, aboriginal to Southwestern Anatolia centering on the ancient Carian city of Halicarnassus. The picture above is the profile of a statue found at the Great Mausoleum of Halicarnassus c. 350 BCE. It is housed at the British Museum in London, UK.⁴ The statue was unearthed in 1857 at the grounds of the mausoleum in Bodrum, Ottoman Turkey by British archeologist, Sir Charles Thomas Newton. It supposedly portrays Mausolus, the great Satrap of Carian descent from the Achaemenid Satrapy of Caria. His Mausoleum was one of the Seven Wonders of the Classical Hellenic World. Even the term “Mausoleum”, meaning burial monument, or place where corpses are kept, comes etymologically from the satrap’s name Mausolus. The statue is unmarked and could also just as likely be identified as a family member of Mausolus.

Another group allied with the Hittites in this war were the Lukka or Lycians as they were later known by Classical Greece.

(Above) A late 6th century BCE fresco of a Lycian soldier atop a chariot, reminiscent of a Greek hoplite, from the Elmali Tomb found in modern day Kızılbel located in Muğla Province in the southwestern corner of the Republic of Turkey. The Lycians, similar to the Carians, were a Luwian speaking people. Yet, according to Herodotus’ Histories (I, 173, s. 1 – 5), the Lycians were originally seafaring invaders, exiled from their native island of Crete by King Minos during the fabled Fall of Troy, which, if it is a real event, took place during the Bronze Age Collapse. The Lycians referred to themselves as the Trimili. They fought on the losing Trojan side of the War as mercenaries and eventually settled in southeastern Anatolia, in a place called Milyas. There they may have adopted a Luwian dialect. Interestingly, they were a matrilineal society, which was very rare in ancient Greece and Anatolia.

These peoples, seemingly far-flung from the Egyptian perspective, continued to show up in Pharaonic inscriptions. Again, in 1200 BCE, the Pharaoh Merneptah chiseled his narrative into stone and left us The Great Karnak Inscription.

(Above) A copied portion (Lines 1 -20) of the Great Karnak inscription from Volume 2 (Tome II) of the book Karnak, Étude Topographique Et Archéologique, published in 1875 by French Archaeologist François Auguste Mariette.

In it, a whole host of groups are described. This included the Eqwesh, possibly referring to the Achaean Greeks as well as the Shekelesh who could be Sicilians based on similarities in name and the fact that many Shekelesh were hired as mercenaries in the Western Mediterranean by Libyans. Moreover, the Shekelesh were also mentioned by the Hittite King Suppiliuliuma in his correspondence with the Canaanite Kingdom of Ugarit. (letter RS 34.129)

(Above) The Triumphal Relief of Shoshenq I at Karnak c. 945 BCE. This relief portrays the great Meshwesh Libyan chief Shoshenq I as he ascends the throne in Egypt wearing the two feathered Shuti crown. He drags his defeated enemies as prisoners behind and below him. Shoshenq’s ascension was in the aftermath of the sonless death of his predecessor Psusennes II. Ultimately, Shoshenq became the first Libyan King/Pharaoh of Egypt in History.

Also mentioned are the Teresh who probably were non-Greek Etruscan, Raetian and Lemnian pirates from what would later be known as the Italian Peninsula.

(Above) A fresco from the Tomb of the Shields c. 325 BCE, located in Tarquinia in what is today Lazio Viterbo in the Italian Republic. This fresco, like many others in the tomb, portray the domestic lives of the Etruscan Velcha family, particularly the builder of the tomb Larth Velcha. The fresco above shows Larth’s father Velthur Velcha with his wife, Larth’s mother Ravnthu Arpthnai mourning the death of their son Larth Velcha.

Similarly, by King Rameses III’s time, he also wrote in his narratives in Medinet Habu of these peoples including the Denyen, the Peleset possibly related to the Philistines, the Shekelesh, the Sherden, the Tjekker and the Weshesh. These people groups began migrating in waves starting around 1450 BCE.

(Above) Side A of a Greek Attic red-figure kylix by the Brygos Painter c. 490 BCE. It portrays the Iliupersis (Greek: Ἰλίου πέρσις) known in English as The Sack of Troy. Found in Vulci, Italy and currently housed at the Louvre in Paris, France.

Large numbers of them looked to colonize parts of the Eastern Mediterranean. The Philistines took Gaza and Ashkelon and later took Gath, Ekron and Ashdod from the native Semites. The Shekelesh, with the help of others, sacked and destroyed Ugarit and captured the city of Dor. The Denyen captured Jaffa for a time until being absorbed into the Semitic Hebrew culture that was developing in the area.

(Above) A relief from Ramses III’s Mortuary Temple in Medinet Habu c. 1186 BCE – 1155 BCE. It shows the defeated and fettered Peleset being marched away as prisoners of war by the Egyptians. It is explained in the Great Harris Papyrus, also known as Papyrus Harris I, that the Peleset, along with the Shardana, Wehesh and Tjekker were taken as captives and settled in Southern Canaan where they had attempted and failed to invade Egypt.⁵

It is uncertain why there were such great migration events in the Mediterranean during this time. Nevertheless, the Sea Peoples and others entering the fray left a trail of destruction for all polities. Mycenaean Greece collapsed and so did the Minoan civilization on the island of Crete. The Hittite Empire broke apart into decentralized Aramean-Hittite hybrid states in what is today Alexandretta. Egypt would retain its power domestically, but lose all of its international strength and its holdings in Canaan, as witnessed in the Report of Wenamun.

(Above) A map of the travels of Wenamun. Wenamun was, according to his report, a high priest of Amun at Karnak. He was tasked by the high priest of Amun Herihor at Thebes to travel to Byblos, the classical vassal of the Egyptians, and ask for tribute in the form of Cedar wood, as lumber was needed to build a ship to carry the effigy of Amun. He first landed in the Canaanite city state of Dor, ruled by the Tjekker King Beder. While there, Wenamun was robbed. He then fled to Tyre. From Tyre, Wenamun finally makes it to Byblos. He noticed that, upon arrival, the people were hostile to him. He is granted audience with the King of Byblos, Zakar-Baal. Wenamun asks the King for the free tribute of cedar wood. Zakar-Baal says he will give Wenamun cedar wood if he pays for it. He then spends a year in Byblos awaiting funds to arrive from the Pharaoh and ultimately sails back to Egypt with nothing. He is blown off course in the interim and lands in Cyprus where he is nearly killed by an angry mob.

Along with the destabilization brought on by the Sea Peoples came natural disasters, like the theorized great earthquake swarm from 1225 BCE to 1175 BCE. During that period, one category 6.5 to 6.9 earthquake in the region would trigger sets of other large earthquakes.

There were also plagues similar to the disease spreading from Egypt in 1324 BCE known as the “Hittite Plague” or medically as Francisella Tularensis. This disease causes skin ulcers, swollen and painful lymph glands, inflamed eyes, sore throat, mouth sores, diarrhea and pneumonia. The plague stretched across the Arwad-Euphrates trading route and devastatingly affected parts of Southeastern Europe and the Middle East. On top of the plague, there was also a mega drought from 1250 BCE to 1100 BCE and famines that wreaked havoc and destruction.

For the most part, it was the newly liberated Canaan that would benefit instantaneously from this upheaval. Lebanese cities, for example, from the time of the earliest recorded King of Tyre, Abi-Malki (technically a prince and Egyptian vassal r. 1347 BCE), had been warring with certain groups of Sea Peoples like the Denyen and had made an alliance with them. This eased tensions for Tyre and Sidon and opened a bridge to establish trading routes with the Western Mediterranean.

(Above) A Punic Sardonic mask found at a gravesite in San Sperate, Sardinia. It dates to the 4th century BCE and is housed at the National Archeological Museum in Caligari in modern Sardinia in the Italian Republic. This mask style became a major symbol of Phoenician culture in the Western Mediterranean which is also known as Punic culture.

Major trading port cities in Canaan, like Alalakh and Ugarit as well as Byblos, were destroyed, yet Sidon and Tyre were freed up to reap the benefits of this commercial vacuum. Sidon and Tyre were also exposed to these peoples from far off, distant lands. They tended to be diplomatic with the Sea Peoples, trading with them and diffusing their culture onto them. It was during this time that merchants from Tyre and Sidon introduced their Phonetic alphabet to the Greeks and Etruscans who quickly adopted and adapted it, using it on everything from monuments to texts to correspondences. The Island of Tyre itself became a hub of innovation during this time.

Around the year 1100 BCE, the Tyrians colonized a part of the North African coast near the modern village of Zana in present day Tunisia. They named the new settlement after the god Melqart. Later on, by the 9th century BCE, its derived form: Utica or “Atiqa” meaning “Old One” referring to the city was used to differentiate it from a later settlement in the same area named Carthage, which was known in Canaanite as “Qart Hadashi” or “New City”.

(Above) The famous warts and all Patrician Torlonia bust c. 1st century CE. It is a copy of a lost original from around 80 BCE – 70 BCE. The bust is a part of the Torlonia Private Art Collection held in Rome, Italy. It is thought to represent Roman Republican soldier, senator and statesman Marcus Porcius Cato, also known as Cato the Elder. Keep in mind that no proof is really given to make the case that the bust is actually a portrait of Cato. Moreover, one of Cato’s career highlights occurred at the eve of Roman victory over Carthage in the Third and final Punic War. Cato’s xenophobic anti-Greek and anti-Phoenician policies as well as his hawkishness and insistence on burning all of Carthage to the ground and destroying all Punic artifacts is a main reason why most of the records of Carthage written by Carthaginians is lost.

Finally, the Assyrians, under the Middle Assyrian Empire, conquered much of Northern Mesopotamia, the Levant and the mountainous Eastern parts of Anatolia. They began to break away from the Hurrian Mitanni Empire in 1363 BCE under the new King Ashur-uballit I.

(Above) A Middle Assyrian cylinder seal portraying a winged hero brandishing a sword and grasping the tail feathers of an ostrich c. 1200 BCE – 1000 BCE. It was acquired by American billionaire, investment banker and financier John Pierpont Morgan between 1885 and 1908 CE.

United Nations Gifts. “Replica of Peace Treaty between Hattusilis and Ramses II” Gift ID: UNNY067G, accessed April, 2024. https://www.un.org/ungifts/replica-peace-treaty-between-hattusilis-and-ramses-ii ↩︎
The University of Chicago, Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures, West Asia & North Africa, “Abu Simbel”, 2024. Accessed April, 2024. https://isac.uchicago.edu/gallery/abu-simbel#I1G4_72dpi.png ↩︎
The University of Chicago, Institute for the Study of Ancient Cultures, West Asia & North Africa, “Abu Simbel”, 2024. Accessed April, 2024. https://isac.uchicago.edu/gallery/abu-simbel#I1G11_72dpi.png ↩︎
The British Museum. “statue”, Accessed April, 2024. https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/G_1857-1220-232 ↩︎
Princeton University Press, “The Collapse of Civilizations”, Accessed April, 2024. https://assets.press.princeton.edu/chapters/s10185.pdf ↩︎

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Did anyone benefit from the Afro-Eurasian Bronze Age Collapse?

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