A century of crisis - World History

A century of crisis ( 1200 ) Indo-European peoples bring down Greece, Egypt, and Mesopotamia.

During the 12th century, the Olmec culture appeared in Mexico. The Olmecs built ceremonial centers and developed sacred art: monolithic altars, bas-relief stelae, and sculptures. They devised hieroglyphic writing and had a calendar. The villages increased in size and houses were built on earthen platforms. They worshiped jaguar deities, related to rain. Social control was in the hands of shamans and sorcerers.

The Eurasian steppes, from the Danube to Siberia, were occupied by the Scythians, an Indo-European people whose language was related to that of the Aryans. They were itinerant ranchers, and they subdued the peasant population.

Meanwhile, most of the civilized world was in shock to a greater or lesser extent. Egypt had rejected the Sea Peoples, but after Meneptah's death it fell into near anarchy. The sea peoples passed to Cyprus, and from there they attacked Phoenicia. In 1200 they razed the cities of Tire and Sidon. In 1191 King Shubbiluliuma II died and, with him, the Hittite empire disappeared from history, dismembered by the sea peoples and internal uprisings. However, the Hittite culture was not lost, but was preserved in a series of tiny Neo-Hittite kingdoms .that survived dominated by one or another power according to the times. To the northwest of Anatolia the Phrygians began to stand out. In the Iliad they are mentioned as allies of Troy, so they were already there before the arrival of the sea peoples, but their rise came after them. Perhaps they took advantage of the disorders or perhaps the invaders occupied Phrygia and thus became "new Phrygians".

Assyria began a long period of frustrating struggles in which it tried unsuccessfully to dominate the surrounding territories, but could not control Babylon and, above all, the powerful kingdom of Urartu. Assyria actually won most of the battles, but her enemies recovered more easily while she was busy elsewhere. In any case, the situation was undoubtedly chaotic and uncertain for the entire area.

For its part, Egypt managed to temporarily recover. In 1186, a Theban ruler named Setnakht, who claims to be a descendant of Ramesses II, manages to unify all of Egypt and becomes the first pharaoh of the 20th Dynasty. In 1184 he succeeded his son with the name of Ramses III. Meanwhile, Mycenaean Greece was going from bad to worse. Armed with iron weapons, the Dorians slowly pushed their way through with nothing the proud Achaeans could do to stop them.

From Cyprus, the Sea Peoples attacked Canaan and moved back into Egypt. In 1177 Ramses III managed to repel them in what is considered the first naval battle in history, but this would be his last campaign. Egypt lost its imperial possessions. Thereafter its borders were reduced to the Nile Valley. The New Empire was over. Palestine was occupied by the Sea Peoples. These called themselves Peleset, although they are known today as Philistines.The name "Palestine" derives from Peleset. The Philistines were mainly Greek, a wave that preceded that of the Dorians and that was pushed into the sea by them, but when they arrived in Palestine they found a culture superior to their own and did not hesitate to assimilate it. In a short time they had abandoned their own language and adopted that of the Canaanites (an archaic form of Hebrew). Essentially, the Philistines occupied five cities each ruled by their own king, but maintaining a loose coalition. Three of them were along the coast: Ashdod, Ashkelon, and Gaza, while two others were inland: Ekron and Gath.

Without Egyptian intervention, the Israelites were more easily able to penetrate Canaan. Little by little they began to confront the local cities, enslaving the weakest and putting the most belligerent to the sword. On the other hand, they could not impose themselves on the Philistines who, despite being few, had iron weapons. Furthermore, the Philistines succeeded in subduing the Israelite tribe of Dan and two other invading tribes that were only later included in the federation of Israel: the tribes of Judah and Simeon. The first seems to be closely related to the Edomites, while the second was a minor tribe that was soon absorbed into Judah.

Babylon had been freed from Assyrian domination, but its Kassite rulers were unable to take advantage of the situation and it was left in anarchy. The one who did know how to react was ancient Elam, who sent expeditions to sack Babylon. In 1174 the Elamites carried off two great relics: the stela with the code of Hammurabi and the stele of Naram-Sin.

In 1158 Ramses III died, who was succeeded by a long series of kings all called Ramses, known as Ramesids. Thus opened a period in which the power of the pharaoh was declining in favor of the priestly power. All the tombs in Thebes (except Tutankhamun's) were looted.

Meanwhile the Dorians occupied positions more and more to the south of Greece and with their movements displaced the Aeolian tribes. Towards 1150 one of them, the one formed by the Thessalians , occupied the region in which they would settle down definitively, and which took the name of Thessaly.

By this time the Phoenician city of Sidon had recovered from the attack by the Sea Peoples and had managed to seize iron weapons. The Israelite tribes were distributed more or less as the map indicates. Levi's was the smallest of all and did not occupy more than a few scattered cities. The tribe of Dan was next to the Philistine territories, but a group of Danites who were not willing to put up with the Philistine domination decided to migrate north, took the city of Lais, sacked it and settled there, renaming it with the name of Dan. Judah and Simeon were subject to the Philistines, while Gad and Reuben, on the other side of the Jordan, fought with the Hebrew kingdoms of Ammon and Moab. Aser, for his part, came under the domination of Sidon.

The northern Canaanites took advantage of the resurgence of Sidon to plan a major offensive against the Israelites. The Canaanite league was led by Jabin, king of the city of Hazor. The closest tribe on which the threat loomed was Naphtali, who at that time had Barak as their leader. He must have understood that his men could not resist a well-endowed army on their own, so he hastened to make a pact with Ephraim. According to the Bible, at that time Ephraim was led by a woman named Deborah,which (under the condition of commanding the army) contributed not only its own men but also those of the tribes of Manasseh and Benjamin (the other two tribes of Rachel, apparently under Ephraim's dominion). Also close at hand with the Canaanite threat, the tribes of Zebulun and Issachar joined the coalition, bringing Jabin to six tribes in all. The Israelites crushed their opponents near Mount Tabor, destroyed Hazor, and thereafter the Canaanites no longer posed any serious danger to Israel.

Around 1120 another Aeolian tribe, the Boeotians, was forced to settle south of Thessaly before the Dorian advance. The region has since been known as Boeotia.

Around 1124 a native Babylonian seized power and ended Kassite rule. His name was Nebuchadnezzar I. He also completely defeated the Elamites. For a moment it seemed that Babylon was going to dominate Mesopotamia again, but it was not to be. By then, Assyria was also on the mend. In 1115 Teglatfalasar I came to the throne , which had an army with iron weapons with which he defeated Nebuchadnezzar I in 1103and rebuilt what had been the empire of Tukulti-Ninurta. Westward he reached as far as Phoenicia, where he made Byblos and Sidon tributaries. The most contentious border was Arabia. During the preceding years of anarchy, the Arab tribes had harassed Mesopotamia as usual. Now Teglatfalasar I was trying to stop them. This time it was the Arameans, against whom Assyria began a series of campaigns. In general, campaigns against the nomads are never final, as the nomad warriors easily retreat and appear in other defenseless areas, or simply disappear until the danger passes.

The Israelites, too, were now under attack by the nomads of Arabia. The so-called Midianites mainly lashed the tribe of Manasseh. The leader of this tribe was then Gideon. The Bible describes a plot with which Gideon questioned the supremacy of Ephraim. Gideon appears to have formed a coalition with the northern tribes who had fought against the Canaanites on Mount Tabor, but without giving Ephraim any preferential treatment. On the contrary, he informed him late and partially of his plans, so that when he made a surprise attack on the Midianites, the warriors of Ephraim were not present, but Gideon led them to the fords of the Jordan, where he expected the Midianites to flee. Thus, Ephraim destroyed the fleeing Midianites, but all the credit fell to Gideon. However, Ephraim did not accept the situation and Israel was on the brink of civil war. Gideon had to acknowledge Ephraim's supremacy.

The tribes of Israel increasingly faced internal power struggles. Until then, each tribe was led by a caudillo or judge chosen by popular acclamation. This worked well when the Israelites were simple nomadic tribes, but now power meant wealth, making it increasingly coveted. Thus, with the fame that Gideon had acquired, it was natural to expect that he would be succeeded by one of his sons, so one of them, Abimelech, he decided to kill his numerous brothers in order to be the only legitimate claimant to the judiciary. Events like these moved some Israelites to propose a hereditary monarchy that would avoid conflicts in the succession. The problem was that choosing a king could cause much more violent conflict than the succession of any judge. Meanwhile, leadership aspirations continued. In the tribe of Gad a capable leader arose, named Jephthah,who achieved a complete victory against the kingdom of Amun. Apparently, Ephraim considered that Jephthah had not properly consulted him about his plans, so he demanded an account from him just as he had done with Gideon. However, Jephta was not intimidated, but allowed Ephraim to send an army to ask him for an account, defeated him, and was even able to cut off his retreat through the fords of the Jordan until he was completely annihilated. This happened around 1100 and thus ended Ephraim's supremacy.

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