Book Review: "After 1177 B.C.: The Survival Of Civilizations"

Book: After 1177 B.C.: The Survival Of Civlizations by Eric Cline (2024), 352 pages.

     I reviewed Eric Cline's book 1177 B.C.--The Year Civilization Collapsed back in 2015. That book examined the causes of the Bronze Age Collapse and the nations caught up in that broad civilizational collapse: the Minoans-Mycenaeans in and around Greece and the Aegean, Egypt along the Nile and extending control into Canaan, the Hittite Empire controlling most of Asia Minor, the Mittani which occupied the northern Tigris and Euphrates river region, and the Babylonians. The impact was likely felt beyond even these kingdoms and empires as trade collapsed.

    The gist of the book is that there was a perfect storm of events and causes that interplayed and magnified each other to lead to wide-spread disruption and collapse, as there is evidence of a centuries long drought (probably due to the climate cooling), several natural disasters including some earthquakes that destroyed a few major cities, resulting in famine, war, collapse of trust in institutions, collapse of long distance trade, social upheaval,  and migrations of people leading to more conflict.

    Although Cline and I use the term "collapse," that is not to say that everything regressed to the stone age. Rather this is a collapse in the sense that Joseph Tainter uses the term: a rapid decline in complexity of the civilization until the complexity reduces to a level where stability returns. In other words, while a society can collapse completely, it can also fragment or shed institutions without fully disappearing. Thus, it can occur at different times and to different extents.

    In the case of Bronze Age Collapse, the Hittite Empire disappeared to never reappear. The Babyloniann declined but adopted and recovered a couple hundred years later. The Mittani were absorbed into the Assyrian Empire. The Minions-Mycenaeans society disappeared to reappear later as the Greeks and Cretens of the Archaic age. The Egyptian Empire went into a decline from which it never fully recovered although it also did not collapse. Some of the territories over which it established control became independent and actually seemed to thrive during the dark ages that followed the collapse, such as the Phoenicians who developed a trading empire and, more importantly, spread their alphabet around the Mediterranean. The collapse of the international tin trade also drove a shift from bronze to iron. 

    After 1177 B.C. explores what happened to the major civilizations and cultures after the Bronze Age Collapse and the next 200 to 300 years. While Cline takes a "glass is half full" approach, emphasizing that the Collapse did not mean the complete loss of civilization, but that cultures adapted--some even thrived--with comparable complexity and international trade reappearing between 200 and 300 years later, depending on the location.

    That doesn't mean that it was an easy transition. Cline notes, for instance, that "there was a dramatic drop in population on mainland Greece immediately after the Collapse." Recent estimates indicate a decline in population of between 40 and 60%! To put that in context, that is greater than the die off from the Black Plague in the 14th Century. That is merely one of many societal changes. Cline identifies seven (7) changes: 

1. The collapse of central administrative organizations;
2. The disappearance of the traditional elite class;
3. A breakdown of the centralized economy;
4. A settlement shift;
5. Population decline; 
6. Loss of writing (what I would characterize more accurately as a loss of certain technologies); and,
7. A pause in the construction of monumental architecture (which is a symptom of the loss of centralized authority--with its taxing power--and decline of the elites and overall disappearance of wealth). 

 In this respect, Cline writes:

Joseph Tainter notes that a systematic collapse of a civilization or society is also usually thought to bring an end to "the artistic and literary features of civilization, and to the umbrella of service and protection that an administration provides." As a result, he says, "The flow of information drops, people trade and interact less, and there is overall lower coordination among individuals and groups. Economic activity drops ... while the arts and literature experience such a quantitative decline that a dark age often ensues. Population levels tend to drop, and for those who are left, the known world shrinks" All of this is usually seen as a fearful event, "truly paradise lost." However, according to Tainter, sociopolitical collapse is quite a normal occurrence and even to be expected in the general course of the life of complex societies.

     But while a dark age followed the Bronze Age Collapse, Cline contends that the question in studying such a period is "'dark' for whom and in what respects?" 

 This is the question at the heart of our explorations. What was it like for those living in the aftermath of the Collapse, and how was it different in each of the affected areas? What did it take to survive?

 Cline then explores different the different regions and what happened in each region, rather than simply address all regions in a chronological fashion. First he examines the fate of Egypt, Israel, and the Southern Levant. Second, Assyria and Babylonia. Third, Phoenicia and Cyprus. Fourth, Anatolia and Northern Syria. Fifth, the Aegean region. 

    Egypt was the only one of the prior great powers that survived with any substantial continuity of government. But the pharaohs that rules following the Collapse oversaw a permanent decline in the power and influence of Egypt. They were faced with disruptions and upheaval within their borders taking the form of an significant jump in tomb robberies (this was the period that Egyptian officials were forced to gather up mummies from scattered tombs and hide them), famine and food shortages, in-fighting among the elites, and "disruptions" caused by foreigners (probably both migrants and slaves) inside Egypt.  As Cline put it, the Egyptians "were able to cope and continue to exist but really failed to make the transition properly, neither adapting particularly well nor transforming at all."

    Of course, Egypt's loss was another's gain. Losing its control over Canaan, it appeared that the mantle of control would fall on the Philistines, but it was actually the Israeli kingdoms that emerged the dominate power over Canaan in the wake of the invasion by the "Sea Peoples". The success of the Philistines and Israel were helped along by climate: although much of the region was gripped by a centuries long drought, the southern Levant experienced an uptick in moisture starting around 1150 to 1100 B.C. and lasting until about 950 B.C. permitting intense cereal and olive cultivation. In fact, newer research shows that the Levant may have been one of the few areas to experience in increase in population during the post-Collapse dark age. But as minor kingdoms, the Israelite kingdoms only flourished until other larger regional empires arose again. 

    Turning to his next region, the upper and lower regions of the Tigris and Euphrates Rivers, Cline observes that "[o]verall, the Assyrians and the Babylonians proved to be among the most resilient and successful of the affected societies to weather the aftermath of the Collapse," being able to retain writing, keeping their systems of government, and even able to engage in some massive building projects. Nevertheless, they did not escape unscathed, as Cline writes, pointing out that "archaeological evidence  obtained from surveys in the region of ancient Babylonia suggests that there may have been a decrease in population of up to 75 percent during the three hundred years between the Collapse at the end of the Bronze Age and the beginning of the Babylonia resurgence after 900 BC." As for the Assyrians, it is notable that there were almost no royal inscriptions during the period from 1208 BC to 1133 BC. Nevertheless, Assyria was able to grown and expand swallowing up the city-states and smaller kingdoms that arose after the Collapse. As Cline writes:

Without any strong competitors, Assyria eventually filled the political void to become the most resilient large state recovering from the Late Bronze Age Collapse. In doing so, the Assyrians invented many of the elements that were adopted by later empires: standing armies, effective communication and transportation systems, and policy propaganda (like the Balawat gate inscriptions).

    Cline next examines the Cypriots and the Phoenicians. The Phoenicians took the advantage of the sack of other port cities during the Sea Peoples invasions to win control of the trade routes across the Mediterranean Sea, "spreading their version of the alphabet, and exchanging trade goods such as purple dye for silver and other metals coming from as far away as Sicily, Sardinia, and Iberia." The Cypriots similarly spread iron goods and iron technology east and west. "Together," Cline contends, "they were the two societies that weathered the transformation to the new normal most successfully; both could even be labeled as anti-fragile, flourishing during the chaos that followed the Collapse." 

    Cline next examines Anatolia and Norther Syria--areas dominated by the Hittites prior to the Collapse. Cline indicates that the Hittite Empire in Anatolia had collapsed and disappeared almost completely in the years after 1200 B.C. 

The capital city of Hattusa was initially abandoned and then partially destroyed, with a small Iron Age village subsequently established on one small portion of the original city. The situation has been recently summed up by Lorenzo d'Alfonso of New York University and his colleagues as follows: "A deep transformation took place in the former core of the empire around the capital Hattusa, resulting in a drastic decrease in political complexity, a shift to subsistence household economy and a lack of evidence for any public institutions." Furthermore, James Osborne, a professor at the University of Chicago, cites recent research stating that there may have been "a drastic settlement drop of about 90%" in south-central Anatolia at this time and says that "despite evidence for continuity in certain locations ... the general picture is one of marked decline and social complexity until  the ninth century."

What is significant about the 9th Century BC is that when the drought that played such a large role in the Bronze Age Collapse ended, when the climate returned to one that was warmer and wetter.

    Nevertheless, "despite the collapse of the Hittite Empire proper, we can see that there were survivors and that life did continue, especially in the hinterland, even if the centralized government and its attendant bureaucracy and administration had essentially vanished, leaving the various areas to their own devices." In addition, some remnant of the Hittite royalty apparently retained some control over as many as 15 city states in northern Syria. And while the region appears to have suffered the most from the invasion of the Sea Peoples, most sites were almost immediately reoccupied following the destruction and resumed agricultural, industrial, and trade activity. Eventually, however, this area fell under the influence of the Assyrians. 

    Mycenae on the Greek mainland similarly fully collapsed, although not as quickly. Cline notes that "[i]t is now clear that it took more than a century for the last vestiges of the Bronze Age Mycenaean palatial society to fade away and the succeeding culture of the Iron Age to begin on mainland Greece." The primary cities were largely abandoned, but life appears to have continued in the countryside, albeit free of a centralized government control and within a simpler economic environment. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing for the commoner: as Cline notes they were freed from the overwhelming taxation to support the palatial elites and their projects, "such that some rural areas may have actually experienced a brief moment of prosperity in the decades immediately after the Collapse." But the collapse of the urban centers also led to the loss of writing for centuries as well as the loss of the representational arts and crafts. "The complex forms of political, social, and economic organization fell into oblivion. Palaces, kings, and royal families became matter for Greek myths." "In short," Cline concludes, "Greek civilization was reduced to the level of a prehistoric society." Thus, while there were survivors, "it was not until the eighth century BC at the earliest that we can talk about Greek culture resuming on a path that led to more than simply basic subsistence and scratching out a living."

    In summing up his book, Cline writes:

    Painting with broad brush strokes, what we see in general from the twelfth century BC onward is a fragmentation and decline in security and material standards of living in the years immediately after the Collapse, continuing down through the tenth century or thereabouts, as the Bronze Age kingdoms fell apart. In the areas that were affected to the greatest extent, including mainland Greece, Crete, Anatolia, and the southern Levant especially, there was a collapse of the local palaces, states, or kingdoms (including government, centralized economy, and so on) even if segments of the population managed to survive.

    However, reintegration then begins during the ninth century and continues through the eighth century...

    To put it another way, and to emphasize the material side of things, in general the period from the twelfth through the tenth centuries BC saw population crashes, abandonment of cities, violence, probable migrations, the collapse of trade routes, disease, earlier ages at death, falling economic output, lower standards of living, and the loss or decline of advanced skills, though the extent varies depending on where one looks in the region. In contrast, the period from the beginning of the ninth century BC onward saw many of these trends reversed. By the time we reach the second half of the eighth century BC, we see new life and innovations in many of the areas, and a fully interconnected world begins to take shape once again for the first time in several centuries.

He sees the Bronze Age and its subsequent collapse and recovery fitting into what is termed the "adaptive cycle" with the early part of the Late Bronze Age representing the Exploitation phase, the Late Bronze Age as the Conservation phase, the Bronze Age Collapse as the Release phase, and the subsequent Iron Age is the Reorganization phase which, will, eventually start the cycle over again--in this case, the Archaic age followed by the Classical age. 

    Cline also examines why some cultures seemed to weather the collapse better than others. Some of it may have been a matter of luck: located in an area that was not as affected by drought as others, being shielded from the attacks of the Sea Peoples, better leaders, more redundancies in their state administration, or armies better able to fight off raiders or conquer neighbors. But he notes, at least as to the Assyrians, that "they may have proved to be resilient because of four things that they were able to retain for whatever reason: their centralized government, still led by the king; their basic economy; their writing system; and their army."

    But the main lesson that Cline wants to emphasize is that "Collapse can involve both the end of old social institutions and the beginning of new ones."

    Unfortunately the archaeological record is too incomplete to come to firm conclusions as to why one culture did better than others. Unlike Cline, I think luck played a major role both as to climate and to which areas were subject to invasion or attack by the Sea Peoples. Some must have been due to the cultures--some were more, perhaps, fatalistic and others more adaptable by nature. I suspect that the relationship between the people and their elites played a role. That is, that elites that maintained their legitimacy even in the face of drought, disaster, or war, were more likely to continue their rule; and for those hated by their populace, the events of the Collapse provided an excuse for their elites "to disappear". Unfortunately, while the loss of elites may have been a temporary boon in those civilizations that were heavily taxed, it also didn't help with recovery (although the conflict among elites in Egypt appears to have been almost as crippling to recovery). 

    And while there are no guarantees, it appears that on an individual basis, living in a rural area that provided water and arable land was vital; and combined with access to trade and trade routes was ideal.