In the book 1177 B.C The Year Civilization Collapsed by Eric H. Cline brings the reader to think whether or not the sea people really existed and if they did, what methods caused them to overtake many civilizations which led to the collapse of strong civilizations such as the Hittites, Greeks, Egypt and many more. As the reader, it is easier to come into an understanding that civilizations did not collapse due to the sea people taking over but because of reasons as natural disasters, economic trade embargoes and internal rebellion as provided by Cline with sufficient evidence in the book.
Even though the author states that the civilizations collapsed because the sea people came, after reading the book it doesn’t make sense to the reader that
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the sea people were that strong to take over a civilization because there were strong civilizations that existed such as the Hittites; a civilizations that was believed to be won in the Battle of the Kadesh in 1274 BCE and was once had the great powers of the ancient world, the Egypt; a civilization with great architecture, had contacts with the outside world and where wealth was dominated and they build many buildings with their knowledge of architecture and last but not least Greece; even though the city states were never united each city state was strong enough to maintain a distinct constitution and have a power of a country such as to declare war and have their own monetary system etc.
If the reader think back about the authors point, is it possible for a group of people we don’t know to build/take over a civilization? We cannot deny that sea people did not come but even if they came, could that be the only reason why civilizations collapsed? For example, United States is seen as a strong nation, and just because Cuba is next to the United States, could Cubans take over the Americans? If so, how? If America ever collapse, what could be other reasons for the collapse? Many questions might come up when thinking about what Cline states as to sea …show more content…
people taking over civilizations and it leading to the collapse of the civilizations in 1177 BCE.
Even in today’s world many nations such as Japan, being a strong nation in the continent of Asia, almost the whole nation was wiped out from the recent tsunami that happened in Japan in 2011 which led to the rebuilding of half of the country because of the devastating natural disaster. It could be that natural disasters such as earthquakes, droughts, tsunamis etc, that steered the civilizations to a failure. As learned, the Minoans faced two volcanic eruptions before the civilizations fully collapsed. After the first eruption, the Minoans thought that the gods were punishing them; being high believers of the gods but when the volcanic eruption hit the second time it depressed the Minoans to the point where they couldn’t keep up with the civilization anymore. Also, after the earthquake, it has created a lot of turmoil in Egypt so they collapsed as well. Greece along with many other civilizations in the eastern Mediterranean has collapsed due to a series of earthquakes. The famous “dust bowl” as learned in previous history classes has led to an enormous amounts of people to migrate from Oklahoma to California and when people leave a place it is harder to maintain a
certain just like the civilizations back in the day because one factor such as climate change could lead to certain natural disasters which may bring a civilization to an end due to the loss of agriculture, people migrating to another place and due to many more other reasons. One of the examples from the book states, “…quake only damaged the city and did not completely destroy it” (140), after reading the quote what difference does that make if the earthquake damaged the city and/or not destroyed it? Still, the city is damaged meaning that the civilization needs to be rebuild in one way or another. Cline makes a good point saying that 1177 BCE cease to exist, but how does he know for sure that it is the sea people that took over the civilizations which led to the collapse of the civilizations when dark age leave historians with no information at all about what happened during the dark age. We can make assumptions that civilizations existed even after that and if they did collapse it may be due to economic trade embargoes because, there were no trade happening at the time. It states in the book that “they [civilizations] maintained their position through a combination of diplomacy and trade” (70) which makes the reader wonder how the civilization would last if the trade is stopped. Even advanced civilizations like Hittites, Egyptians, Minoans and Mycenaeans collapsed due to cutting of the internal trade routes by the mysterious migrating groups whom the Egyptians called the “sea people.” Internal rebellion is a common way which could indicate a collapse of a kingdom/civilization just like it does today. Even in the book Cline express this idea as, “cities destroyed in war will have weapons of various sorts within the destruction debris…in Israel, the excavators found arrowheads stuck in the walls of the buildings” (141) presenting to the reader that internal rebellion/war was happening back in the day leading for the fall of a civilization because a war could destroy a civilization even before the “sea people” could take over. People make up a civilization and war causes death, if people die a civilization will not exist. Currently, we are facing the same situation as we faced back in 1177 BCE and the only thing missing is the secretive invaders known as the “sea people” that Cline says took over most of the civilizations. If people are in a war within the civilization there is no way that the civilization will survive, it will lead to failure and it will collapse. After analyzing the book in depth, as mentioned above the factors/reasons for the collapse of civilizations in 1177 BCE is not because of the shadowy invaders name “sea people” but because of factors such as climate change/natural disasters, economic trade embargoes and internal rebellion. The book states that “nothing was able to oppose this invading mass of humanity” (2) but the factors listed above were able to collapse a civilization. Large empires and small kingdoms that took years to be build up collapsed rapidly and that could not be just because of the sea people. It must have been something else as well. Therefore, as the reader, I do not agree with the author because, in my perspective the civilizations has collapsed because of natural disasters, economic trade embargoes and internal rebellion. Overall, it was an interesting book to read which makes the reader think beyond rather than to believe what the author states.
Jared Diamond author of “The Ends of the World as We Know Them” highlights the reasons for the disappearance of early civilizations. Civilizations like the Mayans, Incas and Aztecs once inhabited the earth for hundreds of years, However; when these advanced civilizations reached the pinnacle of their capability, they faced tragedies such as war, unusual weather, environmental deprivation, terminated trade markets and unscrupulous leaders who contributed to the destruction of their civilization. One significant idea portrayed from Diamond’s article is that there are many factors that threaten American civilization.
In the book “The Great Sea”, author David Abulafia goes thru the history of the Mediterranean. Trade starts in one place and will link to other civilizations in the Mediterranean.
The collapse caused much knowledge and culture to be lost, but some was passed on by what are thought to be Mycenaeans who escaped.
The Bronze Age ended at the beginning of the twelfth century in a collapse that appears to have been both sudden and difficult to define. A key reason that the cause of this collapse is so difficult to identify is because the collapse was so wide spread and complete. The groups we would look to for evidence on this event ceased existing, from the residents of Crete to the Greek mainland, removing their recording capabilities. We have archeological evidence, in the form of ruined cities, but most written records that provide insight into the collapse of the Bronze Age and the events of the world are Egyptian in origin, and thus are limited in their scope and reliability. In fact, these Egyptian records at
With the Minoans civilization there is still great debate on how this civilization collapsed to was it due to the cause of the rise of the Mycenaeans or by the Thera Eruption or even to an extent neither caused the Minoans civilization to collapse as it remains a mystery to this day. As to many historians and archaeologists, they try to make a statement it was one of these events that lead to their collapse while others doubt these events were not the cause of their collapse as it was other things.
Today, we learn the history of our countries and other countries because the history goes around and comes around and we should not commit the exact blunder. One of the examples of the history we learn is the decline of Rome which was caused by political instability such as constant changes of emperors, military faults which caused severe consequences, and economic and civic decay of ancient Rome. For instant, approximately twelve emperors out of twenty-two emperors were assassinated during the period of 235 to 283 CE. The Roman army began to become lazy and was damaged due to their abandoned ground drills. Invaders such as the Huns, Vandals, Ostrogoths, and Visigoths discovered weaknesses of Rome and attacked Rome. The Huns were especially the most famous, strongest, and wildest invaders. With these confusions, the change of emperors and invasions, former Roman citizens whose properties had been conquered “considered their new life” with less rules. As if to rub salt into the wound, a violent disaster caused more catastrophes and soon, epidemics went any further causing more deaths of people.
The example of societal collapse in which I will be making reference to throughout this essay is the Maya civilization. The Maya civilization is, “probably the best known of all early American civilizations.” (Fagan, 1995) It was at its strongest point between AD 300 AND 900. Around AD 900 was the time of its collapse. This civilization was developed in a densely, tropical forest on either highlands or lowlands. Today to visit a Mayan site, people would go to the modern Mexican state, capital city of Merida. This site was once home to the “New World's most advanced Native American civilization before European arrival.” (Diamond, 2009) Over the years there has been many predictions on what had caused the Maya civilization to collapse. At the moment the most recent cause that geographers and scientists have come up with is that climate change may have had a major impact on this collapse. It is said that the rainfall received during the creation of the civilization was a key factor in the continuity of life for the Mayans. This and the addition of societal factors such as religious beliefs, ethnicity and education all had an affect on their way of life, an effect on their societal well-being. Art and architecture that was formed by the Mayans is the foundation for the archaeologists work today. They look at these features and the ruins of the buildings created to depict the kind of lifestyle they lived. Looking at the art and architecture of a specific civilization or community of the past is just one way that can help to inform future adaptations. Another way in which the Europeans received knowledge on the collapse was that they sent out geographers and researchers not long after the collapse to gather as much data and information ...
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