Sea People

Barracuda · Post by **Barracuda** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 4:47 pm

http://i-cias.com/e.o/sea_people.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sea_Peoples

I am picking up on this history about 4,000 years ago when:

"a mysterious (and very disparate) confederacy of ship-faring raiders sailed into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, invaded Cyprus, Hatti and the Levant, and attempted to enter Egyptian territory during the late 19th dynasty"

This had to be one of the major migrations in the ancient world.

What made such diverse and geographically dispersed groups to come together to invade the eastern Med?

Something must have driven them to it.

Post by **Minimalist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 4:54 pm

You may find this site of interest.

http://www.touregypt.net/featurestories/seapeople.htm

Sort of portrays them as the Vikings of their age.

Barracuda · Post by **Barracuda** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 5:00 pm

Thanks! That link does offer an explanation:

" Sea People were probably part of a great migration of displaced people. The migration was most likely the result of widespread crop failures and famine."

Kind of impacts my ideas about people now considered "Greek, Turks" and Persians"

Sounds like they interacted for a lot longer than I thought.

Post by **Minimalist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 5:08 pm

I just pulled out Israel Finklestein's book The Bible Unearthed in which he discusses the Sea Peoples, important to him mainly as they morphed into the Philistines and settled in Southern Canaan when they could not conquer Egypt.

There is scholarly debate about whether or not the Sea Peoples were the cause or the effect of the total breakdown of the Late Bronze Age cultures of the Eastern Mediterranean. In other words, did the Sea Peoples arise to destroy the cultures of Mycenean Greece, the Hitties, Cyprus and Canaan...and deal a two centuries long body blow to Egypt.... or did they arise because the Late Bronze Age cultures in Grece, Turkey and the Levant collapsed from other forces thus dumping a whole lot of desperate people loose on the sea?

Finklestein seems to take no definitive position on that debate BUT he does note that the Canaanite cities of Ashdod and Ekron were destroyed and replaced by a culture with pottery styles far more similar to Mycenean Greek than the former mix of Canaanite and Egyptian.

Barracuda · Post by **Barracuda** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 5:42 pm

I belive it took some event to make these people migrate. And famine is the simplest explanation.

But what made such diverse people come together into one group?

"The Peleset, who were non other than the Philistines that gave their name to Palestine.

The Lukka who may have come from the Lycian region of Anatolia.

The Ekwesh and Denen who seem to be identified with the Homeric Achaean and Danaean Greeks

The Sherden who may be associated with Sardinia.

The Teresh (Tursha or Tyrshenoi - possibly the Tyrrhenians), the Greek name for the Etruscans; or from the western Anatolian Taruisa

Shekelesh (Shekresh, Sikeloi - Sicilians?)

Rokcet Scientist · Post by **Rokcet Scientist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 5:56 pm

Recalling from memory: the 'Sea Peoples' originally are supposed to be a people from central Russia/northern Ukraine who, for some unknown reason, got on the move starting somewhere between 2500 and 2000 BC. And move they did! Around the western seaboard of the Black Sea. Down south. Raizing and destroying just about any civilisation in their path: the Scythes, the ancient Macedonians, the Mycenean cultures, the Minoans, the Levantines, and I probably miss a couple here too. Until stopped by Ramses III, wasn't it?
They're still there. Making life miserable for themselves and everybody else.
L'histoire se répète.

stan · Post by **stan** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 6:03 pm

Sounds like yall are talking about different groups. Will the real sea poeple please stand up?

Is "Sea People" a modern intellectual construct to describe many uncoordinated disparate groups?
Or were they actually a coherent unity of some kind?

Rokcet Scientist · Post by **Rokcet Scientist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 6:07 pm

This trek took place over many centuries. The last couple of which were in a sea environment: Crete, Cyprus and the Levant. I guess that is where they got the moniker 'Sea Peoples'.

Post by **Minimalist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 6:26 pm

stan wrote:Sounds like yall are talking about different groups. Will the real sea poeple please stand up?

Is "Sea People" a modern intellectual construct to describe many uncoordinated disparate groups?
Or were they actually a coherent unity of some kind?

The Egyptians seem to have hung that name on them.

daybrown · Post by **daybrown** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 7:11 pm

The "Vikings" are a clue. AFAIK, this is the very same era when the Minoans were in complete control of Crete, Troy, and other islands & cities in the Agean.

And no wonder, they had the fastest, most seaworthy ships. But you dont see any evidence of warfare in the Minoan communities. This reminds me of the Vikings, who had a kind of Pax Scandia agreement to only raid Christians. The restless young men were encouraged to go "a Viking", while business went on as usual, peacefully back home.

Another clue is a Minoan fresco found at Thera, which shows the city of "At-Lunus", and outside the city, four dudes with spears, helmets, and shields lined up *phalanx* style. The Levantines never did figure out how to do that right.

There are also Egyptian records of port deals where the Nile Delta merchants and ships could come and go freely and run their own affairs without the supervision of the Pharoah. And naturally, when civil order broke down in one of the innumerable Egyptian coups or anarchic revolutions, these merchants would have taken military steps to protect their interests.

So- I dont see it really as an invasion so much as mercenary forces being hired (from all over, and thus the genetic diversity) to protect their interests. Which is why you cant tell where the 'Sea People' came from. National Geo has a piece on Ashkalar, the Philistine capitol, which was a very diverse place, a port town for one of the ends of the silk & frankenscence roads. Geo says there were sacred shrines for all kinds of religions, whatever the merchants and camel drivers and seamen wanted.

Post by **Minimalist** » Fri Mar 17, 2006 8:33 pm

The volcanic explosion of Thera (Santorini) is generally figured to have been the death knell of the Minoan civilzation. A maritime society would have seen much of its fleet destroyed by the tidal waves associated with the blast. While archaeologists argue with other scientists about the date the argument rages between the 17th and 15th centuries BC...or some 300 years prior to the Sea Peoples.

However, there does seem to be a school of thought which holds that the destruction of the Minoan civilization cleared the way for the Myceneans to arise, and they were certainly far more warlike.

Rokcet Scientist · Post by **Rokcet Scientist** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 7:41 am

Minimalist wrote:The volcanic explosion of Thera (Santorini) is generally figured to have been the death knell of the Minoan civilzation. A maritime society would have seen much of its fleet destroyed by the tidal waves associated with the blast. While archaeologists argue with other scientists about the date the argument rages between the 17th and 15th centuries BC...or some 300 years prior to the Sea Peoples.

That's right. Santorini/Thera was a near-fatal blow to the Minoans. They never fully recovered and the Sea Peoples finished them off good a little later.

However, there does seem to be a school of thought which holds that the destruction of the Minoan civilization cleared the way for the Myceneans to arise, and they were certainly far more warlike.

Those 'Myceneans' were by then usurped by (and mixed with) the civilisation destroyers from the north who later came to be known as the Sea Peoples. Crete was 'only' their next target in a millennium-long culture-raizing frenzy. After which Cyprus and the Levant followed.
They were extremely violent raiders and bandits.
And nothing's changed.

Frank Harrist · Post by **Frank Harrist** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 8:52 am

From: The SSEA <ssea.geo@yahoo.com>

FREE LECTURE AND CONFERENCE ON THE SEA PEOPLES

Sponsored by The Canadian Institute for Mediterranean Studies
(http://www.utoronto.ca/cims)

Thursday, March 30 at 7:30 pm in the Sam Sorbara Auditorium of St. Michael's College, 81 St. Mary's St., Toronto
" Excavating Egyptian, Israelites and Philistines: Identity and Ethnicity in the Biblical World" by Prof. Anne Killebrew of Pennsylvania State University
More information is available at
http://www.geocities.com/ssea.geo/killebrew06.html

Friday, March 31 from 9am to 5pm
in the Sam Sorbara Auditorium of St. Michael's College, 81 St. Mary's St., Toronto
Cyprus, the Sea Peoples and the Eastern Mediterranean.
http://www.geocities.com/ssea.geo/SeaPe ... lFlyer.pdf

-----
K. Kris Hirst
About Archaeology
http://archaeology.about.com
www.About.com
About.com is part of The New York Times Company

Rokcet Scientist · Post by **Rokcet Scientist** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 10:02 am

Since I and 99% of this forum's members won't be in Toronto then, could we get a transcript, podcast or vidcast of those lectures?

Frank Harrist · Post by **Frank Harrist** » Sat Mar 18, 2006 10:31 am

Rokcet Scientist wrote:Since I and 99% of this forum's members won't be in Toronto then, could we get a transcript, podcast or vidcast of those lectures?

Hell, I ain't goin'! Toronto's a long ways from Texas. I'm sure someone on About archaeology.com will be there and give us an update.

Archaeologica.org

Sea People

Sea People

seapeople

Re: seapeople