First Re-Settlement of Sea Peoples in Europe Identified

[E.P. Grondine]

Haven't seen that show yet, so I don't know what you're talking about, and have no idea of the context of those numbers, min.

But the effects even of a cometary dust veil can be grim.

What I did watch last night was a Graham Hancock series, in which the YD impact weree used to argue for THE lost civilization. As if there was only ONE lost civilization, and different astronomical systems had not already been developed tens of thousands of years ago.

While Hancock has a mixed race wife, as far as the Americas goes it was the usual great white father stuff: bearded visitors who taught the peoples everything they knew.

I will give Hancock this: he did not throw in his own theosophist religion.
But then the others will do that. They will build on his base.

No one I know in the impact community proper had mentioned Hancock's adoption of the YD to me before.

If I had not gotten hit by my stroke, then I would have been in control of this situation.

I just want to lie down and go to sleep.
Perhaps when I wake up this nightmare will have stopped.

[Samra]

The only thing you need to really get the dominoes of the Sea Peoples phenomenon falling in the eastern Mediterranean is a brutal war of aggression against the Mtcenaean-era Greeks by a strong determined enemy that results in the complete and utter military defeat of the Greeks.

With this collapse the land would very probably have been picked clean of any wealth that could be found whether it was in the form of gold and silver or stood on four hooves and the Greeks would have most likely been treated very badly. Many would have fled their homeland with whatever they could carry to escape the threat to their lives. If the Trojans had suffered a similar fate at the hands of the Greeks sometime prior to the Greek destruction the entire Aegean region would have been awash in homeless, desperate, hungry, and probably quite enraged refugees.

Below is a quote from Michael Wood's book "In Search of the Trojan War" which is a fairly reasonable translation/description of the Linear B "O-KA" series of clay tablets found in 1939 by Carl Blegen at the Mycenaean palace at Pylos on the southwestern Peloponnesian coast. I believe these texts were written after a probing or reconnaissance raid on the palace from the sea and just before the attack that ultimately destroyed it by fire.

"... Thus the watchers are guarding the coasts : command of Maleus at Owitono... 50 men of Owitono to go to Oikhalia, command of Nedwatas.... 20 men of Kyparssia at Aruwote, 10 Kyparissia men at Aithalewes.... command of Tros at Ro'owa: Kadasijo a shareholder, performing feudal service.... 110 men from Oikhalia to Aratuwa. Some of the last tablets written at Pylos speak of rowers being drawn from five places to go to Pleuron on the coast. A second list, incomplete, numbers 443 rowers, crews for at least fifteen ships. A much larger list speaks of 700 men as defensive troops; gaps on the tablet suggest that when complete, around 1000 men were marked down ..."

W. Sheppard Baird
Website

[Minimalist]

Thus the watchers are guarding the coasts : command of Maleus at Owitono... 50 men of Owitono to go to Oikhalia, command of Nedwatas.... 20 men of Kyparssia at Aruwote, 10 Kyparissia men at Aithalewes.... command of Tros at Ro'owa: Kadasijo a shareholder, performing feudal service.... 110 men from Oikhalia to Aratuwa.

Of interest there, Samra, is that at a relatively close period in history ( the Amarna period, c 1350 ) we have pleas from the leaders of Egyptian dominated Canaan for miniscule numbers of soldiers ( 50 men, 100 men ) to help them suppress banditry in the country. So, taking it as a given that no commander ever thinks he has a big enough army, how do we interpret these numbers? Could it be that after a long period of peace the military structure of these LBA kingdoms had atrophied? Maintaining a standing army in peacetime is never a great idea for a king. They are expensive as hell and have a tendency to get involved in politics. If you start to look at it that way, with control of the sea an attacker could easily mass for a strike at a point and overrun it before any "allied" help could be brought up. The US Navy used this tactic over and over against the Japanese during WWII. All you need is to establish local superiority.

[E.P. Grondine]

min - Earlier you mentioned two cities that were not attacked. ( Right now I am too damn tired to go through the "hapiru" inscriptions in depth with you; they are in a different hemisphere).

Sheppard - While I haven't looked at the "o-ka" series in years, please keep in mind that while the phonetic values for LB are very firm, you have to watch out for the translations - they are usually done by scholars of classical Greek, while Hittite was a closer IE language in time.

This sometimes leads to confusion with ideograms - watch out.

You may want to look at the tablets from Ugarit.

Personally, that's why I tried to recover impacts the Americas first: I did not want to have to deal with the nationalism and religion that intrudes on archaeology in that region. I conveniently failed to remember that there were 500 nations here, while the archaeology was done by Europeans.

[Minimalist]

E.P. The Phoenicians were conspicuously left unmolested by the Sea Peoples...Tyre, Sidon.

You may find this on point.

http://www.phoenician.org/sea_peoples.htm


Now, the obvious question to ask is, Why?


One is that the Phoenicians were too strong for the Sea People but this seems unlikely. They took out the Hittites, Cypriots, Cretans and the Mycenaeans and caused severe damage to Egypt. It does not seem that the Phoenicians could have been that big a power.

Two, perhaps they entered into an alliance with the Sea People.

Three, the Sea People were hired as mercenaries by the Phoenicians.

Four, conditions in Phoenicia were different in some critical way from conditions elsewhere.

Five, for tactical reasons they decided to bypass Phoenicia.

If anyone can think of other possibilities I'd love to hear them.

[E.P. Grondine]

Thanks, min - I can't think of any other options in the solution space - but then reality is usually far more interesting than any fiction we can imagine.

Undoubtedly, the solution will be found in texts - and then confirmed by field excavations, or the re-analysis of existing digs. That's why the palace excavations such as Gath, Megiddo, and others have so many riveted.

The Oriental Institute (one of the finest collection of Near Eastern texts in the world) is about 2 hours north of me, but it might as well be on Mars...

[Cognito]

E.P. The Phoenicians were conspicuously left unmolested by the Sea Peoples...Tyre, Sidon.

The only Phoenician city destroyed during the period in question was Arwad; however, that city was under Hittite control at the time. The Hittite and Mycenean empires fell and Egypt was so weakened that the ensuing drought beginning in 1159bce sent it into a tailspin. And as the major powers turned to dust, the Phoenicians began an impressive expansion of trade throughout the Mediterranean and into the Atlantic. Hmmm.

Methinks the Phoenicians became the Avis of the ancient world, hiring out their boats to mercenaries to attack their enemies. It's still done today in the corporate world, but now it's called "competitive advantage".

[Minimalist]

Hmmm.

As the cops say, Cogs....in any crime, follow the money!

[E.P. Grondine]

Only a couple of points, min:

First: "Cretans and Myceneans" - you have Achaeans and other peoples well identified.

Second, you have the Israeli/Phoenician alliance, and the ships going to Tarshish.

Hiram is well attested, is he not?

[Minimalist]

The list was not meant to be exhaustive, E.P.

As Israelite/Phoenician alliance? I'd love to see evidence for it that does not rely on the old testament which, as you know by now, I consider damn near useless for historic purposes especially going back beyond the 7th century.

There may have been a Hiram but "attestation" in the OT is not compelling evidence. Further, no one has found evidence of any "temple" which "Hiram" helped "Solomon" build but neither is there evidence of any sort of glorious city which could contain such a temple. For that matter, there is no extra-biblical evidence for Solomon, either. Although, it is curious that the Assyrian king, Shalmaneser V is actually, in Assyrian, known as Shulmânu-asharid.
Shulmanu? Solomon?? Perhaps Shalmaneser was boffing the queen of Sheba while whatever minor chieftain there was in Jerusalem was out counting his goats?

[Cognito]

As Israelite/Phoenician alliance? I'd love to see evidence for it that does not rely on the old testament which, as you know by now, I consider damn near useless for historic purposes especially going back beyond the 7th century.

Yes, Min. As you know, most of the Old Testament was written by scribes in exile at Assurbanipal's library. It is a political document that resembles a comic book complete with a considerable cast of cartoon characters such as, but not limited to - Solomon the Wise, Samson with his magical Hair, David vs Goliath, Jonah & the Whale, etc.

Any self-respecting boating Canaanite (ie Phoenician) would roll his eyeballs and spit on the ground whenever someone mentioned Hibirus in his presence. Talk about newcomer neighbors who trashed the neighborhood! They were nothing but a bunch of land lubbing, goat roping mountain dwellers. If I am wrong, let YAHWEH lightning-smite me ...........

......... (I'm still here)

[E.P. Grondine]

The list was not meant to be exhaustive, E.P.

I know.
min, if we had firm answers, then there would be no need to look for them.

An Israelite/Phoenician alliance? I'd love to see evidence for it that does not rely on the old testament which, as you know by now, I consider damn near useless for historic purposes especially going back beyond the 7th century.

As you know be now, min, my view is that the OT was composed from source documents that preserved some memories of events, including chronologies. I think I demonstrated that in my earlier posts here on absolute Bronze Age chronologies. Note that OT chronology agrees with one established from independent contemporary records and excavations.

min, as you yourself noted the lack of attacks on certain Phoenician towns, let's start there.

There may have been a Hiram but "attestation" in the OT is not compelling evidence. Further, no one has found evidence of any "temple" which "Hiram" helped "Solomon" build but neither is there evidence of any sort of glorious city which could contain such a temple. For that matter, there is no extra-biblical evidence for Solomon, either. Although, it is curious that the Assyrian king, Shalmaneser V is actually, in Assyrian, known as Shulmânu-asharid.
Shulmanu? Solomon?? Perhaps Shalmaneser was boffing the queen of Sheba while whatever minor chieftain there was in Jerusalem was out counting his goats?

Hiram is kind of aside from this particular problem, except for pointing out OT text processes, and later alliances.

The texts from Ugarit are useful for this as well.

The recovery of an ancient library can provide as much information as a thousand textless excavations. min, cognito, speaking of Yaweh, please also consider the Ebla archives when you are considering OT text sources.

The characters the OT mentions specific to this problem are:
Jehosephat, King of Judah, and
Ahaziah, King of Israel

The OT text sources mentioned internally are:
1) The Book of Jehu, the first son of Hanani
- "Jehosephat" might then be a compound of "Jehu" and "Sephat"
2) The Book of the Kings of Israel

By OT chronology this alliance between Judah and Israel occurred well after the "Sea peoples" invasion and their defeat.

Assume the Sea Peoples lost control of the Mediterranean sea trading routes to Iberia to Egyptian mercenaries - say to "Dorians". (Sheppard's Iberian invaders?)

Certainly, if a circum Africa route had been established, the traders were welcomed in Tarshish, who are attested among the invaders...

But none of the above explains the migrations.

In summary, something occurred, we just don't know what yet...

[Samra]

Sorry for the delay in responding. My colleagues put me to work on the preservation efforts for the Garlo well temple.

I don't think we can make too much from the small numbers of men sent for relatively small jobs (policing, sentry duty, etc.) but the comments on the Bronze Age standing armies and control of the seas are very much on target.

To me the most telling thing about the Pylos Linear B texts is that the Mycenaeans were obviously no longer in control of the seas along their own coasts. For a time after the final Mycenaean takeover of what was left of the Minoans on Crete after the Santorini volcanic eruption the Greeks would have been the dominate naval power in the Mediterranean. A drastic change indeed.

I believe this is connected to a Mycenaean abandonment of the El Argar Aegean colonists in Spain sometime before 1350 BC. The extensive El Argar settlements were totally destroyed by about 1350 BC. This is the same timeframe as the first appearance of the Shardana, Sherden, or Srdn-w in Phoenician Byblos mentioned in the Egyptian Armarna Letters. Sardinia's population probably grew tremendously with the forced emigration of the former Aegean colonists from Spain. At its height Sardinia was literally a fortress island with well over 30,000 nearly impregnable stone tholos watchtowers and fortresses spread over the landscape. The population had to be quite large in order to support all of this construction.

Another thought is what groups shared some degree of cultural affinity? I believe that Troy was originally a strategically located Minoan colony set up to control shipping between the Aegean and Black seas in around 3,200 BC. This was about the same time as the establishment of the Minoan metal-extracting colony in Spain. The Minoans also seem to have had a very cozy relationship with the Phoenicians before their collapse. Their distinctive frescoes have now been found at several different locations in the Levant.

Sheppard Baird
Website

[Minimalist]

I'm glad you mentioned the Ebla tablets, E.P. Do a search and you'll see lots of religious oriented sites making claims that they support all manner of bible nonsense. I am, to this day, frequently astounded by how many xtians claim that the Dead Sea Scrolls absolutely confirm early xtianity ( they do not. ) So the early claims about Ebla seem to have fallen by the wayside as well.

http://cojs.org/cojswiki/Ur_and_Jerusal ... /Dec_1983.

The Ebla texts describe a world focused on Inner Syria in the mid-third millennium B.C., said the Italian lecturers, with no reference to Palestine or Egypt and with only little interest in Mesopotamia. The emphasis of the lecturers was on Ebla as a Syrian site and upon the importance of the archaeological and textual evidence for our understanding of Syria in the Early and Middle Bronze Age. (The Middle Bronze Age levels date to about 2000–1600 B.C.)

It is a sad fact that there are people ( I call them bible-thumpers but feel free to reject that term as pejorative ) seize upon any ancient find and proclaim that it in some way "proves" their superstitions. There is no stopping that and no stopping people from believing them except to patiently point out what real scholars have found. There was an incident in Jerusalem a few years ago in which Eilat Mazar found a seal and pronounced it evidence of a biblical personality from the Persian period. In short order she was reminded that a seal impression is written "backwards" so that it appears correctly meaning that she had completely mis-read the name. She quickly recanted but the damage was done.

http://www.heardworld.com/higgaion/?p=m ... v&paged=45

People are far to eager to credit these stories with reality...which is my complaint with your interpretation. Joseph Smith claims that an "angel" gave him a couple of golden tablets which he turned into the Book of Mormon; these tablets somehow vanished. Lots of people believe him. I don't. You can assert earlier documents but without evidence of them I am afraid you are pretty much in the same boat as Mr. Smith.

I don't think we can make too much from the small numbers of men sent for relatively small jobs (policing, sentry duty, etc.) but the comments on the Bronze Age standing armies and control of the seas are very much on target.

My only reason for mentioning it, Samra, is the timing to the LBA and the apparent agreement in force numbers between 18th Dynasty Egypt and Mycenaean Greece. To concur with E.P. ( for once ) we have so little actual evidence from the period in question that we cannot afford to dismiss any of it. I think it was in Donald Redford Ancient Egypt, Israel and Canaan that it was pointed out that the treaty of peace between the Hittites and the Egyptians resulted in a sustained period of peace in the region. What do you do with demobilized soldiers? If peace lasts for 80-100 years what happens to their skills? In Europe when the Viking Age subsided unemployed knights and men-at-arms hired themselves out to the nobility and spent their time terrorizing the peasantry on behalf of their masters.

But if the basic tactical organization of a Bronze Age army was a nobleman bringing along as many of his retainers as he could afford to pull off the farm to fight with him when the king called then the demobilization looks a lot easier. The army simply goes back to the farm and the noble may take his chariot out for a run once in a while to exercise the horses. When a threat suddenly materializes, in the form of a raid from the sea, the mechanism for gathering a sufficient force to oppose them begins to look like a daunting exercise. By the time the alarm is given, a force is raised, and marches to the scene, the raiders are gone leaving devastation in their wake.

Again to agree with E.P. something did indeed happen. Something on a monumental scale - and it could well have encompassed the Western Med along with the Eastern Med - but here we have to acknowledge our own prejudices. Because of the bible implications people care about the Levant. No one really cares about Spain or Mauretania or Sardinia.

Perhaps you will change their minds?

[E.P. Grondine]

Sorry for the delay in responding. My colleagues put me to work on the preservation efforts for the Garlo well temple.

I don't think we can make too much from the small numbers of men sent for relatively small jobs (policing, sentry duty, etc.) but the comments on the Bronze Age standing armies and control of the seas are very much on target.

To me the most telling thing about the Pylos Linear B texts is that the Mycenaeans were obviously no longer in control of the seas along their own coasts. For a time after the final Mycenaean takeover of what was left of the Minoans on Crete after the Santorini volcanic eruption the Greeks would have been the dominate naval power in the Mediterranean. A drastic change indeed.

I believe this is connected to a Mycenaean abandonment of the El Argar Aegean colonists in Spain sometime before 1350 BC. The extensive El Argar settlements were totally destroyed by about 1350 BC. This is the same timeframe as the first appearance of the Shardana, Sherden, or Srdn-w in Phoenician Byblos mentioned in the Egyptian Armarna Letters. Sardinia's population probably grew tremendously with the forced emigration of the former Aegean colonists from Spain. At its height Sardinia was literally a fortress island with well over 30,000 nearly impregnable stone tholos watchtowers and fortresses spread over the landscape. The population had to be quite large in order to support all of this construction.

Another thought is what groups shared some degree of cultural affinity? I believe that Troy was originally a strategically located Minoan colony set up to control shipping between the Aegean and Black seas in around 3,200 BC. This was about the same time as the establishment of the Minoan metal-extracting colony in Spain. The Minoans also seem to have had a very cozy relationship with the Phoenicians before their collapse. Their distinctive frescoes have now been found at several different locations in the Levant.

Sheppard Baird
Website

Hi Sheppard -

The quote feature is the only way I can look at your post while replying.

The "Minoans" were but one member of the Lycian trade federation. As I told you before, that Theran fresco you worked on is a ship from Ilios going to the trade deferation's meeting on Thera. In my view, what you've restored as a mountain top is the Scamander River and the canal by-passing the straits. The lion has a value of "Ur/mah", where the O/U medial vowel precedes the tribal name in the title of kingship - standard for PIE, through to the Picts (Cruit).

The Mina lost control of Crete to the Achaeans circa 1580 BCE, when the Mina forces were destroyed by the Joshua impact while serving as appenages to the Hittites under the Kingship of Hantilishi.

The Ki-ti (Ghittim) and Ke-ke (Gygy) were in control at Pylos until the "Sea Peoples" invasion.

Thanks for the information on El Agadar, and Sardinia.
Do you know the situation in the Balerics?
Any idea what threat were the Sardinians were fortifying against?

Bottom Line: Why did the Sea Peoples attack? We still don't know.