Contact and Trade or Colonization?: Egypt and the Aegean in the 14th-13th Centuries BC (original) (raw)
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The Aegean in the Early 7th Millennium BC: Maritime Networks and Colonization
Journal of World Prehistory, 2015
The process of Near Eastern neolithization and its westward expansion from the core zone in the Levant and upper Mesopotamia has been broadly discussed in recent decades, and many models have been developed to describe the spread of early farming in terms of its timing, structure, geography and sociocultural impact. Until now, based on recent intensive investigations in northwestern and western Anatolia, the discussion has mainly centred on the importance of Anatolian inland routes for the westward spread of neolithization. This contribution focuses on the potential impact of east Mediterranean and Aegean maritime networks on the spread of the Neolithic lifestyle to the western edge of the Anatolian subcontinent in the earliest phases of sedentism. Employing the longue dure ´e model and the concept of 'social memory', we will discuss the arrival of new groups via established maritime routes. The existence of maritime networks prior to the spread of farming is already indicated by the high mobility of Epipalaeolithic/Mesolithic groups exploring the Aegean and east Mediterranean seas, and reaching, for example, the Cyclades and Cyprus. Successful navigation by these early mobile groups across the open sea is attested by the distribution of Melian obsidian. The potential existence of an additional Pre-Pottery Neolithic (PPN) obsidian network that operated between Cappadocia/ & B. Horejs
In the Midst of the “Great Green”: Egypto- Aegean Trade and Exchange
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The mid- second millennium BC was a period of unprecedented contact between Egypt and the Aegean. It was long thought that most of the contact between these two regions was indirect and largely controlled by Cypriote and Levantine middlemen. Recent discover-ies (for example, the Minoan- style frescoes at Tell el- Dab‘a and new interpretations of known material (such as the new reconstruction of the Gurob ship- cart model or the identification of Mycenaeans on a pictorial papyrus from Tell el- ‘Amarna have made this scenario increasingly tenuous; and evidence suggests that there was, in fact, significant direct contact between Egypt and the Aegean. The means by which this contact was maintained, however, still largely escape the archaeologist's gaze. Nonetheless, through analysis of contempo-rary texts and the archaeological record, it is possible to recon-struct some aspects of interstate contact, including the types of ships that were used and the people they may have carried, the sea routes traversed, and the persons and institutions that prompted the voyages across the “Great Green.”
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An outline of some major contacts between societies from the Arabian Peninsula to the Aegean world during the 1st millennium BCE is presented. It considers the trade progression from the Late Bronze Age to the end of the 1st Millennium BCE and discusses the value and insight of long historical arcs and structures, the importance of large-area historical surveys through different strands of historical, and archaeological evidence for the interpretation of persistent patterns of trade. Trade routes, exchanges of products, technological developments, diplomatic relations, as well as climatic, migratory, and demographic features, are discussed. On the basis of evidence from trade in metals and aromatics, navigation and transportation technologies, as well as water management strategies in remote and arid locations which is further supported by contemporary historical sources, inscriptions, and recent archaeological discoveries, this publication describes the long-term structures of interaction and exchange between the Arabian and the Aegean worlds. These structures, we argue, can be summed up into the notion of an "Aegean-Arabian axis" in which products and culture were tangibly shared. With regards to the Hellenization of societies in Western Asia, the case of the Nabataeans demonstrates the cultural and economic impact of trade and the selective import of cultural and aesthetic tropes, as seen in the architectural evidence from Petra and Mada'In Salih. This approach, alongside the growing complexity and regulation of trade, provides a basis from which to estimate the scale and degree of the impact and effects of events and structures such as, climate, economic crises and large demographic migrations, have had on regional economies by pinpointing changes in consumption, or deviation of a route due to shifting realities that make-or-break societies along nodal points on the Arabo-Aegean Axis. By outlining aspects that connect the Arabian and Aegean worlds such as technologies, customs, seafaring, water systems, and domestications that supported the intensification of trade throughout the 1st millennium BCE, we elucidate some diachronic contacts along the Aegean-Arabian axis. This newly defined case area examines qualitatively the development of connectivity between distant societies of the Aegean Sea and the Arabian Peninsula. The arbitrary delineation of unconventional regions shows how tangible historical links can be produced which emphasize different axes of connections that would otherwise be less visible, less recorded, or omitted. The description of long-term interactions and exchanges between the Arabian and the Aegean worlds demonstrably form an "Aegean-Arabian axis" where products and culture were shared.