CAH Vol. 2 Part II The Middle East and Aegean, 1380-1000 BC

Notes on The Cambridge Ancient History Vol. 2, Part II:
The Middle East and the Aegean Region, 1380-1000 B.C.

Introduction:

A big orange book sits beside me, some 1,100 pages thick. In it, detail by detail, is the history of Iliadic Greece, of the Mideast as the Bible knew it, and indeed, of the Hebrew folk who taught us God.

Very important, yes. I still must lament – the Golden Age of Egypt and the Sumerian empires having been left behind – little by way of true literature accompanies this time period.

And these cultures by and large being extinct – or, for those which have survived, being vastly different from their modern descendants – I have no music, no cuisine of their vintage, to enjoy as I explore their world.

I must be patient. The days of full and joyous immersion will come.
– Sunday, November 4, 2001

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Chapter XVII: Struggle for the domination of Syria, 1400-1300 B.C.

Syria: Key to domination of the ancient world. Egypt controlled the region until the end of the Amarna Age. Then the Hittites, then Hurrians allied with Mitannians.
1385 B.C.: Tushratta, king of Mitanni. His rival, Shuppilu-liumash, king of the Hittites circa 1380.

Circa 1365: Hittites under Shuppilu win first battle for control of Syria.

Circa 1360: Second war: Tushratta crushed; his empire is destroyed. Assyria thus regains its independence.

Shuppilu, though, had stepped onto Egyptian turf and soon had to fight that country, probably then ruled by Tutankhamun. Shuppilu died circa 1346, victim of a plague brought back by his own soldiers.

This would all have been about the time of the Israelite judges.

Chapter XVIII: Assyria and Babylon, 1370-1300 B.C.

As had Egypt under the Hyksos, Assyria and Babylon suffered several centuries of a dark age under the control of foreign invaders.

As we noted, Assyria regained her freedom with the crushing of Mitanni, which had dominated her.

First king of resurgent Assyria was Ashur-uballit.

Meanwhile, the Kassite king of Babylon, Burnaburiash II, wrote to Amenophis IV of Egypt, complaining about the Assyrians’ conduct. But Assyria, one-time vassal of the Kassites, then made marital alliances with Burnaburiash and ultimately put a descendant of Ashur-uballit, one Kurigalzu, on the Babylonian throne.