Kush And The Eastern Mediterranean
The Rise Of Civilization In The Middle East And Africa
Edited By: R. A. Guisepi
Toward the end of the early civilization period, a number of partially
separate civilization centers sprang up on the fringes of the civilized world
in Africa and the Middle East, extending also into parts of southern Europe.
These centers built heavily on the achievements of the great early centers.
They resulted from the expansion efforts of these centers, as in the Egyptian
push southward during the New Kingdom period and from new organizational
problems within the chief centers themselves; in the Middle East, separate
societies emerged during the chaotic centuries following the collapse of the
Hittite empire.
Kush And Axum: Civilization Spreads In Africa
The kingdom of Kush sprang up along the upper (southern) reaches of the
Nile. Kush was the first African state other than Egypt of which there is
record. This was a state on the frontiers of Egyptian activity, where Egyptian
garrisons had been stationed from time to time. By 1000 B.C. it emerged as an
independent political unit, though strongly influenced by Egyptian forms. By
730 B.C., as Egypt declined, Kush was strong enough to conquer its northern
neighbor and rule it for several centuries, though this conquest was soon
ended by Assyrian invasion from the Middle East. After this point the Kushites
began to push their frontiers farther south, gaining a more diverse African
population and weakening the Egyptian influence. It was at this point that the
new capital was established at Meroe. Kushites became skilled in iron use and
had access to substantial African ore and fuel. The use of iron tools extended
the area that could be brought into agriculture. Kush formed a key center of
metal technology in the ancient world, as a basis of both military and
economic strength.
Kushites developed a form of writing derived from Egyptian hieroglyphics
(and which has not yet been fully deciphered). They established a number of
significant cities. Their political organization, also derived from Egypt,
emphasized a strong monarchy with elaborate ceremonies based on the belief
that the king was a god. Kushite economic influence extended widely in
sub-Saharan Africa. Extensive trade was conducted with people to the west, and
this trade may have brought knowledge of iron making to much of the rest of
Africa. The greatest period of the kingdom at Meroe, where activities centered
from the early 6th century onward, lasted from about 250 B.C. to A.D. 50. By
this time the kingdom served as a channel for African goods - animal skins,
ebony and ivory, gold and slaves - into the commerce of the Middle East and
the Mediterranean. Many monuments were built during these centuries, including
huge royal pyramids and an elaborate palace in Meroe. Much fine pottery and
jewelry were produced. Meroe began to decline from about A.D. 100 onward and
was defeated by a kingdom to the south, Axum, around A.D. 300. Prosperity and
extensive political and economic activity did not end in this region, but
extended into the formation of a kingdom in present-day Ethiopia.
The outreach of Kush is not entirely clear beyond its trading network set
up with neighboring regions. Whether African peoples outside the Upper Nile
region learned much from Kush about political forms is unknown. Certainly
there was little imitation of its writing, and the region of Kush and Ethiopia
would long remain somewhat isolated from the wider stream of African history.
Nevertheless, the formation of a separate society stretching below the eastern
Sahara was an important step in setting the bases for technological and
economic change throughout much of upper Africa. Though its achievements flow
less fully into later African development, Kush holds for Africa what Sumer
achieved for the Middle East - it set a wider process of civilization in
motion.
The Mediterranean Region
Smaller centers in the Middle East began to spring up after about 1500
B.C. Though dependent on the larger Mesopotamian culture for many features,
these centers added important new ingredients and in some cases also extended
the hold of civilization westward to the Asian coast of the Mediterranean. The
smaller cultures also added to the diversity of the Middle East, creating a
varied array of identities that would continue to mark the region even under
the impetus of later empires, such as Rome, or the sweeping religion of Islam.
Several of these smaller cultures proved immensely durable and would influence
other parts of the world as well.
The Jews
The most important of the smaller Middle Eastern groups were the Jews,
who gave the world one of its most influential religions. The Jews were a
Semitic people (a population group that also includes the Arabs). They were
influenced by Babylonian civilization but also marked by a period of
enslavement in Egypt. They settled in the southeast corner of the
Mediterranean around 1600 B.C., probably migrating from Mesopotamia. Some
moved into Egypt where they were treated as a subject people. In the 13th
century B.C., Moses led these Jews to Palestine, in search of a homeland
promised by the Jewish God, Yahweh. This was later held to be the central
development in Jewish history. The Jews began at this point to emerge as a
people with a self-conscious culture and some political identity. At most
points, however, the Jewish state was small and relatively weak, retaining
independence only while other parts of the Middle East were disorganized. A
few Jewish kings were able to unify their people, but at many points the Jews
were divided into separate regional states. Most of Palestine came under
foreign (initially Assyrian) domination from 722 B.C. onward, but the Jews
were able to maintain their cultural identity and key religious traditions.
Monotheism
The distinctive achievement of the Jews was the development of a strong
monotheistic religion. Early Jewish leaders probably emphasized a particularly
strong, creator god as the most powerful of many divinities - a hierarchy not
uncommon in animism - but this encouraged a focus on the father God for prayer
and loyalty. By the time of Moses, Jews were urged increasingly to abandon
worship of all other gods and to receive from Yahweh the Torah (a holy Law),
the keeping of which would assure divine protection and guidance. From this
point onward Jews regarded themselves as a chosen people under God's special
guidance. As Jewish politics deteriorated due to increasing foreign pressure,
prophets sprang up to call Jews back to faithful observance of God's laws. By
the 9th century B.C. some religious ideas and the history of the Jews began to
be written down in what would become the Jewish Bible (the Old Testament of
the Christian Bible).
Besides the emphasis on a single God, Jewish religion had two important
features. First was the idea of an overall divine plan. God guided Jewish
history, and when disasters came they constituted punishment for failures to
live up to divine laws. Second was the concept of a divinely organized
morality. The Jewish God demanded not empty sacrifices or selfish prayers, but
righteous behavior. God, though severe, was ultimately merciful and would help
the Jews to regain morality. This system was not only monotheistic but also
intensely ethical; God was actively concerned with the doings of people and so
enjoined good behavior. By the 2d century B.C., these concepts were clearly
spelled out in the Torah and the other writings that were formed into the Old
Testament of the Bible. By their emphasis on a written religion the Jews were
able to retain their identity under foreign rule and even under outright
dispersion from their Mediterranean homeland.
The impact of Jewish religion beyond the Jewish people was complex. The
Jews saw God's guidance in all of human history, and not simply their own.
Ultimately all peoples would be led to God. But God's special pact was with
the Jews, and there was little premium placed on missionary activity or
converting others to the faith. This limitation helps explain the intensity
and durability of the Jewish faith; it also kept the Jewish people a minority
within the Middle East though at various points substantial conversions to
Judaism did spread the religion somewhat more widely. Jewish monotheism,
though a landmark in world religious history, is noteworthy for sustaining a
distinctive Jewish culture to our own day, not for immediately altering a
wider religious map.
Yet the elaboration of monotheism had a wide significance. In Jewish
hands the concept of God became less humanlike, more abstract - a basic change
not only in religion but in overall outlook. Yahweh had a power and a planning
quality far different from the attributes of the traditional gods of the
Middle East or Egypt. The gods, particularly in Mesopotamia, were whimsical
and capricious; Yahweh was orderly and just, and individuals could know what
to expect if they adhered to God's rules. The link to ethical conduct and
moral behavior was also central. Religion for the Jews was a system of life,
not merely a set of rituals and ceremonies. The full impact of this religious
transformation on Middle Eastern and Mediterranean civilization would come
only later, when Jewish ideas were taken up by the proselytizing faiths of
Christianity and Islam. But the basic concept formed one of the legacies of
the twilight period from the first great civilizations to the new cultures
that would soon arise in their place.
The Minoans
The Jews were not alone among the distinct societies popping up in the
eastern Mediterranean. Around 1600 B.C. a civilized society developed on the
island of Crete. This Minoan society traded widely with both Mesopotamia and
Egypt, and probably acquired many of its civilized characteristics from this
exchange. Minoan society, for example, copied Egyptian architectural forms and
mathematics, though it developed important new artistic styles in the colossal
palace built in the capital city, Knossos. The alphabet, too, was adapted from
Egypt. Political structures similar to those of Egypt or the Mesopotamian
empires emphasized elaborate bureaucratic con- trols, complete with massive
record keeping, under a powerful monarch. Minoan navies at various points
conquered parts of the mainland of Greece, eventually leading to the
establishment of the first civilization there. Centered particularly in the
kingdom of Mycenae, this early Greek civilization developed considerable
capacity for monumental building, and also conducted important wars with
city-states in the Middle East, including the famous conflict with Troy.
Civilizations in Crete and in Greece were overturned by a wave of
Indo-European invasions, culminating around 1000 B.C., that temporarily
reduced the capacities of these societies to maintain elaborate art or
writing, or extensive political or economic organizations. While the
civilization that would arise later, to form classical Greece, had somewhat
separate origins, it would build extensively on the memories of this first
civilized society and on its roots in Egyptian and Mesopotamian achievements.
The Phoenicians
Another distinct society grew up in the Middle East itself, in what is
now the nation of Lebanon. Around 2000 B.C. a people called the Phoenicians
settled on the Mediterranean coast. Like the Minoans, they quickly turned to
seafaring because their agricultural hinterland was not extensive. The
Phoenicians used their elaborate trading contacts to gain knowledge from the
major civilization centers, and then in several key cases improved upon what
they learned. Around 1300 B.C. they devised a much simplified alphabet based
on the Mesopotamian cuneiform. The Phoenician alphabet had only 22 letters,
and so was learned relatively easily. It served as ancestor to the Greek and
Latin lettering systems. The Phoenicians also upgraded the Egyptian numbering
system.
The Phoenicians were, however, a merchant people, not vested in extensive
cultural achievements. They advanced manufacturing techniques in several
areas, particularly the production of dyes for cloth. Above all, for
commercial purposes, they dispersed and set up colonies at a number of points
along the Mediterranean. They benefited from the growing weakness of Egypt and
the earlier collapse of Minoan society and its Greek successor, for there were
few competitors for influence in the Mediterranean by 1000 B.C. Phoenician
sailors moved steadily westward, setting up a major trading city on the coast
of North Africa at Carthage, and lesser centers in Italy, Spain, and southern
France. The Phoenicians even traded along the Atlantic coast of Europe,
reaching Britain where they sought a supply of tin. Ultimately Phoenicia
collapsed in the wake of the Assyrian invasions of the Middle East, though
several of the colonial cities long survived.
