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Sea Peoples



 
 
The Sea Peoples is the term used for a confederacy of seafaring raiders of the second millennium BC who sailed into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, caused political unrest, and attempted to enter or control Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
ian territory during the late 19th dynasty
Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt

The Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combined under the group title, New Kingdom....
, and especially during Year 8 of Ramesses III
Ramesses III

Usimare Ramesses III was the second Pharaoh of the Twentieth dynasty of Egypt and is considered to be the last great New Kingdom king to wield any substantial authority over Egypt....
 of the 20th Dynasty
Twentieth dynasty of Egypt

The Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combined under the group title, New Kingdom. This dynasty is considered to be the last one of the New Kingdom of Egypt, and was followed by the Third Intermediate Period....
. The Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah
Merneptah

Merneptah was the fourth ruler of the Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt of Ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for almost ten years between late July or early August 1213 to May 2, 1203 BC, according to contemporary historical records....
 explicitly refers to them by the term "the foreign-countries (or 'peoples') of the sea" (Egyptian
Egyptian language

Egyptian is a branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages language family along with the Chadic languages, Berber languages, Semitic languages, Cushitic languages and possibly Omotic languages languages....
 ) in his Great Karnak Inscription
Great Karnak Inscription

Located on the wall of the Precinct of Amun-Re#First Court , in the Precinct of Amun-Re of the Karnak, in modern Luxor, the Great Karnak Inscription of Merneptah is a record of the campaigns of this king against the Sea Peoples....
.






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The Sea Peoples is the term used for a confederacy of seafaring raiders of the second millennium BC who sailed into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, caused political unrest, and attempted to enter or control Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
ian territory during the late 19th dynasty
Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt

The Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combined under the group title, New Kingdom....
, and especially during Year 8 of Ramesses III
Ramesses III

Usimare Ramesses III was the second Pharaoh of the Twentieth dynasty of Egypt and is considered to be the last great New Kingdom king to wield any substantial authority over Egypt....
 of the 20th Dynasty
Twentieth dynasty of Egypt

The Eighteenth, Nineteenth, and Twentieth Dynasties of ancient Egypt are often combined under the group title, New Kingdom. This dynasty is considered to be the last one of the New Kingdom of Egypt, and was followed by the Third Intermediate Period....
. The Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah
Merneptah

Merneptah was the fourth ruler of the Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt of Ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for almost ten years between late July or early August 1213 to May 2, 1203 BC, according to contemporary historical records....
 explicitly refers to them by the term "the foreign-countries (or 'peoples') of the sea" (Egyptian
Egyptian language

Egyptian is a branch of the Afro-Asiatic languages language family along with the Chadic languages, Berber languages, Semitic languages, Cushitic languages and possibly Omotic languages languages....
 ) in his Great Karnak Inscription
Great Karnak Inscription

Located on the wall of the Precinct of Amun-Re#First Court , in the Precinct of Amun-Re of the Karnak, in modern Luxor, the Great Karnak Inscription of Merneptah is a record of the campaigns of this king against the Sea Peoples....
. Although some scholars believe that they "invaded" Cyprus
Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is an island country situated in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, west of Lebanon, Syria, and Israel, south of Turkey and north of Egypt....
, Hatti
Hatti

Hatti in Bronze Age Anatolia refers to:*the area of Hattusa, roughly delimited by the Halys bend*the Hattians of the 3rd millennium BC and 2nd millennium BC millennia BC...
 and the Levant
Levant

The Levant describes, traditionally, the Eastern Mediterranean at large, but can be used as a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia formed by the lands bordering the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, roughly bounded on the north by the Taurus Mountains, on the south by the Arabian Desert, and on the west by the M...
, this hypothesis is disputed.

Historical context


The Late Bronze Age in the Aegean
Aegean Sea

The Aegean Sea is an elongated embayment of the Mediterranean Sea located between the southern Balkans and Anatolian peninsulas, i.e., between the mainlands of Greece and Turkey respectively....
 was characterized by raiding and resettling of threatening and migratory peoples, sometimes used as mercenaries by the Egyptians, and operating primarily on land. Many were not listed as Sea Peoples. Among them were the 'prw (Habiru
Habiru

Habiru or Apiru or pr.w was the name given by various Sumerian, History of Ancient Egypt, Akkadian, Hittites, Mitanni, and Ugaritic sources to a group of people living as nomadic invaders in areas of the Fertile Crescent from Northeastern Mesopotamia and Iran to the borders of Egypt in Canaan Depending on the source and epoch,...
) of Egyptian inscriptions, or 'apiru of cuneiform ("bandits"). Sandars uses the analogous name, "land peoples." Some people, such as the Lukka
Lukka

The Lukka lands are often mentioned in Hittites texts from the second millennium BC. It denotes a region in the southwestern part of Anatolia. The Lukka lands were never put under permanent Hittite control and were viewed as hostile by the Hittites....
, were in both categories. Some scholars suspect that one of the groups of "Habiru" were the Hebrews
Hebrews

Hebrews are an ancient people defined as descendants of biblical Patriarch Abraham , a descendent of Noah.In the Bible, the patriarch Abraham is referred to a single time as the ivri, which is the singular form of the Hebrew-language word for Hebrew ....
.

The identity of the sea peoples has been an enigma to modern scholars, who have only the scattered records of ancient civilizations and archaeology to inform them. The evidence shows that the identities and motives of these peoples were not unknown to the Egyptians; in fact, many had been subordinate to them or in a diplomatic relationship with them for at least as long as the few centuries covered by the records.

Documentary records


Byblos obelisk

The earliest ethnic group
Ethnic group

An ethnic group is a group of humans whose members identify with each other, through a common heritage that is real or presumed.Ethnic identity is further marked by the recognition from others of a group's distinctiveness and the recognition of common culture, linguistic, religion, human behaviour or Race traits, real or presumed, as indic...
 later considered among the sea peoples is believed to be attested in Egyptian hieroglyphics on the "Byblos obelisk" found in the "Obelisk Temple" at Byblos
Byblos

Byblos is the Greek language name of the Phoenician city Gebal . It is a Mediterranean city in the Mount Lebanon Governorate of present-day Lebanon under the current Arabic language name of Jbeil and was also referred to as Gibelet during the Crusades....
. The inscription mentions kwkwn son of rwqq, transliterated as Kukunnis, son of Lukka, "the Lycia
Lycia

Lycia was a region in Anatolia in what are now the Provinces of Turkey of Antalya Province and Mugla Province on the southern coast of Turkey. It was a federation of ancient cities in the region and later a Roman province of the Roman Empire....
n." The date is given variously as 2000 or 1700 BC.

Early Amarna age

The Lukka
Lukka

The Lukka lands are often mentioned in Hittites texts from the second millennium BC. It denotes a region in the southwestern part of Anatolia. The Lukka lands were never put under permanent Hittite control and were viewed as hostile by the Hittites....
 appear much later and also the Sherden in the Amarna Letters
Amarna letters

The Amarna letters are an archive of correspondence on clay tablets, mostly diplomatic, between the Ancient Egypt administration and its representatives in Canaan and Amurru during the New Kingdom....
, perhaps of Amenhotep III
Amenhotep III

Amenhotep III was the ninth pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt. According to different authors, he ruled Egypt from June 1391 BC-December 1353 BC or June 1388 BC to December 1351 BC/1350 BC after his father Thutmose IV died....
 or his son Akhenaten
Akhenaten

Akhenaten , was a Pharaoh of the Eighteenth dynasty of Egypt, who died 1336 BC or 1334 BC. He is especially noted for attempting to compel the Egyptian population in the monotheism worship of Aten, although there are doubts as to how successful he was at this....
, around the mid-14th century BC. A Sherden man is an apparent renegade mercenary, and three more are slain by an Egyptian overseer. The Danuna are mentioned in another letter but only in passing reference to the death of their king. The Lukka
Lukka

The Lukka lands are often mentioned in Hittites texts from the second millennium BC. It denotes a region in the southwestern part of Anatolia. The Lukka lands were never put under permanent Hittite control and were viewed as hostile by the Hittites....
 are being accused of attacking the Egyptians in conjunction with the Alashiya
Alashiya

Alashiya or Alasiya was an important state during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages and was situated somewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean....
ns, or Cypriotes
Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is an island country situated in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, west of Lebanon, Syria, and Israel, south of Turkey and north of Egypt....
, with the latter having stated that the Lukka were seizing their villages.

Reign of Ramesses II

Records or possible records of sea peoples generally or in particular date to two campaigns of Ramesses II
Ramesses II

Ramesses II was the third Egyptian pharaoh of the Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt. He is often regarded as Ancient Egypt's greatest, most celebrated, and most powerful pharaoh....
, a pharaoh of the militant 19th Dynasty: operations in or near the Delta in Year 2 of his reign, and the major confrontation with the Hittite
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
 Empire and allies at the Battle of Kadesh
Battle of Kadesh

The Battle of Kadesh took place between the forces of the Egyptian Empire under Ramesses II and the Hittite Empire under Muwatalli II at the city of Kadesh on the Orontes River, in what is now the Syrian Arab Republic....
 in his Year 5. The dates of this long-lived pharaoh's reign are not known for certain but they must have comprised nearly all of the first half of the 13th century BC.

In his Year 2, an attack of the Sherden or Shardana on the Nile Delta was repulsed and defeated by Ramesses who captured some of the pirates. The event is recorded on Tanis Stele II. An inscription by Ramesses II on the stela from Tanis
Tanis

The word Tanis has a number of meanings:* Tanis - An alternative metal group from Baton Rouge, Louisiana* Tanis Diena - A Latvian pig festival...
 which recorded the Sherden raider's raid and subsequent capture speaks of the continuous threat which they posed to Egypt's Mediterranean coasts:
"the unruly Sherden whom no one had ever known how to combat, they came boldly sailing in their warships from the midst of the sea, none being able to withstand them."


The Sherden prisoners were subsequently incorporated into the Egyptian army for service on the Hittite
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
 frontier by Ramesses. Another stele usually cited in conjunction with this one is the "Aswan Stele" (there were other stelae at Aswan
Aswan

Aswan , Egyptian language: Swenet , Coptic language: Swan; Greek language: Syene; ) is a city in the south of Egypt, the capital of the Aswan Governorate....
), which mentions the king's operations to defeat a number of peoples including those of the "Great Green." If the latter term means "sea", the "sea peoples" seem to be indicated even at this early date, but if it means the swampy Delta region, then the peoples need not have been of the sea. It is plausible to assume that the Tanis and Aswan Stelae refer to the same event, in which case they reinforce each other.

The Battle of Kadesh
Battle of Kadesh

The Battle of Kadesh took place between the forces of the Egyptian Empire under Ramesses II and the Hittite Empire under Muwatalli II at the city of Kadesh on the Orontes River, in what is now the Syrian Arab Republic....
 was the outcome of a campaign against the Syrians and allies in the Levant
Levant

The Levant describes, traditionally, the Eastern Mediterranean at large, but can be used as a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia formed by the lands bordering the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, roughly bounded on the north by the Taurus Mountains, on the south by the Arabian Desert, and on the west by the M...
 in the pharaoh's Year 5. The imminent collision of the Egyptian and Hittite empires became obvious to the both of them and they both prepared campaigns against the strategic mid-point of Kadesh for the next year. Ramesses divided his Egyptian forces, which were then ambushed piecemeal by the Hittite army and nearly defeated. The arrival of the last of the Egyptians turned the tide of battle and the king was able to escape, leaving Kadesh in Hittite hands.

At home, Ramesses had his scribes formulate an official description that has been called "the Bulletin
The Bulletin

The Bulletin is a discontinued Australian weekly magazine that was published in Sydney from 1880 until January 2008. It was influential in Australian culture and politics from about 1890 until World War I, the period when it was identified with the "Bulletin school" of Australian literature....
" because it was widely published by inscription. Ten copies survive today on the temples at Abydos
Abydos, Egypt

Abydos , one of the most ancient cities of Upper and Lower Egypt, is about 11 km west of the Nile at latitude 26? 10' N. The Egyptian name of both the eighth Nome of Upper Egypt and its capital city was Abdju, technically, 3bdw as in the hieroglyphs shown to the right, the hill of the symbol or reliquary, in which...
, Karnak
Karnak

The Karnak temple complex, universally known only as Karnak, describes a vast conglomeration of ruined temples, chapels, pylons and other buildings....
, Luxor
Thebes, Egypt

Thebes was a city in Ancient Egypt located about 800 km south of the Mediterranean, on the east bank of the river Nile . It was the capital of Waset, the fourth Upper Egyptian Nome ....
 and Abu Simbel
Abu Simbel

Abu Simbel is an archaeological site comprising two massive rock temples in southern Egypt on the western bank of Lake Nasser about 290 km southwest of Aswan....
, with reliefs depicting the battle. A poem, the Poem of Pentaur, describing the battle survives also.

The poem relates that the previously captured Sherden were not only working for his majesty, they were formulating a plan of battle for him; i.e., it was their idea to divide Egyptian forces into four columns. There is no evidence of any collaboration with the Hittites or malicious intent on their part, and if Ramesses considered it, he never left any record of that consideration.

Ramesses had defeated the Kheta, or Syrian Hittites, the previous year. The poem relates that the Kheta were at Kadesh now with a force "like grasshoppers". The list is mainly "land peoples", but the Lukka
Lukka

The Lukka lands are often mentioned in Hittites texts from the second millennium BC. It denotes a region in the southwestern part of Anatolia. The Lukka lands were never put under permanent Hittite control and were viewed as hostile by the Hittites....
 are there as well.

Reign of Merneptah


The major event of the reign of the Pharaoh Merneptah
Merneptah

Merneptah was the fourth ruler of the Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt of Ancient Egypt. He ruled Egypt for almost ten years between late July or early August 1213 to May 2, 1203 BC, according to contemporary historical records....
, 1213 BC to 1203 BC. 4th king of the 19th Dynasty, was his battle against a confederacy termed "the Nine Bows" at Perire in the western delta in the 5th and 6th years of his reign. Depredations of this confederacy had been so severe that the region was "forsaken as pasturage for cattle, it was left waste from the time of the ancestors."

The pharaoh's action against them is attested in four inscriptions: the Great Karnak Inscription
Great Karnak Inscription

Located on the wall of the Precinct of Amun-Re#First Court , in the Precinct of Amun-Re of the Karnak, in modern Luxor, the Great Karnak Inscription of Merneptah is a record of the campaigns of this king against the Sea Peoples....
, describing the battle, the Cairo Column, the Athribis Stele (which last two are shorter versions of the Great Karnak) and a stele found at Thebes, called variously the Hymn of Victory, the Merneptah Stele
Merneptah Stele

The Merneptah Stele ? also known as the Israel Stele or Victory Stele of Merneptah ? is an inscription by the Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah , which appears on the reverse side of a granite stela erected by the Pharaoh Amenhotep III....
 or the Israel Stele. It describes the reign of peace resulting from the victory.

The Nine Bows were acting under the leadership of the king of Libya
Libya

Libya , officially the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya , is a country located in North Africa. Bordering the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Libya lies between Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
, and an associated near concurrent revolt in Canaan
Canaan

Canaan is an ancient term for a region encompassing modern-day Israel and Lebanon, the Palestinian Territories, plus adjoining coastal lands and parts of Jordan, Syria and northeastern Egypt....
, involving Gaza
Gaza

Gaza is a Palestinian people city in the Gaza Strip, approximately southwest of Jerusalem, with a population of 410,000, making it the largest city under the control of the Palestinian National Authority....
, Ashkelon
Ashkelon

Ashkelon or Ashqelon is a coastal city in the South District of Israel. The ancient seaport of Ashkelon dates back to the Bronze Age. In the course of its history, it has been ruled by the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Babylonians, the Phoenicians, the Ancient Romes, the Muslims and the Crusaders....
, Yenoam and Israel. Exactly which peoples were consistently in the Nine Bows is not clear, but present at the battle were the Libyans, some neighboring Meshwesh
Meshwesh

The Meshwesh were an ancient Libyan tribe from Cyrenaica. During the Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt and Twentieth dynasty of Egypt Dynasty, the Meshwesh were in almost constant conflict with the Egyptian state....
, and possibly a separate revolt in the following year involving peoples from the eastern Mediterranean including the Kheta (or Hittites), or Syrians, and (in the Israel Stele) for the first time in history the Israelites. In addition to them the first lines of the Karnak inscription include some sea peoples: which must have arrived in the Western Delta or from Cyrene
Cyrene

Cyrene may refer to:* Cyrene , a Greek mythological figure* Cyrene, Libya, an ancient Greek colony in North Africa* The USS Cyrene , a motor torpedo boat tender...
 by ship.

Later in the inscription Merneptah receives news of the attack:

"His majesty was enraged at their report, like a lion", assembled his court and gave a rousing speech. Later he dreamed he saw Ptah
Ptah

In Egyptian mythology, Ptah was the deification of the primordial mound in the Ennead cosmogony, which was more literally referred to as Ta-tenen , meaning risen land, or as Tanen, meaning submerged land....
 handing him a sword and saying "Take thou (it) and banish thou the fearful heart from thee." When the bowmen went forth, says the inscription, "Amun
Amun

Amun, reconstructed Egyptian language Yamanu , was the name of a deity in Egyptian mythology who gradually rose from being an abstract concept to the patron deity of Thebes, Egypt and one of the most important deities in Ancient Egypt before fading into obscurity....
 was with them as a shield." After six hours the surviving Nine Bows threw down their weapons, abandoned their baggage and dependents, and ran for their lives. Merneptah states that he defeated the invasion, killing 6,000 soldiers and taking 9,000 prisoners. To be sure of the numbers, among other things, he took the penises of all uncircumcised enemy dead and the hands of all the circumcised, from which history learns that the Ekwesh were circumcised, a fact causing some to doubt they were Greek.

Letters at Ugarit

Some sea peoples appear in four letters found at Ugarit
Ugarit

Ugarit was an ancient cosmopolitan port city, sited on the Mediterranean coast. Ugarit sent tribute to Ancient Egypt and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus , documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean Greece and Cypriot pottery found there....
, the last three of which seem to foreshadow the destruction of the city around 1180 BC. The letters are therefore dated to the early twelfth century. The last king of Ugarit
Ugarit

Ugarit was an ancient cosmopolitan port city, sited on the Mediterranean coast. Ugarit sent tribute to Ancient Egypt and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus , documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean Greece and Cypriot pottery found there....
 was Ammurapi
Ammurapi

Ammurapi was the last Bronze Age ruler and king of the Ancient Syria city of Ugarit who ca. 1215 - 1180 BC. Ammurapi was a contemporary of the Hittites King Suppiluliuma II....
, or Hammurabi (c. 1191–1182 BC), who, throughout this correspondence, is quite a young man.

The earliest is letter RS 34.129, found on the south side of the city, from "the Great King", presumably Suppiluliuma II
Suppiluliuma II

Suppiluliuma II, the son of Tudhaliya IV, was the last known king of the New Kingdom of the Hittite Empire, ruling ca. 1207 ? 1178 BC , contemporary with Tukulti-Ninurta I of Assyria....
 of the Hittites
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
, to the prefect of the city. He says that he ordered the king of Ugarit to send him Ibnadushu for questioning, but the king was too immature to respond. He therefore wants the prefect to send the man, whom he promises to return.

What this language implies about the relationship of the Hittite empire to Ugarit is a matter for interpretation. Ibnadushu had been kidnapped by and had resided among a people of Shikala, probably the Shekelesh, "who lived on ships." The letter is generally interpreted as an interest in military intelligence by the king.

The last three letters, RS L 1, RS 20.238 and RS 20.18, are a set from the Rap'anu Archive between a slightly older Ammurapi, now handling his own affairs, and Eshuwara, the grand supervisor of Alasiya. Evidently, Ammurapi had informed Eshuwara, that an enemy fleet of 20 ships had been spotted at sea.

Eshuwara wrote back and inquired about the location of Ammurapi's own forces. Eshuwara also noted that he would like to know where the enemy fleet of 20 ships are now located. Unfortunately for both Ugarit and Alasiya, neither kingdom was able to fend off the Sea People's onslaught and both were ultimately destroyed. A letter by Amurapi (RS 18.147) to the king of Alasiya--which was in fact a response to an appeal for assistance by the latter—has been found by archaeologists. In it, Ammurapi describes the desperate plight facing Ugarit:

Ammurapi, in turn, appealed for aid from the viceroy of Carchemish—a state which actually survived the Sea People's onslaught—but its viceroy could only offer some words of advice for Ammurapi:

Reign of Ramesses III

Pharaoh Ramesses III
Ramesses III

Usimare Ramesses III was the second Pharaoh of the Twentieth dynasty of Egypt and is considered to be the last great New Kingdom king to wield any substantial authority over Egypt....
, the second king of the 20th Dynasty, who reigned for most of the first half of the 12th century BC, was forced to deal with a later wave of invasions of the Sea Peoples—the best recorded being in his eighth year. The pharaoh records the Sea People's activities in several long inscriptions from his Medinet Habu
Medinet Habu

Medinet Habu is an important Egypt archaeology and tourism locality on the Theban Necropolis of the modern city of Luxor.Somewhat ambiguously, the toponym Medinet Habu can refer to either:...
 mortuary temple:

"The foreign countries (ie. Sea Peoples) made a conspiracy in their islands, All at once the lands were removed and scattered in the fray. No land could stand before their arms: from Hatti
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
, Qode
Kadesh

This article is about Kadesh in the lands of the Amurru, bordering on Damascus Syria up to Hammath; see also Kadesh orKedesh Kadesh was an Cities of the Ancient Near East of the Levant, located on or near the headwaters or ford of the Orontes River It is surmised by Kenneth Kitchen to be the ruins at Tell Nebi Mend, about south...
, Carchemish
Carchemish

Carchemish was an important ancient city of the Mitanni and Hittites empires, now on the frontier between Turkey and Syria. It was the location of an Battle of Carchemish between the Babylonians and Egyptians, mentioned in the Bible....
, Arzawa
Arzawa

Arzawa was the name of a region or kingdom in Western Anatolia, which later to be known as Lydia in the post-Hittite era. It was the western neighbour and sometimes vassal of the Hittites, and probably bordered on the Assuwa league to the north....
 and Alashiya
Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is an island country situated in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, west of Lebanon, Syria, and Israel, south of Turkey and north of Egypt....
 on, being cut off [ie. destroyed] at one time. A camp was set up in Amurru
Amurru

Amurru are names given in Akkadian language and Sumerian language texts to the god of the Amorite/Amurru people, often forming part of personal names....
. They desolated its people, and its land was like that which has never come into being. They were coming forward toward Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
, while the flame was prepared before them. Their confederation
Confederation

Usually created by treaty but often later adopting a common constitution, confederations tend to be established for dealing with critical issues such as defense , foreign affairs, or a common currency, with the central government being required to provide support for all members....
 was the Peleset, Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
, Shekelesh, Denyen
Denyen

The Denyen are one of the groups associated with the Sea Peoples, raiders associated with the Eastern Mediterranean Greek Dark Ages who attacked Egypt during the reign of Rameses III....
 and Weshesh, lands united. They laid their hands upon the land as far as the circuit of the earth, their hearts confident and trusting: 'Our plans will succeed!"


No land could stand before their arms
The ends of several civilization
Civilization

A civilization is a society or culture group normally defined as a complex society characterized by the practice of agriculture and settlement in towns and city....
s around 1175 BC have instigated a theory that the Sea Peoples may have caused the collapse of the Hittite
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
, Mycenaean
Mycenaean Greece

Mycenaean Greece is a cultural period of ancient Greece taking its name from the archaeological site of Mycenae in northeastern Argolis, in the Peloponnese of southern Greece....
 and Mitanni
Mitanni

Mitanni or Hanigalbat was a loosely organized Hurrian-speaking Hittite vassal state in northern Syria from ca. 1500 BC-1300 BC."The Assyrians called the lands of Mitanni Hanigalbat while to the Hittites it was the land of the Hurrians....
 kingdoms. The American Hittitologist
Hittitologist

A Hittitologist is an archaeologist, historian, linguist, or art historian who specialises in the study of the Ancient Hittites and their Near Eastern Empire which was based in Hattusa in modern day Anatolia....
, Gary Beckman
Gary Beckman

Professor Gary Beckman is a noted Hittitologist and Professor of Hittite and Mesopotamian Studies from the University of Michigan. He has written several books on the Ancient Hittites: his publication 'Hittite Diplomatic Texts' and 'Hittite Myths' were both republished twice--in 1991 and 1999 respectively....
, writes on page 23 of Akkadica 120 (2000):

Ramesses' comments about the scale of the Sea Peoples' onslaught in the eastern Mediterranean are confirmed by the destruction of the states of Hatti
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
, Ugarit
Ugarit

Ugarit was an ancient cosmopolitan port city, sited on the Mediterranean coast. Ugarit sent tribute to Ancient Egypt and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus , documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean Greece and Cypriot pottery found there....
, Ashkelon
Ashkelon

Ashkelon or Ashqelon is a coastal city in the South District of Israel. The ancient seaport of Ashkelon dates back to the Bronze Age. In the course of its history, it has been ruled by the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Babylonians, the Phoenicians, the Ancient Romes, the Muslims and the Crusaders....
 and Hazor
Hazor

Hazor is the name of several places in the biblical and modern Israel:Biblical locations:* Tel Hazor, site of an ancient fortified city in the Upper Galilee, among the most important Caananite towns, and the largest ancient ruin in modern Israel and UNESCO World Heritage Site....
 around this time. As the Hittitologist Trevor Bryce observes:

This situation is confirmed by the Medinet Habu
Medinet Habu

Medinet Habu is an important Egypt archaeology and tourism locality on the Theban Necropolis of the modern city of Luxor.Somewhat ambiguously, the toponym Medinet Habu can refer to either:...
 temple reliefs of Ramesses III which show that:
Checking the onslaught
The inscriptions of Ramesses III
Ramesses III

Usimare Ramesses III was the second Pharaoh of the Twentieth dynasty of Egypt and is considered to be the last great New Kingdom king to wield any substantial authority over Egypt....
 at his Medinet Habu
Medinet Habu (temple)

Medinet Habu is the name commonly given to the Temples of a Million years of Ramesses III, an important New Kingdom period structure in the Medinet Habu of the same name on the Theban Necropolis of Luxor in Egypt....
 mortuary temple in Thebes
Thebes, Egypt

Thebes was a city in Ancient Egypt located about 800 km south of the Mediterranean, on the east bank of the river Nile . It was the capital of Waset, the fourth Upper Egyptian Nome ....
 record three victorious campaigns against the sea peoples considered bona fide: Years 5, 8 and 12, as well as three considered spurious: against the Nubia
Nubia

Nubia is a region in Southern Egypt along the Nile and in what is now northern Sudan. Most of Nubia is situated in Sudan with about a quarter of its territory in Egypt....
ns and Libya
Libya

Libya , officially the Great Socialist People's Libyan Arab Jamahiriya , is a country located in North Africa. Bordering the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Libya lies between Egypt to the east, Sudan to the southeast, Chad and Niger to the south, and Algeria and Tunisia to the west....
ns in Year 5 and the Libyans with Asiatics in the Year 11. During the Year 8 some Hittites
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
 were operating with the sea peoples.

The inner west wall of the second court describes the invasion of Year 5. Only the Peleset and Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
 are mentioned, but the list is lost in a lacuna
Lacuna (manuscripts)

A lacuna is a gap in a manuscript, inscription, text, painting, or a musical work.The state of old manuscripts or inscriptions which have weathered or been damaged sometimes gives rise to lacunae ? passages consisting of a word or words that are missing or illegible....
. The attack was two-pronged, one by sea and one by land; that is, the sea peoples divided their forces. His majesty was waiting in the Nile
Nile

The Nile is a major north-flowing river in Africa, generally regarded as the List of rivers by length in the world.The Nile has two major tributary, the White Nile and Blue Nile, the latter being the source of most of the Nile's water and silt, but the former being the longer of the two....
 mouths and trapped the enemy fleet there. The land forces were defeated separately.

The Sea peoples did not learn any lessons from this defeat, as they repeated their mistake in the Year 8 with a similar result. The campaign is recorded more extensively on the inner northwest panel of the first court. It is possible but not generally believed that the dates are only those of the inscriptions and both refer to the same campaign.

In Ramesses' Year 8, the
Nine Bows appear again as a "conspiracy in their isles." This time they are revealed unquestionably as sea peoples: the Peleset, Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
, Shekelesh, Denyen
Denyen

The Denyen are one of the groups associated with the Sea Peoples, raiders associated with the Eastern Mediterranean Greek Dark Ages who attacked Egypt during the reign of Rameses III....
 and Weshesh, which are classified as "foreign countries" in the inscription. They camped in Amor and sent a fleet to the Nile.

The pharaoh was once more waiting for them. He had built a fleet especially for the occasion, hid it in the Nile mouths and posted coast watchers. The enemy fleet was ambushed there, their ships overturned, the men dragged up on shore and executed ad hoc.

The land army was attacked and routed as it crossed the Egyptian border. Additional information is given in the relief on the outer side of the east wall. The land battle occurred in the vicinity of Zahi against "the northern countries." When it was over several chiefs were captive: of Hatti
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
, Amor and Shasu
Shasu

Shasu is an Egyptian language term for nomads who appeared in the Levant from the fifteenth century BCE all the way to the Third Intermediate Period....
 among the "land peoples" and the Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
, "Sherden of the sea", "Teresh of the sea" and Peleset.

The campaign of the Year 12 is attested by the Südstele found on the south side of the temple. It mentions the Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
, Peleset, Denyen
Denyen

The Denyen are one of the groups associated with the Sea Peoples, raiders associated with the Eastern Mediterranean Greek Dark Ages who attacked Egypt during the reign of Rameses III....
, Weshesh and Shekelesh.

Papyrus Harris I
Papyrus Harris I

Papyrus Harris I is also known as the Great Harris Papyrus and simply the Harris Papyrus . Its technical designation is Papyrus British Museum 9999....
 of the period, found behind the temple, suggests a wider campaign against the sea peoples, but does not mention the date. In it the persona of Ramses III says: "I slew the Denyen (D'-yn-yw-n) in their isles" and "burned" the Tjeker and Peleset, implying a maritime raid of his own. He also captured some Sherden and Weshesh "of the sea" and settled them in Egypt. As he is called the "Ruler of Nine Bows" in the relief of the east side, these events probably happened in Year 8; i.e., his majesty would have used the victorious fleet for some punitive expeditions elsewhere in the Mediterranean.

The Onomasticon of Amenemope, or Amenemipit (amen-em-apt) gives a slight credence to the idea that the Ramesside kings settled the Sea Peoples in Palestine. Dated to about 1100 BC, at the end of the 21st dynasty (which had numerous short-reigned pharaohs), this document simply lists names. After six place names, four of which were in Philistia, the scribe lists the Sherden (Line 268), the Tjeker (Line 269) and the Peleset (Line 270), who might be presumed to occupy those cities. The Story of Wenamun
Story of Wenamun

The Story of Wenamun is a Literature text written in hieratic in the Egyptian language language. It is only known from one incomplete copy discovered in 1890 at al-Hibah, Egypt, and subsequently purchased in 1891 in Cairo by the Russian Egyptologist Vladimir Goleni?cev ....
 on a papyrus of the same cache also places the Tjeker in Dor
Dor

Tel Dor , is an archeological site located on Israel's Mediterranean coast, about 30 km south of Haifa....
 at that time.

Survivors
A few states such as Byblos
Byblos

Byblos is the Greek language name of the Phoenician city Gebal . It is a Mediterranean city in the Mount Lebanon Governorate of present-day Lebanon under the current Arabic language name of Jbeil and was also referred to as Gibelet during the Crusades....
 and Sidon
Sidon

Sidon,or Sa?da, is the third-largest city in Lebanon. It is located in the South Governorate, Lebanon of Lebanon, on the Mediterranean Sea coast, about 40 km north of Tyre, Lebanon and 40 km south of the capital Beirut....
 managed to survive the Sea Peoples' invasions unscathed. Despite Ramesses III's pessimism, Carchemish
Carchemish

Carchemish was an important ancient city of the Mitanni and Hittites empires, now on the frontier between Turkey and Syria. It was the location of an Battle of Carchemish between the Babylonians and Egyptians, mentioned in the Bible....
 also survived the Sea Peoples' onslaught. King Kuzi-Teshub
Kuzi-Teshub

Kuzi-Teshub was the son of Talmi-Teshub who was both the last viceroy of the Hittite Empire at Carchemish under Suppiluliuma II, and a direct descendant of Suppiluliuma I....
 I who was the son of Talmi-Teshub
Talmi-Teshub

Talmi-Teshub was "the great-great-great-grandson of Suppiluliuma I" and a viceroy at Carchemish in Syria under Suppiluliuma II. According to royal seal impressions found at Lidar H?y?k found in 1985 on the east bank of the Euphrates river, Talmi-Teshub was succeeded by his own son, Kuzi-Teshub....
--a direct contemporary of the last ruling Hittite king--Suppiluliuma II
Suppiluliuma II

Suppiluliuma II, the son of Tudhaliya IV, was the last known king of the New Kingdom of the Hittite Empire, ruling ca. 1207 ? 1178 BC , contemporary with Tukulti-Ninurta I of Assyria....
, is attested in power there. Kuzi-Tesup and his successors ruled a small mini-empire from Carchemish which stretched from "Southeast Asia Minor, North Syria...[to] the west bend of the Euphrates." from c.1175 BC to 990 BC.

Hypotheses about the Sea Peoples

A number of hypotheses concerning the identities and motives of the sea peoples described in the records have been formulated. They are not necessarily alternative or contradictory hypotheses; any or all might be mainly or partly true.

Philistine hypothesis

The archaeological evidence from the southern coastal plain of ancient Palestine
Palestine

Palestine is a name which has been widely used since Roman times to refer to the region between the Mediterranean Sea and the Jordan River. It is derived from a name used already much earlier for a narrower geographical region, mainly along the coastal region....
, termed Philistia in the Hebrew Bible
Hebrew Bible

The term Hebrew Bible is a generic reference to those books of the Bible originally written mostly in Biblical Hebrew with some Biblical Aramaic....
, indicates a disruption of the Canaan
Canaan

Canaan is an ancient term for a region encompassing modern-day Israel and Lebanon, the Palestinian Territories, plus adjoining coastal lands and parts of Jordan, Syria and northeastern Egypt....
ite culture that existed during the Late Bronze Age, and its replacement (with some integration) by a culture with a possibly foreign (mainly Aegean
Aegean

Aegean may refer to*Aegean Sea*Aegean Islands*Aegean Region, Turkey*Aegean civilization*Tyrsenian languages*Aegean Airlines*Aegean Macedonia, another term for the Macedonia ...
) origin. This includes distinct pottery, which at first belongs to the Mycenaean IIIC tradition (albeit of local manufacture) and gradually transforms into a uniquely Philistine pottery. Mazar says:

Sandars, however, does not take this point of view, but says:

Artifacts of the Philistine culture are found at numerous sites, in particular in the excavations of the five main cities of the Philistines
Philistines

The Philistines were a ethnic group who occupied the southern coast of Canaan, their territory being named Philistia in later contexts....
: the "Pentapolis
Pentapolis

A pentapolis, from the Ancient Greek words penta 'five' and polis 'city' is geographic and/or institutional grouping of five cities....
" of Ashkelon
Ashkelon

Ashkelon or Ashqelon is a coastal city in the South District of Israel. The ancient seaport of Ashkelon dates back to the Bronze Age. In the course of its history, it has been ruled by the Canaanites, the Philistines, the Babylonians, the Phoenicians, the Ancient Romes, the Muslims and the Crusaders....
, Ashdod
Ashdod

Ashdod , is the List of Israeli cities in Israel, located in the South District of the country, on the Mediterranean Sea Israeli Coastal Plain, with a population of 207,000....
, Ekron
Ekron

The city of Ekron was one of the five cities of the famed Philistine 'pentapolis,' located in southwestern Canaan.During the Iron Age, Ekron was a border city on the frontier contested between Philistia and the kingdom of Judah....
, Gath, and Gaza
Gaza

Gaza is a Palestinian people city in the Gaza Strip, approximately southwest of Jerusalem, with a population of 410,000, making it the largest city under the control of the Palestinian National Authority....
. Some scholars (e.g. S. Sherratt, Drews, etc.) have challenged the theory that the Philistine culture is an immigrant culture, claiming instead that they are an
in situ development of the Canaanite culture, but others argue for the immigrant hypothesis; for example, T. Dothan and Barako.

Minoan hypothesis


Two of the peoples who settled in the Levant
Levant

The Levant describes, traditionally, the Eastern Mediterranean at large, but can be used as a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia formed by the lands bordering the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, roughly bounded on the north by the Taurus Mountains, on the south by the Arabian Desert, and on the west by the M...
 have traditions that may connect them to Crete
Crete

Crete is the largest of the Greek islands and the List of islands in the Mediterranean largest island in the Mediterranean Sea at 8,336 km? ....
: the Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
 and the Peleset (Philistines). The Tjeker may have left Crete to settle in Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
 and left there to settle Dor
Dor

Tel Dor , is an archeological site located on Israel's Mediterranean coast, about 30 km south of Haifa....
. According to the Old Testament
Old Testament

In Western Christianity, the Old Testament refers to the books that form the first of the two-part Christianity Bible Biblical canon. These works correspond to the Hebrew Bible , with some variations and additions....
 the Israelite God brought the Philistines out of Caphtor
Caphtor

Caphtor is a locality mentioned in the Book of Amos, 9.7: "Have not I brought up Israel out of the land of Egypt? and the Philistines from Caphtor, and the Syrians from Kir?" It is named as the place of origin of the Caphtorites, said in Genesis 10:13-14 to descend from Ham's son Mizraim ....
. This view is accepted by the mainstream of Biblical and classical scholarship as Crete, but there are alternative minority theories. Crete of the times was populated by peoples speaking a good many languages, among which were Mycenaean Greek and Eteocretan, the descendant of the language of the Minoans. It is possible but by no means certain that these two peoples spoke Eteocretan.

Greek migrational hypothesis

The identifications of Denyen
Denyen

The Denyen are one of the groups associated with the Sea Peoples, raiders associated with the Eastern Mediterranean Greek Dark Ages who attacked Egypt during the reign of Rameses III....
 with the Greek Danaans and Ekwesh with the Greek Achaeans
Achaeans

The Achaeans is one of the collective names used for the Greeks in Homer's Iliad and Odyssey. The other names are the Danaans and Argives ....
 are long-standing issues in Bronze Age scholarship, whether Greek, Hittite or Biblical, especially as they lived "in the isles." If the Greeks do appear as sea peoples, what were they doing? Michael Wood gives a good summary of the question and the hypothetical role of the Greeks (who have already been proposed as the identity of the Philistines above):

Wood would include also the Sherden and Shekelesh, pointing that "there were migrations of Greek-speaking peoples to the same place [Sardinia and Sicily] at this time." He is careful to point out that the Greeks must only have been an element among the peoples, and that their numbers must have been relatively small. His major hypothesis, however, is that the Trojan War
Trojan War

In Greek mythology, the Trojan War was waged against the city of Troy by the Achaeans after Paris of Troy stole Helen from her husband Menelaus, the king of Sparta....
 was fought against Troy VI and that Troy VIIa, the candidate of Carl Blegen
Carl Blegen

Carl William Blegen was an archaeologist famous for his work on the site of Pylos in modern day Greece and Troy in modern day Turkey. Blegen was professor of classical archaeology at the University of Cincinnati, Ohio ....
, was sacked by essentially Greek sea peoples. He suggests that Odysseus' assumed identity of a wandering Cretan coming home from the Trojan War who fights in Egypt and serves there after being captured "remembers" the campaign of Year 8 of Ramses III, described above. He points out also that places destroyed on Cyprus
Cyprus

Cyprus , officially the Republic of Cyprus , is an island country situated in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, east of Greece, west of Lebanon, Syria, and Israel, south of Turkey and north of Egypt....
 at the time (such as Kition) were rebuilt by a new Greek-speaking population.

Trojan Hypothesis

The possibility that the Teresh were connected on the one hand with the Tyrrhenians
Tyrrhenians

The Tyrrhenians or Tyrsenians is an exonym used by Ancient Greece authors to refer to a pre-Greek....
, believed to be an Etruscan
Etruscan civilization

Etruscan civilization is the modern English name given to the culture and way of life of a people of ancient Italy and Corsica whom the ancient Romans called Etrusci or Tusci....
-related culture, and on the other with Taruissa, a Hittite name possibly referring to Troy, had already been on the academic card table for some time. The Roman poet, Virgil
Virgil

Publius Vergilius Maro was a classical Roman poet, best known for three major works?the Bucolics , the Georgics and the Aeneid?although several Appendix Vergiliana are also attributed to him....
, plays this card when he depicts Aeneas
Aeneas

This article is about the Roman hero. For other uses, see Aeneas .In Greco-Roman mythology, Aeneas was a Troy hero, the son of prince Anchises and the goddess Venus_....
 as escaping the fall of Troy by coming to Latium
Latium

Lazio, called Latium in English language, is a Regions of Italy of central Italy, bordered by Tuscany, Umbria, and Marche to the north, Abruzzo to the east, Campania to the south, and the Tyrrhenian Sea to the west....
, there to found a line descending to Romulus
Romulus

Romulus may refer to any of these articles:...
, first king of Rome
Rome

Rome is the capital city of Italy and Lazio, and is Italy's largest and most populous city, with 2,724,347 residents in an urban area of some ....
. Considering that Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
n connections have been identified for other sea peoples, such as the Tjeker
Tjeker

The Tjekker or Tjeker were one of the Sea Peoples and are known mainly from the Story of Wenamun The name tkr/skl has been transliterated variously as Tjekru, Tjekker, skl, Sikil, Djekker, etc....
 and the Lukka
Lukka

The Lukka lands are often mentioned in Hittites texts from the second millennium BC. It denotes a region in the southwestern part of Anatolia. The Lukka lands were never put under permanent Hittite control and were viewed as hostile by the Hittites....
, Eberhard Zangger
Eberhard Zangger

Eberhard Zangger, , a senior research associate in the Department of Earth Sciences at the University of Cambridge , is a German writer on geoarchaeology investigating the global interrelations between man and environment, especially in the prehistoric and protohistoric Aegean Sea....
 puts together an Anatolian suite:

Mycenaean warfare hypothesis

This theory suggests that the Sea Peoples were populations from the city states of the Greek Mycenaean civilization
Mycenae

Mycenae , is an archaeology in Greece, located about 90 km south-west of Athens, in the north-eastern Peloponnese. Argos is 6 km to the south; Corinth, 48 km to the north....
, who destroyed each other in a disastrous series of conflicts lasting several decades. There would have been few or no external invaders and just a few excursions outside the Greek-speaking part of the Aegean civilization
Aegean civilization

Aegean civilization is a general term for the Bronze Age civilizations of Greece and the Aegean Sea. There are in fact three distinct but communicating and interacting geographic regions covered by this term: Crete, the Cyclades and the Greek mainland....
.

Archaeological evidence indicates that many fortified sites of the Greek domain were destroyed in the 13th century BCE, which destruction was understood at mid-20th-century to have been simultaneous or nearly so and was attributed to the Dorian Invasion
Dorian invasion

The Dorian invasion is a concept devised by historians of Ancient Greece to explain the replacement of pre-classical dialects and traditions in southern Greece by the ones that prevailed in Classical Greece....
 championed by Carl Blegen
Carl Blegen

Carl William Blegen was an archaeologist famous for his work on the site of Pylos in modern day Greece and Troy in modern day Turkey. Blegen was professor of classical archaeology at the University of Cincinnati, Ohio ....
 of the University of Cincinnati
University of Cincinnati

The University of Cincinnati is a coeducational public university research university in Cincinnati, Ohio, Ohio, part of the University System of Ohio....
. He believed Mycenaean Pylos
Pylos

This article is about the Greek geographical feature and town. For the mythological figure see Pylus . For board game see Pylos .Pylos, or P?los , is a large bay and a town on the west coast of the Peloponnese, in the district of Messenia in southern Greece....
 was burned during an amphibious raid by warriors from the north (Dorians).

Subsequent critical analysis focused on the facts that the destructions were not simultaneous and all the evidence of Dorians came from later times. John Chadwick
John Chadwick

John Chadwick was an England Linguistics and Classics scholar most famous for his role in deciphering Linear B, along with Michael Ventris....
 championed a sea peoples hypothesis, which asserted that as the Pylians had retreated to the northeast, the attack must have come from the southwest, the sea peoples being, in his view, the most likely candidates. He states that they were based in Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
 and although doubting that Mycenaeans called themselves "Achaeans" speculates that "... it is very tempting to bring them into connexion." He does not assign the Greek identity to all the sea peoples.

Considering the turbulence between and within the great families of the Mycenaean city-states in Greek mythology, the hypothesis that the Mycenaeans destroyed themselves is long-standing and finds support by the reputable Greek historian Thucydides
Thucydides

Thucydides was a Greeks history and author of the History of the Peloponnesian War, which recounts the 5th century B.C. war between Sparta and Athens to the year 411 B.C....
, who theorized:

The connection of these predations to the fall of Mycenaean Greece and more widely to the sea peoples is a logical outcome. Although some advocates of the Philistine or Greek migration hypotheses (above) identify all the Mycenaeans or sea peoples as ethnically Greek, the cautious Chadwick (founder, with Michael Ventris
Michael Ventris

Michael George Francis Ventris was an England architect and classical scholar who, along with John Chadwick, was responsible for the decipherment of Linear B....
, of Linear B
Linear B

Linear B is a script that was used for writing Mycenaean language, an early form of Greek language. It predated the Greek alphabet by several centuries and seems to have died out with the fall of Mycenaean Greece civilization....
 studies) adopts rather the multiple ethnicity view.

Italian peoples hypotheses

Sunurax Gay Gayguy
Theories of the possible connections between the Sherden to Sardinia
Sardinia

Sardinia is the Mediterranean islands#By area island in the Mediterranean Sea . The area of Sardinia is . The island is surrounded by the France island of Corsica, the Italian Peninsula, Tunisia and the Balearic Islands....
, Shekelesh to Sicily
Sicily

Sicily is an Autonomous regions with special statute of Italy. Of all the regions of Italy, Sicily covers the largest land area at 25,708 km? and currently has just over five million inhabitants....
 and Teresh to Tyrrhenians
Tyrrhenians

The Tyrrhenians or Tyrsenians is an exonym used by Ancient Greece authors to refer to a pre-Greek....
, even though long-standing, are based solely on onomastic
Onomastics

Onomastics or onomatology is the study of proper names of all kinds and the origins of names. The word is Greek language: ????at?????a . toponymy, the study of place names, is one of the principal branches of onomastics....
 similarities.

The Sardinian architecture produced by the Nuragic civilization was the most advanced of any civilization in the western Mediterranean during the Sea Peoples epoch, including those in the regions of Magna Graecia. Of the 8,000 existent nuraghe
Nuraghe

The nuraghe is the main type of megalithic edifice found in Sardinia, dating back before 1000 Before Christ. Today it has come to be the symbol of Sardinia and its distinctive culture....
s, only a few have been scientifically excavated. Interest in Sardinian archaeology has been small, except for the black market trade in ancient bronze statues.

The pre-Roman Sicels
Sicels

The Sicels were one of the three main tribes who, before the arrival of Colonies in antiquity, inhabited Sicily, according to the traditional ethnic division of Thucydides ....
 are known from a number of locations, including Sicily
Sicily

Sicily is an Autonomous regions with special statute of Italy. Of all the regions of Italy, Sicily covers the largest land area at 25,708 km? and currently has just over five million inhabitants....
, presumed named after them. The Tyrrhenian Sea
Tyrrhenian Sea

The Tyrrhenian Sea is part of the Mediterranean Sea off the western coast of Italy.It is bounded by Corsica and Sardinia , Tuscany, Lazio, Campania, and Calabria , and Sicily ....
 gives some credence to the story of Tyrrhenus mentioned above.

No evidence has been uncovered yet to settle the enigmatic Italian connections of these sea peoples. The self-name of the Etruscans,
Rasna, does not lend itself to the Tyrrhenian derivation. Assertions in various articles and books that the Sherdens definitely were or were not from Sardis
Sardis

Sardis, also Sardes , modern Sart in the Manisa province of Turkey, was the capital of the ancient kingdom of Lydia, one of the important cities of the Persian Empire, the seat of a proconsul under the Roman Empire, and the metropolis of the province Lydia in later Roman and Byzantine Empire times....
 or some ancestor state have no foundation in the evidence. The Etruscan civilization
Etruscan civilization

Etruscan civilization is the modern English name given to the culture and way of life of a people of ancient Italy and Corsica whom the ancient Romans called Etrusci or Tusci....
 has been studied and the language partly deciphered. It has variants and representatives in Aegean inscriptions, but these may well be from travellers or colonists of Etruscans during their seafaring period before Rome
Rome

Rome is the capital city of Italy and Lazio, and is Italy's largest and most populous city, with 2,724,347 residents in an urban area of some ....
 destroyed their power. The entire Etruscan civilization can scarcely be explained by a few ships of Teresh or even a whole fleet.

Archaeology is equally enigmatic. About all that can be said for certain is that Mycenaean
Mycenaean

Mycenaean may refer to:* Mycenae, coming from or belonging to this ancient town in Peloponnese in Greece* Mycenaean Greece, the Greek-speaking regions of the Aegean Sea as of the Late Bronze Age, named after the Mycenae of the Trojan War epics...
 pottery was widespread around the Mediterranean and its introduction at various places, including Sardinia, is often associated with cultural change, violent or gradual. These circumstances appear to be enough for archaeological theorizers. The prevalent speculation is that the Sherden and Shekelesh brought those names with them to Sardinia and Sicily, "perhaps not operating from those great islands but moving toward them." More recent genetic evidence indicates that the populations in those regions are more related to the people of Anatolia than to anywhere else, but this evidence is not event- or period-specific.

Anatolian famine hypothesis

A famous passage from Herodotus
Herodotus

Herodotus of Halicarnassus was a Greeks historian who lived in the 5th century BC and is regarded as the "Father of History" in Western culture....
 portrays the wandering and migration of Lydia
Lydia

Lydia was an Iron Age kingdom of western Asia Minor located generally east of ancient Ionia in the modern Turkey provinces of Manisa Province and inland Izmir Province....
ns from Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
 because of famine:

Connections to the Teresh of the Merneptah Stele
Merneptah Stele

The Merneptah Stele ? also known as the Israel Stele or Victory Stele of Merneptah ? is an inscription by the Ancient Egyptian Pharaoh Merneptah , which appears on the reverse side of a granite stela erected by the Pharaoh Amenhotep III....
, which also mentions shipments of grain to the Hittite Empire to relieve famine, are logically unavoidable. Many have made them, generally proposing a coalition of seagoing migrants from Anatolia and the islands seeking relief from scarcity. Tablet RS 18.38 from Ugarit
Ugarit

Ugarit was an ancient cosmopolitan port city, sited on the Mediterranean coast. Ugarit sent tribute to Ancient Egypt and maintained trade and diplomatic connections with Cyprus , documented in the archives recovered from the site and corroborated by Mycenaean Greece and Cypriot pottery found there....
 also mentions grain to the Hittites, suggesting a long period of famine, connected further, in the full theory, to drought. Barry Weiss, using the Palmer Drought Index
Palmer Drought Index

The Palmer Drought Index, sometimes called the Palmer Drought Severity Index and often abbreviated PDSI, is an often-used measurement of dryness based on recent precipitation and temperature....
 for 35 Greek, Turkish, and Middle Eastern weather stations, showed that a drought of the kinds that persisted from January 1972 would have affected all of the sites associated with the Late Bronze Age collapse. Drought could have easily precipitated or hastened socio-economic problems and led to wars. More recently, Brian Fagan
Brian Fagan

Brian Murray Fagan is an author of popular archaeology books as well as being emeritus professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Santa Barbara, United States....
 has shown how mid-winter storms from the Atlantic were diverted to travel north of the Pyrenees and the Alps, bringing wetter conditions to Central Europe, but drought to the Eastern Mediterranean.

Invader hypothesis

The term invasion is used generally in the literature concerning the period to mean the documented attacks implying a local or unspecified origin. An origin outside the Aegean also has been proposed, as in this example by Michael Grant
Michael Grant

Michael Grant may refer to:* List of characters in Manhunt 2#Michael Grant, character in the 2007 video game Manhunt 2* Michael Grant, 12th Baron de Longueuil...
:

Such a comprehensive movement is associated with more than one people or culture; instead, a "disturbance" happens, according to Finley:

If different times are allowed on the Danube, they are not in the Aegean:

The following movements are compressed by Finley into the 1200 BCE window: the Dorian Invasion
Dorian invasion

The Dorian invasion is a concept devised by historians of Ancient Greece to explain the replacement of pre-classical dialects and traditions in southern Greece by the ones that prevailed in Classical Greece....
, the attacks of the Sea Peoples, the formation of Philistine kingdoms in the Levant
Levant

The Levant describes, traditionally, the Eastern Mediterranean at large, but can be used as a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia formed by the lands bordering the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, roughly bounded on the north by the Taurus Mountains, on the south by the Arabian Desert, and on the west by the M...
 and the fall of the Hittite
Hittites

The Hittites were an ancient Anatolian people who spoke a Hittite language of the Anatolian languages of the Indo-European languages family, and established a kingdom centered at Hattusa in north-central Anatolia ca....
 Empire, when in fact those events required at least a few hundred years.

The archaeological evidence is treated in the same way. Robert Drews presents a map showing the destruction sites of some 47 fortified major settlements, which he terms "Major Sites Destroyed in the Catastrophe." They are concentrated in the Levant
Levant

The Levant describes, traditionally, the Eastern Mediterranean at large, but can be used as a geographical term that denotes a large area in Western Asia formed by the lands bordering the Eastern shores of the Mediterranean, roughly bounded on the north by the Taurus Mountains, on the south by the Arabian Desert, and on the west by the M...
, with some in Greece
Greece

Greece , officially the Hellenic Republic , is a country in southeastern Europe, situated on the southern end of the Balkans. It has borders with Albania, Bulgaria and the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia to the north, and Turkey to the east....
 and Anatolia
Anatolia

Anatolia or Asia Minor is a region of Western Asia, comprising most of the modern Republic of Turkey. It is a geographic region bounded by the Black Sea to the north, the Caucasus to the northeast, the Aegean Sea to the west, the Mediterranean Sea to the south, and the Iranian plateau to the east and southeast....
. The questions of dates and agents of destruction remain for the most part unanswered in detail, without which no single catastophe or related catastophes can be postulated beyond the level of pure speculation.

The invaders; that is, the replacement cultures at those sites, apparently made no attempt to retain the cities' wealth, but instead built new settlements of a materially simpler cultural and less complex economic level atop the ruins. For example, no one appropriated the palace and rich stores at Pylos
Pylos

This article is about the Greek geographical feature and town. For the mythological figure see Pylus . For board game see Pylos .Pylos, or P?los , is a large bay and a town on the west coast of the Peloponnese, in the district of Messenia in southern Greece....
, but all were burned up and the successors (whoever they were) moved in over the ruins with plain pottery and simple goods. This demonstrates a cultural discontinuity.

Whether all the discontinuities were sufficiently contemporaneous to warrant a theory of great waves of invasion is another question. Ethnic identities from the Danube
Danube

The Danube is the longest river in the European Union and Europe's second longest river after the Volga.The river originates in the Black Forest in Germany as the much smaller Brigach and Breg River rivers which join at the eponymously named German town Donaueschingen, after which it is known as the Danube and flows eastwards for a distance...
 and beyond are in short supply in the records.

Serbonian Bog

The name of the
Serbonian Bog applied to the lake of Serbonis (Sirbonis or Serbon) in Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
 relates to the Sea Peoples. When sand blew onto it, the Serbonian Bog appeared to be solid land, but was in fact a bog
Bog

A bog or mire is a wetland type that accumulates acidic peat, a deposit of dead plant material—usually mosses, but also lichens in Arctic climates....
. The term is now applied metaphorically to any situation in which one is entangled from which extrication is difficult.

The Serbonian Bog has been identified as
Sabkhat al [Bardawil], one of the string of Bitter Lakes to the east of the Nile
Nile

The Nile is a major north-flowing river in Africa, generally regarded as the List of rivers by length in the world.The Nile has two major tributary, the White Nile and Blue Nile, the latter being the source of most of the Nile's water and silt, but the former being the longer of the two....
's right branch. It was described in ancient times as a quagmire
Quagmire

A quagmire is a type of wetland. Rhetorically, "quagmire" may refer to a predicament or situation from which it is difficult to extricate oneself....
 in which armies were fabled to be swallowed up and lost.

The term
Serbonian came from the name of the Sherden (also known as Serden or Shardana) sea pirates, one of several groups of "Sea Peoples
Sea Peoples

The Sea Peoples is the term used for a confederacy of seafaring raiders of the second millennium BC who sailed into the eastern shores of the Mediterranean, caused political unrest, and attempted to enter or control Egyptian territory during the late Nineteenth dynasty of Egypt, and especially during Year 8 of Ramesses III of the Twentieth dy...
" who appear in fragmentary Egypt
Egypt

Egypt is a country mainly in North Africa, with the Sinai Peninsula forming a land bridge in Western Asia. Covering an area of about , Egypt borders the Mediterranean Sea to the north, the Gaza Strip and Israel to the northeast, the Red Sea to the east, Sudan to the south and Libya to the west....
ian records in the second millennium B.C.

Bibliography



External links

  • : a course at Penn State
  • , paper by Itamar Singer at the UCLA Near Eastern Languages & Culture site.
  • , article by Eberhard Zangger in Saudi Aramco World, Volume 46, Number 3, May/June 1995.
  • , undergraduate paper by Joseph Morris published by Florida State University Classic Department.
  • , Master's Thesis of Daniel Jacobus Krüger, published at the University of South Africa site.
  • , article by "I Cornelius" in "Military History Journal" - Vol 7 No 4 of The South African Military History Society.