The Bronze Age collapse around 1200 BC was a period of widespread societal breakdown in the interconnected Bronze Age world, driven not by a single cause but by a "perfect storm" of destabilizing factors, ultimately leading to the end of major empires and the emergence of new civilizations.
Mind Map
クリックして展開
クリックしてインタラクティブなマインドマップを確認
okay so today we will discuss the bran
age collapse um I want to paint you a
picture of the world in about
1,200 uh BC about um so in this world
the center of this world
Greece okay across from the M gree
across the agan SE
okay this is the
agent is what we call
call
Anatolia today we refer to Anatolia as
turkey okay and the in Anatolia the highte
highte Empire
Empire
rules um Anatolia further south is a
place called canine okay canine is
important um when we do the Bible
because that is the birthplace of the
Israelites okay so canine today is what
we refer to as
Lebanon uh Syria and Israel today uh
Canan is a province of the Egyptian
Egypt okay um over here is a place called
called
Mesopotamia and we today call
Mesopotamia uh Iraq okay
um over here is today what we call uh
Iran back then it was basically Persia
over here is
Afghanistan and then next to Afghanistan is
is
India and of course remember these are the
steps okay so for Mason and Greece you
also had the Mediterranean and over here
are the islands of Cyprus and Cit
um and then over here is a place called
Iberia and over here is Britain
okay so this is
a this is a map of the world in 1200 BC
and what's really important for you to
recognize about this world is it's
interconnected meaning that they are
trading and communicating with each
other okay this is what we call the
Bronze Age the Bronze Age and why is it
called the Bronze Age because they're
trading basically bronze during this
period back then bronze is like oil
today okay it is the basis for the
economy the very structure of their
economy um bronze is an alloy made of
copper and Tin
um coer and Tin you have to mine okay
and and only a few places will have
these resources so tin is found in
Britain in
Liberia in Anatolia in
Afghanistan okay um copper is mainly
found in
Cyprus and
CIT and also in Anatolia okay now
meaning and what this means is in order
to make bronze you basically have to
trade with the entire world okay so uh
India this world the trading would go as
far as from India to Britain even China
over here was part of this world but not
to the degree as these other
places okay um in this world
there are different ways that you can
profit or make money okay the first the
first way is
mining so basically extracting resources
to incorporate in order to make bronze
second way is uh
industry manufacturing right so
turning uh so making bronze from tin and
copper and then turning bronze into
weapons into Pottery to be sold
elsewhere the third way you can make
money is by what trading
right so in this world if you look at this
this
Trading if you look at this map who
trading this area right does that make
sense because it is the center of the
world you the pass through this world in
order to access everywhere else okay and
this place over here if you look at the
map it becomes the center of the world
because this place becomes the logistics
Hub of the world right to get to
anywhere you have to pass through this
place and so this place can
basically collect toes right this place
is called what you guys
know excuse me
yeah it's it's the toll gate of the
world right you have to pass through
this place in order to access other
places therefore this place is very
wealthy this place can you guess what
this place is
guess
Choy have you guys heard of the chosan
war okay we will do The
Iliad uh next semester we will discuss
the ilad
next class but I want you to understand
this place is called Troy and because
this place is so important for centuries
they've been fighting Wars over this
place because it's really uh the center
of the of the universe right if you can
control this place you become very
wealthy because everyone has pass for
you you can collect
tolls um you can trade okay does that
make sense and the last way you can make
money off this world is
what what what what's the last way in
which you can make a lot of money in this
this
world we can do it through mining
industry trading what what else can you
money piracy right does there make sense
steel right
hary right so when we read the OT what
you will discover is um the Greeks Who
attack Troy they were basically PIR
Pirates uh Troy made a lot of money off
trading and Pirates went to steal a lot
of their resources and wealth okay does
that make
sense so um the main point is that this
world was interconnected it was a
globalized world we call this
globalization but at the same time it
was very chaotic it very it was very
Dynamic okay they traded with with each
other but they also fought Wars against
against each
other does that make sense and uh these
places in the center of the universe my
in Greece okay became very wealthy
because they traded and they and they um
engaged in piracy uh the high ties
became very wealthy Egypt became very
wealthy okay because they were the
universe but a couple of decades later
this entire world collapsed this world
disappeared meaning that Maia Greece was
destroyed it was completely burned down
and they lost about a quarter of their
population okay the hiat Empire
destroyed and even though canine
disappeared and even though Egypt was not
not
destroyed it ceased to be a hedgemon it
ceased to be a global power and a few
decades later they were conquered by
outside powers
okay after 1200 BC Egypt ceased to be a
power so this is what we call the bran age
age
collapse and for the decades Scholars
have been trying to figure out what
happened why is it that in 1200 BC this
world was wolfy it was
interconnected and then a few decades
later it all disappeared it collapsed
and that's a great mystery that no one
has been able to solve okay so let me
tell you what we know we know that what
caused this collapse or what we call the
sea peoples sea
peoples and we know
because um
Egypt has written records of battling
the sea peoples so basically over the
course of a few decades people were
coming in from the west and attacking
Egypt okay this was not one people this
was a series of different peoples
attacking Egypt from the sea and Egypt
had to spend decades in order to repulse
the sea peoples what we know is the sea
peoples whoever they were they didn't
destroy Egypt but they did did they
destroy the high ties and they did
destroy the masan Greece
Okay so and what we figure what what we
know is the sea peoples they were
basically a combination of
pirates and also
refugees these people attacked Egypt
because Egypt was the Bread Basket of
the world that's where all the food was
so they're attacking Egypt for the food
okay these are people who are hungry
they join Pirates had ships they were
trying to take over Egypt together they
destroyed Mas and Greece they destroyed
the high tides but they fail to destroy
Greece they were stopped they they were
stopped in Egypt okay so another
question then is was driving this
population movement from west to east
okay that's a great mystery and over the
past few
decades different solutions different
ideas have been proposed okay before we
fought that it must have
been an
invasion so the idea is that what's
happening is you had people from the
north of Europe invade Mas and Greece
which drove them
Westward okay that's the first um idea
that we had but we have not found any
evidence to this to we have not found
any evidence this is the case Okay so
even though this was a one of the first
theories there's actually no evidence to
support this second theory that we had
um is basically a natural
disaster so the idea is maybe there was
a volcanic explosion somewhere okay and
this caused the weather to change and
Now farmers could no longer feed
themselves so then they started to move
westwards and attack Egypt okay that's a
second theory and there's more evidence
for this but this but the um theory that
we have today is
a perfect storm okay
or a systems
collapse and the idea here is that it
was not one thing in one year that
caused this system to collap it was a
series of events over decades okay and
these three major events
are um natural disasters or so basically
earthquakes so we have archaological
evidence that there was a series of
earthquakes in this region at this time
which destabilized the region okay so
earthquakes happen we also have evidence
of climate change okay so the weather
became cooler over the course of this
period which meant that it was harder to
grow crops okay and we also have evidence
evidence
of Eternal Revolt okay meaning that
people rebelled against the elite overthrew
overthrew
Kings and there was a lot of war and
violence okay so the the theory that we
have today is what caused the bran H
collapse was a perfect
storm basically a multiple factors which
led to systems
collapse okay does that make sense guys
far any questions so far are we clear
all right so one thing that you have
made you that you have made notice in
this class is that I have a very
different understanding of History than
other people okay so I happen to
disagree with this theory of the per
storm even though it is the scholarly
consensus right so I want to explain to
you today my theory of what
happened all right so the first thing
you you need to understand is this
system collapsed even though it was
traumatic for Europe it is not unique in
human history this sort of stuff has
happened before okay so we we if we go
over here to North
America uh to the Mayas okay so the Maya
the Maya civilization existed in Central
America okay or gu Guatemala basically
um and so we find a similar pattern
where in about 200 ad okay in the year
200 their civilization start to explode
okay it start to increase it's re reach
its peak in about 900 00 ad okay in the
year 900 its civilization was over the
place in Central America but then after
900 it went all the way down okay so
about 30 years Time by 1200 they're
basically their entire civilization
almost collapsed so it's a very similar
pattern to what was happening in the Bron
Bron
age so the question then is why does this
this
happened all
right and so to understand this I going
to present you with a new theory that we
will use a lot in this class so I want
you to understand this Theory okay but
it and it comes from a historian by the
name of Peter
Turin Peter turchin who's a historian uh
he's uh American but he came over from
Russia he's basically
russian-american and and um he has a
overproduction and Elite over production
the theory is very interesting because
it's arguing against the way we
traditionally understand why societes
collaps okay so the way we we usually
understand why societies collapse is we
and basically what KARK says is
eventually your Society um collapses
because the people Revolt okay so
Rebellion so in other words KL Marx
believes that Society collapses because
it is a bottom up
process okay it's a bottomup process if
you treat workers badly they will stop
working if you force them to work they
will go on strike if you force them to
work again they will fight against you
they will Rebel Okay a work a revolution
that's what KL
marks um argues and Peter Turin says
okay that's a really interesting Theory
but if you look at the historical data
if you look at the evidence the problem
is in the bottom okay if you look at why
collapsed it's not because of of the
people reell
it's because there's infighting among the
the
War among the
elite does that make sense that's his
theory if the problem with Society isn't
that you there's too many poor people
the problem are the problem is there are
too many rich people that's the real
problem and that's why SI collaps right
all right so let let me explain to you
this Theory slowly
right all
right okay it's fine all right so in
this world about 1200 BC we have
permanent hereditary Elite okay
permanent hereditary Elite permanent
just means they're always there
okay hereditary means they pass on their
status and their privilege and their
wealth to their
children and this is new in human
history because before there was an
elite but they were not permanent
meaning they could be changed over
time and they didn't pass their
privileges on to their children everyone
had to earn their privilege and pass
power okay so the elite was constantly
shifting in society but now in about the
year 1200 BC you had a permanent
teritory Elite when you have that you
have three
advantages okay what they lead give to
society are three major advantages the
first major advantage is the idea of organization
right basically think of the elite as
your brain of as society's brain they
can help coordinate resources okay
that's good for war you're fighting an
enemy you need an elite to lead you into
battle okay it's also good
for public
works okay so think of the pyramids in
Egypt and the Great War of China right
you need an elad to um
organize your resources in order to
create Public Works that benefit all
Society so the main the main thing here
right yes so you need a lead in order to
have irrigation so that's the first
major benefit of having a permanent
teritary Elite second major advantage is
because you have better organization you
have more wealth
okay so becomes wealthier if you have a permanent
permanent
Elite people work
harder okay and even though there's more
inequality inequality also forces people
to work harder does that make sense okay
and because you have these two things
organization and wealth you also have
scale and what scale basically means is
your population now can move
up before in the in the egalitarian
society when you didn't have a permanent
Elite at most Society could reach about
10,000 people but now when you have when
you have a
permanent Elite you can reach about a
million people okay so now you can scale
up so these are three major advantages
advantages
to having an elite okay but there's a
problem with having an elite and the the
problem is they engage something called
behavior all right I want you guys to
remember this term R sicking Behavior
which is very important for our class so
what does this mean it means
basically um so think of a landlord
right a landlord doesn't really do
anything but a landlord has land that it
can rent to you the farmer and exchange
you give me a share of your crops right
so I don't do anything but because I
have land I can rent it out to
you right it turns out the elite mainly
make their money through rent seeking
Behavior so let me give you another
example of rent seeking behavior all of
you want to go to university right why
do you want to go to university what's your
purpose what's your purpose in going to University
University be
honest it's to get the degree right okay the
degree okay and the degree is your
ticket to success in society okay you
believe that when you go to university
you are getting a ticket the degree in
order to
access social Mobility okay to access
wealth in society in other words the
universities are charging you rent okay
so the degree is basically
rent does that make
sense okay now some of you may say wait
that's wrong because I'm going imers you
learning well guess what when you
actually go to university you're going
to discover they don't actually teach
you that much okay they don't have to
teach you that much and the reason why
is you're stuck paying the rent
you need the degree right so you don't
have to actually teach you anything you
have to come to class anyway does that
make sense the same thing for the school
where in order to get to University you
have to go through this high school so
you're here paying tuition and you're
paying rent does that make sense you're
not here in school to learn you're here
in school to get the degree so that you
can access University and get the get
get that degree okay and all this
process all you're doing is paying
rent right so if you are if you have a
school you can charge people rent just
as as if you're landlord you can charge
people rent for renting your room or
real estate property okay does that make
sense this this is what we call Rent sicking
sicking
Behavior now you're like okay well this
kind of
sucks okay and it does
suck but what keeps the system together
okay basically the idea of social
contract is yes we the elite we know we
are Charing your rent and we know this
sucks for you the people but we have a
contract so as the elite I'm obligated
to help
Society okay so uh the way they help Society
Society
is uh by giving back to society okay so
so what the elite do in throughout
Society in the past is they organize um public
Feast okay and also public
temples so in today Society you know
like the parks the schools they're built
by the government right but back then
they didn't have a government that the
elites who were responsible for building
temples for building uh for for holding
public fees okay so this this is the
idea of a social
contract okay and the reason why you
need a social contract is because if you
don't have a social contract and you
just charge rent people will
leave does that make sense okay so in
this world it's very chaotic but there
are different places there are different
sortal organizations you you you can go
to so if you are in uh Egypt and you
don't really like Egypt guess what you
can go to Mesopotamia okay so these
cities were in competition with each
other for people because people provided
labor and resources okay does that make
sense all
right so this is how it usually works
but over time this system will break
down okay this system will breakdown and
it's and it's because of red sicking
Behavior okay so the first issue
is this with rent sticking
debt okay so I'm a
landlord and you're you are paying me
rent in order to use my land right and
that land and that rent is usually a
portion of your crops okay so you you
does that make sense maybe 10% of your
crops but let's just say for example
it's a bad year it doesn't rain okay and
you don't have any crops to pay me rent
do you're supposed to pay pay me a rent
but you don't have the money so what do you
do uh no that comes later what what do
you do
first H exactly thank you yes okay so
the first thing that happens is uh
borrowing okay you basically go into debt
okay so you promis to pay me double in
the next year and I'm like okay fine
right but you get unlucky and the next
year it's also a bad year and so for
five years in a
row you are in debt the problem with
interest okay meaning like over time the
debt becomes so large there's no way you
can pay it off if you can't pay it off
now okay good yeah so the idea is De
slavery okay so if you can't pay me back
you become you become my slave okay you
promis me that your children will work
for work for me for
free okay
and so Deb
slavery becomes the natural product of
rent sicking Behavior does that make
sense over time you're always going to
have a percentage of your population who
go into debt
slavery and this creates a lot of
inability in society because obviously
they either want to run away or they
they want to rebel okay does that make
sense the other problem is
um Elite over
production and the idea here
is everyone wants to be the renter right
everyone wants to be the landlord right
but there's only so much
land so now people are competing
competing
for the power to charge
sense okay so over time in any
society as the population increases the
number of people who go into that
slavery increase and therefore people at
the bottom are very angry but at the
same time the elite the number go up but
it's only a set number set amount of
land and therefore they have to fight
over the
land okay does that make sense
and So eventually what happens
is the society goes into war okay as the
elite fight each over as Elite fight
rent okay doesn't make sense and so the
main message of elite over production is
unless you can control the amount the
number of the elite in your Society your
Society must
collapse does that make sense it must
collapse because you have too many
people fighting for for too little power
it must
collapse so
historically what are ways you you what
are things you can do to control the
elite what what are things you can do to
elite excuse
okay um so so but then where does the property
go okay so okay so one possible thing
you can do is the idea of land redistribution
redistribution
okay so historically
this is one mechanism you can use to
control the growth of the elite and this
is how kings came into Power okay so
most societies have an elite and then
one person from the elite said listen
this Society is not working let me
redistribute the land and cancel debt in
order for our society to keep on going
okay and this person became the king so
that's one possible solution okay okay
me okay so you can also have a civil war
War okay the can fight amongst
themselves and whoever wins gets gets
everything okay so that's a second
possible solution what's another possible
solution what's another possible
solution okay Empire building right does
it make sense Empire
Building in other words let's not fight
amongst ourselves let's go and Conquer New
New
Territory it doesn't make sense so
because you you have a permanent
teritary Elite okay over time they're
going to reach a mass too many people
when you have too many Elite you have to
resolve this issue through three ways
okay the first thing you can do is kill
the elite and redistribute the land
that's what a king does second thing you
can do is have a civil war Okay the
third thing you can do is create an
empire okay
but the these three solutions by
themselves are also unstable okay
revolution right Civil War is war Empire
Building is also War does that make
sense so no matter how you do these
things you're always going to create
instability and eventually your Empire
your Society will
collapse does that make
sense all right so let me give you another
another
example of how this works to clarify for
you okay so um there's a book called
Thomas is a French Economist
and this is a very famous book that's
been that's been recently published
and in the book he looked at the past
100 Years of economic growth and what he
discovered that over time
is the uh Financial economy grows faster
than the real economy Capital grows
faster than
Capital grows at
5% real economy
grows at
2% right if things stay stable over time
this will happen to all societies
Capital will grow faster than the real
economy what this means is let's just
say you have a million dollars okay I
have a million dollars I have different
options to invest my money I can start a
factory or I can start or I can put all
my money into real estate or the stock
market where should I put my money
I can I can I can open a factory right
or I can put it in a stock market where
why exactly do you understand if you
have money today you do not put your
money into the factories you do not open
a new
business you put it in the stock market
because you make more money that way way
that it's yeah exactly it's just a
bubble guys okay why is it a
bubble because money isn't real Capital
isn't real it's a fiction you understand
so in other
words you you don't work anymore you
understand you're just renting now okay
okay you you're engaging in the rent
sicking Behavior we have too many people
doing that you have a society where nobody
nobody
works does that make
sense nobody does any work because all
the wealth is being put into rent sying
speculation so no one's doing any more work
work
no one's creating more wealth and this
eventually leads to social collaps at
some point okay does it make
sense all right so Peter turon's theory
of elite overproduction is because the
number of rich people can only go up
over time your Society must collapse at some
some
point unless you choose to have a
revolution or you have a civil war or
you go invade other countries okay those
are your three options but you but if
you did that that creates more
instability so over time no matter how
how you structure your Society it will
collapse does that make sense okay so
that's what happened during the branch
it collapse where these societies must
in Greece hitit Egypt Canan they were fundamentally
