Decentralization And The Rise Of The Private Merchant

Susan Sherratt concluded that the Sea Peoples represent the final step in the replacement of the old centralized politicoeconomic systems present in the Bronze Age with the new decentralized economic systems of the Iron Age—that is, the change from kingdoms and empires that controlled the international trade to smaller city-states and individual entrepreneurs who were in business for themselves. She suggested that the Sea Peoples can “usefully be seen as a structural phenomenon, a product of the natural evolution and expansion of international trade in the 3rd and early 2nd millennium, which carried within it the seeds of the subversion of the palace-based command economies which had initiated such trade in the first place.”57

Thus, while she concedes that the international trade routes might have collapsed, and that at least some of the Sea Peoples may have been migratory invaders, she ultimately concludes that it does not really matter where the Sea Peoples came from, or even who they were or what they did. Far more important is the sociopolitical and economic change that they represent, from a predominantly palatial-controlled economy to one in which private merchants and smaller entities had considerably more economic freedom.58

Although Sherratt’s argument is elegantly stated, other scholars had earlier made similar suggestions. For example, Klaus Kilian, excavator of Tiryns, once wrote: “After the fall of the Mycenaean palaces, when ‘private’ economy had been established in Greece, contacts continued with foreign countries. The wellorganized palatial system was succeeded by smaller local reigns, certainly less powerful in their economic expansion.”59

Michal Artzy, of the University of Haifa, even gave a name to some of the private merchants envisioned by Sherratt, dubbing them “Nomads of the Sea.” She suggested that they had been active as intermediaries who carried out much of the maritime trade during the fourteenth and thirteenth centuries BC.60 However, more recent studies have taken issue with the type of transitional worldview proposed by Sherratt. Carol Bell, for instance, respectfully disagrees, saying: “It is simplistic … to view the change between the LBA and the Iron Age as the replacement of palace administered exchange with entrepreneurial trade. A wholesale replacement of one paradigm for another is not a good explanation for this change and restructuring.”61 While there is no question that privatization may have begun as a by-product of palatial trade, it is not at all clear that this privatization then ultimately undermined the very economy from which it had come.62 At Ugarit, for example, scholars have pointed out that even though the city was clearly burned and abandoned, there is no evidence either in the texts found at the site or in the remains themselves that the destruction and collapse had been caused by decentralized entrepreneurs undermining the state and its control of international trade.63

In fact, combining textual observations with the fact that Ugarit was clearly destroyed by fire, and that there are weapons in the debris, we may safely reiterate that although there may have been the seeds of decentralization at Ugarit, warfare and fighting almost certainly caused the final destruction, with external invaders as the likely culprits. This is a far different scenario from that envisioned by Sherratt and her like-minded colleagues. Whether these invaders were the Sea Peoples is uncertain, however, although it is intriguing that one of the texts at Ugarit specifically mentions the Shikila/Shekelesh, known from the Sea Peoples inscriptions of Merneptah and Ramses III.

In any event, even if decentralization and private individual merchants were an issue, it seems unlikely that they caused the collapse of the Late Bronze Age, at least on their own. Instead of accepting the idea that private merchants and their enterprises undermined the Bronze Age economy, perhaps we should consider the alternative suggestion that they simply emerged out of the chaos of the collapse, as was suggested by James Muhly of the University of Pennsylvania twenty years ago. He saw the twelfth century BC not as a world dominated by “sea raiders, pirates, and freebooting mercenaries,” but rather as a world of “enterprising merchants and traders, exploiting new economic opportunities, new markets, and new sources of raw materials.”64 Out of chaos comes opportunity, at least for a lucky few, as always.

Was It The Sea Peoples And Where Did They Go?

We come, finally, to a consideration of the Sea Peoples, who remain as enigmatic and elusive as ever. Whether they are seen as sea raiders or migrating populations, the archaeological and textual evidence both indicate that the Sea Peoples, despite their moniker, most likely traveled both by land and by sea—that is, by any means possible.

Those proceeding by sea would most likely have hugged the coastline, perhaps even putting in to a safe harbor every evening. However, questions remain as to whether the enemy ships mentioned in the Ugaritic texts belonged to the Sea Peoples or to renegade members of their own kingdom, as implied in the letter sent by Eshuwara, the governor of Alashiya.65

In this regard, we should take into account the letter just mentioned, from the House of Urtenu in Ugarit, that mentions the “Shikila people,” who, more likely than not, can be identified with the Shekelesh of the Egyptian records.

The letter was sent by the Hittite king, probably Suppiluliuma II, to the governor of Ugarit, and refers to a young king of Ugarit, who “does not know anything.” Singer, among other scholars, sees this as a probable reference to Ammurapi, who was the new king of Ugarit at the time. In the letter, the Hittite king says that he wishes to interview a man named Ibnadushu, who had been captured by the Shikila people “who live on ships,” in order to find out more information about these Shikila/Shekelesh.66 However, we do not know whether the interview ever took place or what else might have been learned from Ibnadushu.

It is generally agreed that this document contains the only specific mention by name of the Sea Peoples outside of Egyptian records, although it has also been suggested that there might be others. The “enemy from the land of Alashiya” who attacked the last Hittite king, Suppiluliuma II, on land after he had fought three sea battles against Alashiyan (i.e., Cypriot) forces is possibly a reference to the Sea Peoples. So too is an inscription found at Hattusa in 1988, which may contain an indication that Suppiluliuma II was already fighting the Sea Peoples who had landed on the southern coast of Anatolia and were advancing north.

Most documents and inscriptions, other than the Egyptian records, simply contain the more general phrase “enemy ships,” though, and do not specifically name the Sea Peoples. Those of the Sea Peoples who came by land possibly, and perhaps likely, proceeded along a predominantly coastal route, where the destruction of specific cities would have opened up entire new areas to them, in much the same way that Alexander the Great’s battles at the Granicus River, Issus, and Gaugamela opened up specific portions of the ancient Near East to his army almost a thousand years later. Assaf Yasur-Landau of the University of Haifa has suggested that some of the Sea Peoples could have begun their journey in Greece and passed through the Dardanelles to western Turkey/Anatolia. Others—perhaps most of them, he says—would simply have begun their journey at this point, perhaps joining those coming from the Aegean, with the route continuing along the southern coast of Turkey to Cilicia at its eastern end, and then down to the southern Levant via a route running along the coast. If they followed this route, they would have encountered the city of Troy, the kingdoms of Arzawa and Tarhuntassa in Anatolia, and the cities of Tarsus and Ugarit in southeastern Anatolia and northern Syria, respectively. Some or all of these sites do show signs of destruction and/or subsequent abandonment that occurred about the time that the Sea Peoples are presumed to have been active, but it is unclear whether they were actually responsible.68

In fact, the archaeological evidence now seems to suggest that most of the sites in Anatolia were simply either completely or mostly abandoned at this time, rather than put to the torch by the Sea Peoples. We can speculate that if the international trade, transportation, and communication routes were disrupted by wars, famines, or other forces, the cities dependent upon these routes might have withered and died, with the result that their populations would have left gradually or fled rapidly, depending upon the speed of commercial and cultural decline. As one scholar has recently said, “while it is reasonable to assume that Cilicia and the Syrian coast were affected by the actions of the Sea Peoples, so far neither historical nor archaeological evidence for any kind of activity of the Sea Peoples in the Hittite homelands is attested … the real causes for the collapse of the Hittite state seem to be internal rather than external.”69

A prime example of assigning blame without proof is the recent claim related to the radiocarbon dating at Tell Tweini, the site of the Late Bronze Age harbor town of Gibala within the kingdom of Ugarit. Here, the laboratory results led the excavators and their colleagues to conclude that they have found evidence of destruction wreaked by the Sea Peoples, and to specifically date it to 1192–1190 BC.70 They state, without caveat: “The Sea Peoples were seaborne foes from different origins. They launched a combined land-sea invasion that destabilized the already weakened power base of empires and kingdoms of the old world, and attempted to enter or control the Egyptian territory. The Sea Peoples symbolize the last step of a long and complex spiral of decline in the ancient Mediterranean world.”71