Dr Melissa Kennedy | University of Western Australia

Collapse, Climate Change and Refugees: The End of the Levantine Early Bronze Age

Scholars have frequently described the  end of  the third  millennium  BCE as an  era  of  ‘collapse’  and settlement disruption. In the southern Levant this horizon was distinguished by the disintegration of the walled-town culture of the Early Bronze Age 11-111 (ca. 3 200- 2600 / 2500 BCE} and a return to small-scale ruralism during the Early Bronze Age IV (ca . 2600  / 2500-  2000  BCE}.  A variety  of  differing theories have been posited to account for these  changes  –  with  aridiflcation, earthquake  and  population  movements  all cited to account for the decline of the Levantine Early Bronze Age.

This lecture will outline the possible events that marked end of the third millennium BCE in this region . It will detail how the northern Levant and Upper Mesopotamia were marked by a series of significant and large-scale natural, environmental and man-made incidents, which coalesced  and  created a perfect storm of disruption, culminating in the cessation of the Early Bronze Age.

Click here to download the discount code for A Land in Between: The Orontes Valley in the Early Urban Age, edited by Melissa A. Kennedy (PDF 975KB)

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Hosted by the Near Eastern Archaeology Foundation (NEAF)

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