Page 67 - Western Civilization A Brief History, Volume I To 1715 9th - Jackson J. Spielvogel

Stonehenge. The Bronze Age in northwestern Europe is known for its megaliths, or large standing stones. Between 3200 and 1500 B.C.E., standing stones arranged in circles or lined up in rows were erected throughout the British Isles and northwestern France. The most famous of these megalithic constructions is Stonehenge in England.
Anatolia (modern Turkey) around 1750 B.C.E. coalesced with the native peoples to form the Hittite kingdom with its capital at Hattusha (Bo􏰀gazk€oy in modern Turkey).
THE HITTITE EMPIRE The Hittites began to spread out- ward around 1600 B.C.E., but it was not until around two hundred years later that a new line of kings created the Hittite New Kingdom or Hittite Empire. Especially notable was Suppiluliumas (suh-PIL-oo-LEE- uh-muss) I (ca. 1370–1330 B.C.E.), one of the strongest rulers of the era, who established Hittite control from western Turkey to northern Syria. Suppiluliumas formed an alliance with the Egyptians and then con- quered Syria. The Hittites were the first of the Indo- European peoples to make use of iron, enabling them to construct weapons that were stronger and cheaper to make because of the widespread availability of iron ore. The end of Hittite power came in part from inter- nal problems but also as a result of attacks by the Sea Peoples from the west around 1200 B.C.E. and by a group of aggressive tribespeople known as the Gasga, who raided Hittite cities. By 1190 B.C.E., Hittite power had come to an end.
During its heyday, however, the Hittite Empire was one of the great powers in western Asia. The Hittite ruler, known as the Great King, controlled the core areas of the kingdom, but in western and southern Anatolia and Syria, he allowed local rulers to swear alle- giance to him as vassals. However, constant squabbling over succession to the throne at times tended to weaken royal authority.
At its height, the Hittite Empire also demonstrated an interesting ability to assimilate other cultures into its own. In language, literature, art, law, and religion, the Hittites borrowed much from Mesopotamia as well as from the native peoples that they had sub- dued. Hittite religion, for example, combined Indo- European deities and Mesopotamian gods. Recent scholarship has stressed the important role of the Hit- tites in transmitting Mesopotamian culture, as they transformed it, to later Western civilizations in the Mediterranean area, especially to the Mycenaean Greeks (see Chapter 3).
The crumbling of the Hittite kingdom and the weak- ening of Egypt after 1200 B.C.E. left a power vacuum in western Asia, allowing a patchwork of petty kingdoms and city-states to emerge, especially in the area at the eastern end of the Mediterranean Sea. The Hebrews were one of these peoples.
On the Fringes of Civilization 29
TABLE 2.1
Some Indo-European Languages
Subfamily
Indo-Iranian Balto-Slavic
Hellenic Italic
Celtic Germanic
Languages
Sanskrit, Persian
Russian, Serbo-Croatian, Czech, Polish,
Lithuanian Greek
Latin, Romance languages (French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Romanian)
Irish, Gaelic
Swedish, Danish, Norwegian, German,
Dutch, English
NOTE: Languages in italic type are no longer spoken.
migrations, around 2000 B.C.E. they began major no- madic movements into Europe (including present-day Italy and Greece), India, and western Asia. One group of Indo-Europeans who moved into Asia Minor and
Copyright 2017 Cengage Learning. All Rights Reserved. May not be copied, scanned, or duplicated, in whole or in part. Due to electronic rights, some third party content may be suppressed from the eBook and/or eChapter(s). Editorial review has deemed that any suppressed content does not materially affect the overall learning experience. Cengage Learning reserves the right to remove additional content at any time if subsequent rights restrictions require it.
a Adam Woolfitt/CORBIS