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The 18th dynasty, an indigenous Egyptian ruling family, came to power just before the 16th century bce. It established the New Kingdom and drove the Hyksos out. Upon returning to Syria-Palestine, the kings of the New Kingdom clashed with the Hurrian state of Mitanni and subsequently the Anatolian Hittites, who were penetrating Syria from the north in the fourteenth century bce. One major source of knowledge about this time is the Amarna Letters, which are diplomatic communication written in Babylonian script and language and found in Egypt by archaeologists.
After emerging from captivity under Mitanni in the early fourteenth century bce, Assyria and Kassite Babylonia emerged as the preeminent kingdoms in Mesopotamia. Complex treaties, which were often violated, regulated the relationship between nations. Assyria became the target of Hittite and Babylonian animosity with the destruction of Mitanni (about 1350). Assyria conquered Kassite Babylonia in the year 1230. The first “International Age” in human history came to a close with this, and the Hittite Empire’s collapse around the year 1200.
During the Trojan War, the Hittite empire fell, and numerous coastal cities in Greece, Cyprus, and Syria-Palestine were destroyed, new peoples began to invade the Aegean Sea region, Anatolia, and the Fertile Crescent around the middle of the thirteenth century bce. The most well-known of the newcomers from the west are the Philistines, who settled in Palestine, and the Phrygians, who took over the majority of the ancient Hittite homeland.
Along the same lines, between 1020 and 960 BCE, a tribal confederation was established in western Palestine and Transjordan by the Hebrews. Saul and David later transformed it into a kingdom.
From Turkistan, Iranian tribesmen were flooding into Iran from the east, headed by the Medes. The Aramaeans arrived from the west and south. Middle Eastern history will be forever changed by the Aramaeans and the Medes.
Under the dominion of the Aramaeans and other allied tribes in the eleventh century bce, the Assyrian empire was overshadowed. By 850, the Assyrians had taken over much of southern Armenia, Babylonia, and Syria in addition to a large portion of western Media. It wasn’t until the late 10th century that they started to feel better. The empire thrived in the years that followed, reaching its peak expansion just before the year 630. The governmental structure was quite well-developed, and the language evolved into Aramaic.
Soon after the Philistine and Aramaean conquests, the Canaanite Phoenicians who had settled along the coast of Syria resumed their trade activities. They colonized North Africa and perhaps Spain in the ninth and tenth century after venturing out into the Mediterranean. Once the sixth century passed, their sway over the western Mediterranean waned. After then, the Carthaginians’ colonies in the western and central Mediterranean continued to trade with the Phoenicians.
In the east, around the close of the seventh century, the Assyrian kingdom was vanquished by the Chaldeans and Medes. The Babylonian Chaldean dynasty promoted trade and administration modeled after that of the Assyrians. In the reign of Nebuchadrezzar II (c. 605–c. 561 bce), the Neo-Babylonian empire rose to the status of preeminent political power. From the Anatolian Taurus Mountains to eastern Arabia and far into southern Iran, its dominion reached. The destruction of their state and their subsequent captivity in Babylon had a profound effect on the Jews and the Greeks, whose lore of Babylon’s greatness became legendary, among those living during this brief period of statehood.
The empires that followed the Achaemenid
By establishing the Achaemenian kingdom in the 6th century, the Iranian Persians led by Cyrus the Great vanquished their Median relatives (549). After this, the empire of Babylon was conquered (539), and Lydia was conquered (546). The Persian Empire adopted Zoroastrianism as its state religion and Aramaic as its de jure language. Thanks to Cyrus’s progressive policies, the Assyro-Babylonian policy of exiling conquered peoples and attempting to eradicate all forms of local nationalism came to an end.
Despite controlling the entire Middle East at its heyday, the Achaemenian Empire was unable to effectively extend into Europe due to opposition from the Greeks.
Alexander the Great conquered Anatolia in 334 B.C.E. and the Persian Empire nine years later. Macedonian “successor states” were formed after his death from his enormous kingdom. Syrian Seleucid rulers had sway over most of what is now Iran, Mesopotamia, and Anatolia. From a little region to the southeast of the Caspian Sea, the still-nomadic Parthians developed about 250 BCE.
After seizing Iran, they proclaimed independence from the Seleucid empire and began to advance westward into Mesopotamia in the 2nd century bce. The Persian Sasanians succeeded the semi-Hellenized Parthians in the third century ce. During their reign from 224 to 642 cc, the Sasanians expanded Iran’s borders, revitalized its government and cultural life, and posed a threat to Roman dominance in the Middle East. When the Muslim Arabs defeated the Sasanian empire in 636, it marked the end of an era of ancient Middle Eastern culture.
