1177 bc the year civilization collapsed by eric cline

I’ll admit that before reading the book, Cline’s conclusion didn’t feel particularly satisfying. Ultimately, Cline settles on an “all of the above” hypothesis as the most likely answer to what caused the fall of these civilizations. But that doesn’t mean we can’t use what we do know about the time period to weigh the merits of the various explanations that have been proposed, which include earthquakes, climate change, internal rebellion, the invasion of the Sea Peoples, and more. If there is a smoking gun, we haven’t discovered it yet. Cline readily admits that, at the end of the day, we simply still don’t know what actually caused the collapse. Now let’s move on to the main subject of the book - the collapse of the Bronze Age. This book really is a gold mine for those of us fascinated by myth and the historical truths that may underpin them.

He does an excellent job of summarizing the history of these topics and what the evidence tells us.

One of the coolest aspects of this book is Cline’s willingness and ability to expand on tangential Bronze Age topics, including the legend of the Exodus of the Israelites from Egypt, the Trojan War, King Tut and his tomb, various sunken ships that have been found, and many others. But I have to admit I was still tempted to rush through this stage of the book to get to the parts about the Sea Peoples, earthquakes, etc. Understanding the societies of the time and how they were connected was critical to making sense of how things went wrong in the 12th century. Cline had told me in our conversation that the entire middle portion of the book was focused on the centuries leading up to the Bronze Age collapse, rather than just the collapse itself. The format of the book itself was less surprising.

This was a welcome surprise as I tend to prefer shorter books that I can read in a matter of days or a couple of weeks over ones I know could drag on forever. For some reason, I assumed it was going to be a massive, 800-page tome, but it turned out to be much more manageable at under 200 (plus extensive footnotes, bibliography, etc.). My first reaction was that it was shorter and smaller than I expected. So I was very excited to see the book arrive in the mail a few days ago. There is just so much to cover when it comes to the fall of the Bronze Age and it was clear I had only scratched the surface of Cline’s expertise on the subject. The conversation was fascinating, but I wish we had three hours instead of one.

1177 bc the year civilization collapsed by eric cline