Ancient History - Part 60: Limited Rule For The Philistines

Despite the Philistine rule of the lower portion of the Levant region, the Hebrew religion remained unaffected by their influence. While the Philistine civilization drew heavily from their Aegean counterparts (as seen by their rebranding of Canaanite cities to Greco names), the invaders' very dominance over Palestine did not amount to much of anything in the way of changes to the Semitic culture. 

Upon the Philistine conquest of the five largest Canaanite cities Ekron, Askalon, Gaza, Ashdod, and Gath, each was left without a ruler, Gath being the sole exception. Within Gath was the seat of the king, who ruled the entirety of the Philistine Confederation. New towns were settled in the hillside surrounding these cities, primarily Philistine in makeup and origin though this was not to last as the populace soon intermingled.

Philistine rule was designed to dominate by force, militarily. Ironically distrustful of invaders, they viewed uncircumcised men and their brethren as unwelcomed visitors at best, and until king David would later rise to liberate his people, maintained a strangle-hold upon key areas in Judah and Israel.

The culmination of this repression of the Israelites by the Philistines resulted in war. At Ebenezer, a site in southern Palestine, two major battles took place between the Philistines and the Israelites. The Philistine warriors in full battle-regalia the first won against the Israelites, capturing the Ark of the Covenant. In the follow-up battle, the mercenary units of David, the Cherethites, made their presence known, winning the uprising king and his Israelites the day and their well-earned independence.

Nothing detracts more from a dictator's rule than a disinterested populace. In the case of the Philistine dominance over the Semitic peoples, it was less than two centuries for a rebellion to build and surmount an efficient effort of resistance.

When it comes to Palestine, historically speaking, rule over the the Semitic people always bears a limited shelf life, as their spirit to prevail in their fight for freedom proves them victors for thousands of years in whatever contests of attrition they are subjected to in order to survive.

[THE BATTLES OF EBENEZER]

Ancient History - Part 58: The Bible Meets History (And The Romans Ignore It)

According to the Hebrew Bible, king David is referenced as employing two groups who were listed together, the Cherethites and Pelethites, as an elite mercenary faction ("huscarles"). The Cherethites are synonymous with the Philistines, but the Pelethites are unconfirmed as being ethnically Philistine in nature. Most modern historians tend to agree that the Pelethites were likely also Philistine in makeup though occupied a separate regional part of the Levant than their neighboring brothers-in-arms.

Whilst the people of the inner Levant composed of these two groups, separate from king David and his Kingdom of Israel, the coastal peoples were largely Cretan. It is thusly this mix that caused much of confusion amongst later day historians in the coming days of Rome, when historians such as Tacitus confused the genealogies of the Levant (i.e. Tacitus on multiple instances confuses the Philistines with the Jews, erroneously categorizing them as one and the same).

In Gaza, Samson brought down the pillars which crushed the Philistines at their temple. Ancient Rome again miscategorized the names and places associated with the area to reflect Jupiter and other mentions of their own religious customs over those of Semitic faith in Asia Minor. Whilst the Romans adopted words such as "our Lord" to be interpreted as one of their own gods, and in the case of Minoa, a name brought to Gaza from Crete by the Philistines, the Romans affiliated it to resemble a piece of their own pantheon ("Jupiter Kreta-genes").

It is intriguing to reflect upon how the Romans, once overtaking the region a thousand years later, would update their new surroundings to their own society's proclivities and language as they would become the new overseers of the Levant for many, many ages. Upon witnessing the work of the dead previous civilizations before them, now in their possession, they adopted them to undoubtably become Roman, down to the very redefinition of terms and their original meanings. 

As we today live in an era where those in control have shown a tendency to ban, re-define, rename, and withhold information to alter the very perception of reality around us along with its true history, it is important to remember that for better or worse, the Romans once did it first.

[SAMSON depicted destroying the pillars of the Philistine's Pentapolis - Temple in Gaza City]

Ancient History - Part 56: For Those Who Would Be Egyptian

[DARDANELLES - Entry point of the Bryges invasion of Asia Minor]

The initial migration of the Sea Peoples through the Levant differs greatly than their engagements compared to when the Hittites ruled the region. Those slow-building attacks whether by battlefield or sea piracy, largely endured by the indigenous Hittite allies, were not a forced march that Egypt had to later contend with in the aftermath of Hatta's fall. The Bryges, inhabitants of the Balkan Peninsula, first invaded Thrace, and later crossed the Dardanelles to carve out a piece of Anatolia, and upon doing so, renamed themselves as "Phrygians".

This is how Egypt believed the kingdom of the Hittites fell.

Next, the Philistines fell to the newly renamed Phrygians, and Egypt began to suffer direct attacks from this new opposition, the same conquerors of Thrace and Hatta. Yet, there was one key difference: Egypt was aware of this pending invasion well in advance. This foresight allowed Egypt to prepare for war, but the opposition she faced was a challenge unlike any the Empire of the Nile had ever contended with before.

Since the dawn of the Middle Kingdom's inception, this New Kingdom of Egypt's wars of the past all dealt with her own foreign excursions and military adventurism of her day. She recognized the ripe lands of the Fertile Crescent and the lands beyond the Levant and fought many rival kingdoms over these interests. But no foreign entity ever struck precisely at the heart of Egypt, and with the Phrygians marching southward along the coasts of Cilicia, with many other allied tribes joining the ranks, the Migrant Army aimed to do just that.

Soon, Egypt stared across the lines upon an enemy horde. 

Preparation for war is always difficult. This not due to any actor being inept of their own duties that necessarily leads to the folly of ill decision-making, but rather the challenge of utilizing a short window of opportunity that quickly closes. Does one strike while the iron is hot? Or shall he rest in patient vigilance within the safety of his walls, waiting for a better development? Big talk is cheap when the battle is over with all critique now bearing the benefit of hindsight, and Egypt held no such benefit then against the continuing existential threats that plagued her kingdom's people.

[Typical Phrygian garb]

Ancient History - Part 55: A Deeper Look Into The Sea Peoples

Let us take an introspective look upon when this troublesome mass migration from the westerners began, leading up to Egypt's successful battlefield engagements against them. The Pisidians who dwelt from Sagalassos along with the feather-crested battle-armored Lycians of Lycia and Carians of Caria (all geographically located throughout modern day Turkey) gathered and pushed southwestward.

According to Egyptian record, no land could stand against this massive horde, and upon their departure from Anatolia, one-by-one the Syrian city-states began to fall. There were two notable divisions amongst this threat to the Near East: 

The shipmen and the land-horde.

First it was Alashiya that was attacked, overrun by shipmen who assaulted from the sea. Upon victory, the migrant fleet next completely overtook the Syrian Gulf of Issus, permanently circling its coastline in its callous occupation. 

The land-horde however marched into Syria en masse. Arvad, Cappadocia, and of course the legendary historic city of Carchemish were not spared. These places of import, their beauty first desecrated, were largely destroyed by this land-horde, with many citizens likely losing their lives as foreign invasions of this nature rarely offer much in the ways of mercy.

The Amurru kingdom (Palestine) was next attacked and leveled, and it was here that the massive push was halted. We know what came next with the battles between Egypt and the Sea Peoples, but massive damage had been done to Egypt's subjects, and the Near East now bore a literal culture war on its hands between the native kingdoms and the invaders.

When you fear nothing, doubt is eliminated. If your enemies project weakness, then the time to attack is immediate. Thusly, the doubtless hordes of the west immediately attacked the Syrian princes, who'd in the past always relied upon the protections of either the Hittites or the Egyptians, themselves noticeably possessing no desire to fight. And it all fell apart. Trade was displaced and there was no preventing the trail that was blazed right through their land. 

This is not to overshadow the achievements of Egypt in defeating the Sea Peoples when it eventually came to thwarting direct attack, but if one thing can be ascertained about Ancient Egypt it is that defending her subjects was not one of her strengths, if the Upper Levant region is any indication.

[THE FORTRESS OF ARVAD]

Ancient History - Part 53: The Innocence Of The Minoans

There is much in the way of confusion when it comes to identifiers and datapoints regarding the cultural histories between the differing Mediterranean seafaring peoples, particularly during their great migrations into Asia Minor. Often, aggressive acts of piracy that plagued Egypt were mistaken as Minoan (Crete) in nature instead of Mycenaean. It was commonplace for Egypt to mistake newly established Greek settlements for Philistine settlements, Philistine settlements for Semitic settlements, and so forth.

This situation has thusly created a puzzle box of sorts for contemporary historians to decipher the most likely of tribes in certain situations and events whilst sifting through the occasional erroneous accounts scattered throughout ancient Egyptian record.  The most poignant example is to simply look again between the two ethnically separate Greek nations of the time, the Minoans and the Mycenaeans.

Egypt referenced the term "Northerners" many times and it has been widely interpreted to indicate the Mycenaean-Greeks despite Crete, populated and ruled by the Minoan-Greeks, being geographically another northward contender for the recurring reference.

If "Northerners" refers to the Mycenaean-Greeks then "Keftians" refers to the Minoan-Greek population that dwelled on Crete. Therefore, the Mycenaean-Greeks had the ability of travel-by-sea and the Minoan-Greeks, despite the height of their civilization's peak established during the Middle Kingdom of Egypt's decline, did not. This is not to say that a Minoan or two never departed their isle to the mainland coast of the Levant, but mass migration during this civilization's epoch at the scale of their northwestward neighbors (the Mycenaeans) is widely ruled out as unlikely.

Prior to the rise of Mediterranean piracy, the Minoan civilization had begun to deteriorate (by 15th century BC) marking this newer nautical enemy of the Egyptians as intrinsically Mycenaean-Greek via process of elimination. The "Peoples of the Sea" were never Minoan in nature, did not wear their garb, and it is evidenced that the Minoans actually engaged in fierce skirmishes against them, thwarting invasions from the waters against the very same enemy that would later engulf Egypt's coasts and the adjacent coastlines of Libya and Phoenicia. 

An existential threat to the Empire of the Nile saw the Egyptians lump many differing foreign cultures into the same group, when in fact there were various contrasting tribes who encompassed the invading migrants who first encroached upon their waters and would later infiltrate into her region. It has since been the duty of scholars studying this period to attempt to ascertain the correct correlation and identifications in this steep game of "Who's Who?" ever since.

[MINOAN PALACE - Knossos]

Ancient History - Part 52: New Players In Town

Upon the collapse of the Hittite Empire, the former lands of her domain fell into the hands of the local princes and lords of the Levant region, most notably in the case of the Philistines, who up to that point began to settle in Palestine. The necessary documentation required for this era of recorded history for the events that followed relies largely upon Egyptian reports dating back to 1190 BC.

In addition to the Philistines, the Aegeans, or the Kleftians, as the Egyptians preferred to name the Mediterranean seafaring peoples, began to enter Asia Minor and colonize upon Cyprus and other uncontested coastal shores along Anatolia, Syria, and Lebanon. However contrary to ancient Egyptian presumptions, these were more than merely tribes migrating from what we know as modern day Greece, but tribes also originating from Crete, Sicily, Sardinia, and the rest of modern day Italy. Egypt lumped the "People of the Sea" as Greek in origin, but latter-day historians of the age of Great Britain have since matched the names of several deceased as varying all throughout the Mediterranean.

Egypt was firmly placed into the uncomfortable position of seeing foreigners pushing into the lands she once occupied, yet powerless to oppose the rapid changing of the times. New cultures would dominate and carve out boundaries to establish strong heterogenous states, while the empires of old, would follow into the footsteps of Hatta on the long downhill road towards decay.

Egypt's pharaoh, Ramses III thusly felt obligated to act against these new players in town, but the Philistines eagerly awaited this pending challenge, and his army was met and repulsed by a stalwart force of Philistine defenders. Upon defeating the once-great Egyptian power, the new migration seamlessly integrated vast swaths of territory, pathing the way for other tribes to follow. For the first time in centuries, the Semitic peoples were permitted to establish their own leadership to rule themselves, this valiant stand put on full display as a warning for any future would-be conquerors. 

The Achilles' heel to every empire is a loss on the battlefield to a lesser enemy for all to witness. One could argue that with the defeat of Egypt, the Philistines did not merely claim their independence, but signaled the end of Egyptian polity of the Near East, created by Thutmose centuries earlier, once and for all. 

[THE PHILISTINES as depicted by Egypt]