6 - Independence and imperialism: politico-economic structures in the Bronze Age Levant

Summary

Archaeological and documentary evidence from the southern Levant's Middle and Late Bronze Ages (2000/1900–1200 BC) reveal two latent geopolitical structures. Documentary evidence relevant to the North Jordan and Jezreel Valleys (in the modern-day states of Jordan and Israel, respectively) is discussed as one independent data source. Archaeological material from the same region, and particularly from the North Jordan Valley site of Pella, is presented as a separate, independent data source. An Annales framework facilitates reciprocal examination of these two streams of evidence, and makes it possible to offer new perspectives on politico-economic factors that affected independent and imperial polities in the North Jordan, Jezreel, and Beth Shan Valleys between about 1700 and 1200 BC.

Introduction

The study of change through time and space is basic not only to archaeology, but to history, anthropology, and geography. Annales historians have emphasized that the recognition of change in patterned human activity on any level may indicate a break in customs, ideas, or technologies. For archaeologists, the challenge is to identify and isolate such patterned changes and to relate them to sociocultural continuity or discontinuity. The conditions of change may be generated within or without society; in many cases, similar factors promote both stability and change, complexity and collapse.