La crisis del siglo XII A.C. pueblos del mar y guerra de Troya CA. 1215-1175 A.C

Abstract

The assaults of the Sea Peoples were produced in two different moments, separated by 32 years, ca. 1208 and ca. 1176 B.C., and they were collateral effects of the crisis of large two states, first Ahhiyawa and thereinafter Hatti. This instability phase was generalized in the Eastern Mediterranean after the death of Ramesses II ca. 1213 B.C. and Tudhaliya IV, ca. 1215/1209 B.C., in the which one the internal tensions within Hatti and Egypt, by the successoral problems, had an importance much greater than the external assaults, overvalue by the relief of Medinet Habu and the destruction of Ugarit. The growing weakness of Ahhiyawa-Thebes favored the control of Millawanda-Miletus by Hatti. On the other hand, the successive assaults on Thebes from the Argolid, first by the Seven against Thebes ca. 1220 B.C. and after by their sons, the Epigoni, ca. 1210 a.C., forced a dynastic change and the emigration of an important contingent of Theban population, being the Ikyws Akaywash of Millawanda and Thebes the principal foreign people that participated, supporting to the Lybians, in the assault the fifth year of Merneptah, ca. 1208 B.C. Also participated Srdn Sherden of Sardis and the Sardenos mount in Mira, currently Lydia, Rk Lukka of Lycia, together with Trs Tursa and Skrs Shekelesh of Kizzuwanda or Eastern Cilicia. A campaign of Tudhaliya IV in Lukka-Lycia, annexing this territory, had provoked an initial displacement of Prst Peleset, first to Crete, together with Tkr Tjekker of Tarhuntassa. From there, they continued toward Palestine, perhaps ca. 1194 B.C., supporting to the great chancellor Bay and the throne access of the new pharaoh Siptah and the mother queen Twosret. The campaigns of Suppiluliuma II in Lukka, Tarhuntassa and perhaps Kizzuwanda, provoked the displacement of Prst Peleset of Lukka, Tkr Tjekker of Tarhuntassa or Western Cilicia, and Dnn Dainiuna and Skrs Shekelesh of Kizzuwanda, that they were displaced mainly by land with their families crossing Mukis, Ugarit and Amurru, where installed their camp, for thereinafter to penetrate in territory of the Egyptian Empire, in the eighth year of Ramesses III, ca. 1176 B.C. They had naval support of the Wss Weshesh ‘of the sea’, originating from Issus in Kizzuwanda, but they were defeated in the Delta by ships of Byblos, transporting Egyptian soldiers. Finally, they finished installed in the Palestinian coast, taking advantage the previous settlement of the Prst Peleset in Ashkelon. Little before, perhaps ca. 1177 B.C., the year seven of Ramesses III, was produced the destruction of Ugarit, since is mentioned in Medinet Habu that already Hatti and Kargamish have been destroyed. Other important source of information for this period is the Trojan War, whose destruction was dated by Manetho during the reign of pharaoh Twosret, widow of Sethos II, ca. 1188-1186 B.C. The Iliad, the Odyssey and the Nostoi or returns of the Trojan War, are the heroic narrative in terms of the Boeotians of Ahhiyawa-Thebes, from whose port of Aulis departed the fleet to assault Troy. If the Achaeans of Ahhiyawa, originating from Miletus and Thebes, were the most important contingent than participated in the assault against Merneptah, the recitals that appear in the Odyssey or in the Nostoi of the Trojan Cycle also reflect the own heroic narrative of the Sea Peoples. Exist a coincidence in the conquests of Sidon by Prst Peleset of Askhelon, ca. 1187 B.C., and of Troy by the Achaeans, ca. 1186 B.C., that reveals a certain coordination between the Prst Peleset of Lukka and the Tkr Tjekker of Tarhuntassa, both refugees in Crete, where was governing Idomeneus, in relation with the Achaean naval force that was besieging Troy, in which Idomeneus was one of their three principal leaders. The siege of Troy during 10 years, ca. 1196-1186 B.C., though also they attacked a good stretch of the Anatolian coast, it was a campaign of Mycenae and its allies against one of the vassal kingdoms of Hatti in the Anatolian coast, the which one had the support of the remaining dependent kingdoms of Hatti, River Seha in Asia, Mira in Lydia, Millawanda in Caria or Lukka in Lycia. Reflect the ancient rivalry between Ahhiyawa and Arzawa by the control of Aegean. The economic key of the war was the control of the last good port before of the access to the Sea of Marmara, because the frequent presence of opposite maritime currents and adverse winds were demanding in occasion long periods waiting in a safe port. This route was opening the road toward the Black Sea, which had begun to be cross only one generation before the Trojan War, as reflects The Argonauts of Apolonius of Rhodes, and permitted to reach the great mining region of the north coast of Anatolia and the gold of river Rioni in Colchis (Georgia).