The Pax Assyriaca: The Historical Evolution of Civilisations and the Archaeology of Empires

This volume provides a study of the evolutionary process of ancient civilizations, stressing the comparison between theoretical principles and relevant historical and archaeological evidence. For this reason, the study focusses on the origin, development and collapse of the first stage of the ‘Central Civilization’, which was the result of the merger of two primeval civilizations, Mesopotamia and Egypt, during the ‘Near Eastern phase’ of this Central Civilisation. This merger seems to have been the result of the political expansion of an imperial entity coming from Mesopotamia under the aegis of the so-called Neo-Assyrian Empire from 1000 BC to 600 BC – better known as the Pax Assyriaca – although the process of full integration with Egypt seems to have been concluded, according to the archaeological records, only by the successor empires of Assyria circa 430 BC.

Table of Contents

INTRODUCTION

The Concept of Civilization

Historical Evolution of Civilisations

CHAPTER 1

The Historical Evolution of the Ancient Near East and the Rise of the Assyrian Phenomenon

The Ancient Near East as Geopolitical Entity

The Land of Mesopotamia as the Cradle of Civilisation

The Mesopotamian Symbiosis

The Assyrian Phenomenon

The Ancient Near East and the ‘Catastrophe’ at the End of the Bronze Age

CHAPTER 2

The Neo-Assyrian Empire and the Pax Assyriaca

The Meaning of ‘Empire’ and its Principal Dimensions

The Neo-Assyrian Expansion and its Peripheral Politics of Domination

The Neo-Assyrian Hierarchy of its Imperial Core

The Neo-Assyrian Order and its Global Context

CHAPTER 3

Ancient Egypt and the Pax Assyriaca

General Introduction to the Egyptian Civilisation

Ancient Egypt and the Neo-Assyrian’s Peripheral Politics of Domination

Ancient Egypt and the Neo-Assyrian Imperial Core

Ancient Egypt and the Neo-Assyrian Order in its Global Context

CHAPTER 4

The Collapse of the Pax Assyriaca

The Collapse of the Neo-Assyrian Empire

Ancient Egypt and the Collapse of the Neo-Assyrian Empire

CONCLUSION

BIBLIOGRAPHY