Elise Van Campo

Environmental Roots of the Late Bronze Age Crisis

The Late Bronze Age world of the Eastern Mediterranean, a rich linkage of Aegean, Egyptian, Syro-Palestinian, and Hittite civilizations, collapsed famously 3200 years ago and has remained one of the mysteries of the ancient world since the event’s retrieval began in the late 19th century AD/CE. Iconic Egyptian bas-reliefs and graphic hieroglyphic and cuneiform texts portray the proximate cause of the collapse as the invasions of the “Peoples-of-the-Sea” at the Nile Delta, the Turkish coast, and down into the heartlands of Syria and Palestine where armies clashed, famine-ravaged cities abandoned, and countrysides depopulated. Here we report palaeoclimate data from Cyprus for the Late Bronze Age crisis, alongside a radiocarbon-based chronology integrating both archaeological and palaeoclimate proxies, which reveal the effects of abrupt climate change-driven famine and causal linkage with the Sea People invasions in Cyprus and Syria. The statistical analysis of proximate and ultimate features of the sequential collapse reveals the relationships of climate-driven famine, sea-borne-invasion, region-wide warfare, and politico-economic collapse, in whose wake new societies and new ideologies were created.

Primary domestication and early uses of the emblematic olive tree: palaeobotanical, historical and molecular evidence from the Middle East

Our knowledge of the origins of olive tree domestication in the Middle East and on the processes governing its extension and persistence in different vegetation types from prehistory through antiquity to modern times derives from diverse sources, spanning the biological sciences to the humanities. Nonetheless, it lacks a robust overview that may lead to floating interpretations. This is especially true in the Middle East, considered as the cradle of agriculture, and where the evolutionary history of this emblematic tree is intertwined with that of civilizations. Olive fruit, oil and wood have been, since Prehistoric times, characteristic products of the lands bordering the Mediterranean Sea. In the domestic economy of these countries, the olive tree gradually became a traditional tree crop since the first oil extraction, through the emergence of regional commerce that accompanied the rise and fall of early Near‐Middle Eastern urbanism, until the development of modern trade, with an oil production estimated at circa 3000000 tons per year. The rising importance of the olive tree in human life has turned the tree into an endless source of fascination in the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean, a symbol and a sacred tree, widely cited in the Bibles, the Koran, and in ancient literature. Here we argue that advances in radiocarbon chronology, palaeobotany, genetics, and archaeology‐history have profoundly refined the history of olive trees in the Middle East. This review shows that the heartland of primary olive domestication must be enlarged to the Levant and not only focus on the Jordan Valley. The domestication of the olive tree is a long and ongoing process, linked to the early production of oil and the development of the olive trade. We also suggest that the olive tree became a particular icon, a sacred tree, during the Biblical period in the Levant.

Drought is a recurring challenge in the Middle East

Climate change and water availability in the Middle East are important in understanding human adaptive capacities in the face of long-term environmental changes. The key role of water availability for sedentary and nomad populations in these arid to semiarid landscapes is understood, but the millennium-scale influence of hydrologic instability on vegetation dynamics, human occupation, and historic land use are unknown, which has led to a stochastic view of population responses and adaptive capacities to precipitation anomalies. Within the time-frame of the last two global climate events, the Medieval Climate Anomaly and the Little Ice Age, we report hydrologic instability reconstructed from pollen-derived climate proxies recovered near Tell Leilan, at the Wadi Jarrah in the Khabur Plains of northeastern Syria, at the heart of ancient northern Mesopotamia. By coupling climate proxies with archaeological-historical data and a pollen-based record of agriculture, this integrative study suggests that variability in precipitation is a key factor on crop yields, productivity, and economic systems. It may also have been one of the main parameters controlling human settlement and population migrations at the century to millennial timescales in the arid to semiarid areas of the Middle East. An abrupt shift to drier conditions at ca. AD 1400 is contemporaneous with a change from sedentary village life to regional desertion and nomadization (sheep/camel pastoralists) during the preindustrial era in formerly Ottoman realms, and thereby adds climate change to the multiple causes for Ottoman Empire “decline.”

The Sea Peoples, from Cuneiform Tablets to Carbon Dating

The 13th century BC witnessed the zenith of the Aegean and Eastern Mediterranean civilizations which declined at the end of the Bronze Age, ∼3200 years ago. Weakening of this ancient flourishing Mediterranean world shifted the political and economic centres of gravity away from the Levant towards Classical Greece and Rome, and led, in the long term, to the emergence of the modern western civilizations. Textual evidence from cuneiform tablets and Egyptian reliefs from the New Kingdom relate that seafaring tribes, the Sea Peoples, were the final catalyst that put the fall of cities and states in motion. However, the lack of a stratified radiocarbon-based archaeology for the Sea People event has led to a floating historical chronology derived from a variety of sources spanning dispersed areas. Here, we report a stratified radiocarbon-based archaeology with anchor points in ancient epigraphic-literary sources, Hittite-Levantine-Egyptian kings and astronomical observations to precisely date the Sea People event. By confronting historical and science-based archaeology, we establish an absolute age range of 1192–1190 BC for terminal destructions and cultural collapse in the northern Levant. This radiocarbon-based archaeology has far-reaching implications for the wider Mediterranean, where an elaborate network of international relations and commercial activities are intertwined with the history of civilizations.

Early urban impact on Mediterranean coastal environments

A common belief is that, unlike today, ancient urban areas developed in a sustainable way within the environmental limits of local natural resources and the ecosystems capacity to respond. This long-held paradigm is based on a weak knowledge of the processes underpinning the emergence of urban life and the rise of an urban-adapted environment in and beyond city boundaries. Here, we report a 6000-year record of environmental changes around the port city of Akko (Acre), Israel, to analyse ecological processes and patterns stemming from the emergence and growth of urban life. We show that early urban development deeply transformed pre-existing ecosystems, swiftly leading to an urban environment already governed by its own ecological rules and this, since the emergence of the cities.

Wild or cultivated Olea europaea L. in the eastern Mediterranean during the middle-late Holocene? A pollen-numerical approach

Assessment of the wild or cultivated origin of Olea europaea L. during the middle to late Holocene according to pollen analyses is of palaeoecological and evolutionary interest as olive is thought to be one of the earliest cultivated trees and is still one of the most important fruit trees of the eastern Mediterranean. This paper considers data from the Bronze—Iron Age harbour-town, Tell Tweini, of the Ugarit Kingdom, in the Syrian coastal lowland near Jableh (17 m a.s.l.) and from the Hellenistic—Roman Moatra-Bereket (1410 m a.s.l.), in the territory of Sagalassos, in Turkey’s western Taurus Mountains. Both of these sites have recorded the rise and collapse of early eastern Mediterranean urban systems from 4200 to 1600 cal. yr BP. The Syrian data suggest that the Olea pollen-type originated from wild varieties during the Bronze and Iron Ages despite archaeological evidence for olive cultivation in the northern Levant. For Turkey, the results of the pollen-numerical analyses support the existing archaeological evidence of a wealthy oleoculture in Hellenistic and Roman Anatolia and suggest important anthropogenic pressures on local ecosystems.

Solar pacing of storm surges, coastal flooding and agricultural losses in the Central Mediterranean

Storm surges, leading to catastrophic coastal flooding, are amongst the most feared natural hazards due to the high population densities and economic importance of littoral areas. Using the Central Mediterranean Sea as a model system, we provide strong evidence for enhanced periods of storminess leading to coastal flooding during the last 4500 years. We show that long-term correlations can be drawn between storminess and solar activity, acting on cycles of around 2200-yr and 230-yr. We also find that phases of increased storms and coastal flooding have impacted upon mid- to late Holocene agricultural activity on the Adriatic coast. Based on the general trend observed during the second half of the 20th century, climate models are predicting a weakening of Mediterranean storminess. By contrast, our new data suggest that a decrease in solar activity will increase and intensify the risk of frequent flooding in coastal areas.

Medieval coastal Syrian vegetation patterns in the principality of Antioch

The coastal area of Jableh, in the vicinity of the Saladin and Al-Marquab castles, is a fertile alluvial plain located on the northwestern part of Syria, in what was once the crusader Principality of Antioch. In order to detail the coastal environment during the crusader period in the Middle East, palynological analyses have been conducted on the underlying coastal-alluvial deposits. The recovered sediments represent a continuous record of the environmental history of the area spanning a c. AD 850—1850 cal. yr period, from the Muslim Era up to and including the late Ottoman times. During the local crusader period (AD 1100—1270), the area was dominated by an arborescent mattoral mixed with a xerophytic shrub-steppe. The alluvial plain was slightly waterlogged and colonized by a wetland meadow with an open vegetation of steppe-like character on bare surfaces and fresh arable soils. The riparian and open deciduous riverine forests were weakly developed. Signs of agricultural activities are mainly recorded for the High Medieval period (AD 1000—1300), with an increase of vineyards in the coastal area. Since c. AD 1250 cal. yr until the end of the crusader period, agricultural activities never reached the same intensity as during the Mameluke Sultanate and the Ottoman Empire.

Climate change and water management in the biblical city of Dan

Past climate shifts in water-stressed areas show that stagnant water could be a health threat in the context of global change. Global climate change has sharpened focus on the social and economic challenges associated with water deficits, particularly in regions where anthropogenic demands exceed supply. This modern condition was also experienced by the people of ancient western Asia, where chronic water shortages were accentuated by recurrent droughts. However, human societies may react to climate change, particularly desiccation, in different ways depending on specific local conditions. Focusing on the biblical site of Tel Dan (present-day Israel), we show the effects of severe precipitation decline in an environment that was well watered and fertile even in times of drought. Such local niches of prosperity became attractive targets for predation when food resources became scarce in surrounding rain-fed areas. We propose that predation forced urban populations to either flee or adopt new subsistence strategies. Predation and abandonment, even if only partial, led to the poor maintenance of water networks in and around the city. Once stagnant water surrounded the area, water-borne disease proliferated. Our study shows how climate changes can disrupt social and political structures, cause water system management to collapse, and facilitate marshland expansion.

The 4.2 ka BP event in the Levant

The 4.2 ka BP event is defined as a phase of environmental stress characterized by severe and prolonged drought of global extent. The event is recorded from the North Atlantic through Europe to Asia and has led scientists to evoke a 300-year global mega-drought. For the Mediterranean and the Near East, this abrupt climate episode radically altered precipitation, with an estimated 30 %–50 % drop in rainfall in the eastern basin. While many studies have highlighted similar trends in the northern Mediterranean (from Spain to Turkey and the northern Levant), data from northern Africa and the central-southern Levant are more nuanced, suggesting a weaker imprint of this climate shift on the environment and/or different climate patterns. Here, we critically review environmental reconstructions for the Levant and show that, while the 4.2 ka BP event also corresponds to a drier period, a different climate pattern emerges in the central-southern Levant, with two arid phases framing a wetter period, suggesting a W-shaped event. This is particularly well expressed by records from the Dead Sea area.