Bronze Age Collapse

A catastrophic systems failure wipes out nearly every major civilization in the Eastern Mediterranean within decades.

Between roughly 1200-1150 BCE, the Hittite Empire, Mycenaean Greece, the Kassite dynasty of Babylon, and numerous Levantine city-states collapsed. Egypt survived but was severely weakened.

Perspective

Eric Cline's work on this is essential. It wasn't one cause — it was cascading failures: drought, invasion, trade disruption, internal revolt, earthquakes. Sound familiar? Complex interconnected systems fail together. This is the first recorded example of systemic collapse, and it won't be the last.