- 41 minutes ago
Τα Μυστικά του Πολιτισμού (The Secrets to Civilization)
2021 | Επ. 1/3 | HD
Κορυφαίοι ιστορικοί μοιράζονται μαζί μας καινούργια δεδομένα για την κατάσταση του πλανήτη μας και αποκαλύπτουν πώς αυτά τα δεδομένα παρέχουν νέες πληροφορίες για την επίδραση των κλιματικών αλλαγών, των πανδημιών και της ηφαιστειότητας, στην εξέλιξη της ανθρώπινης ιστορίας.
Ερευνούμε πώς η κλιματική αλλαγή επηρεάζει τους πολιτισμούς και διαπιστώνουμε ότι την εποχή του Τρωικού Πολέμου και της Εξόδου επικρατούσε ψυχρό κλίμα που προκάλεσε την κατάρρευση κάποιων πολιτισμών.
2021 | Επ. 1/3 | HD
Κορυφαίοι ιστορικοί μοιράζονται μαζί μας καινούργια δεδομένα για την κατάσταση του πλανήτη μας και αποκαλύπτουν πώς αυτά τα δεδομένα παρέχουν νέες πληροφορίες για την επίδραση των κλιματικών αλλαγών, των πανδημιών και της ηφαιστειότητας, στην εξέλιξη της ανθρώπινης ιστορίας.
Ερευνούμε πώς η κλιματική αλλαγή επηρεάζει τους πολιτισμούς και διαπιστώνουμε ότι την εποχή του Τρωικού Πολέμου και της Εξόδου επικρατούσε ψυχρό κλίμα που προκάλεσε την κατάρρευση κάποιων πολιτισμών.
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02:48και προσπαθεί τι έγινε το πρόβλημα για περισσότερο χρόνο.
02:55Αυτή είναι η ερώτηση που έγινε το ερικ Κλίν έγινε να αντιμετωπίσει
02:58από την πίστηση έγινε από πολλές πρόβλημα.
03:02Λέρας, όμως, βρίσκονται από την Ελλάδα και την Ελλάδα,
03:05και εγώ πήγε το έγινε, και πήγε, το έχω μια νερό βιβλή,
03:09και πήγε το παιδί και το παιδί.
03:12Τι έγινε ότι δεν έγινε ότι είχα παιδί και συμβαίνει
03:15και στρατηματικά μεταξιδότητας στην αρχή.
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04:17This extraordinary kingdom had endured for over 2,000 years when disaster struck.
04:24The last few centuries had been good to Egypt.
04:28This was the era of famous pharaohs like Akhenaten,
04:33of his wife, Nefertiti,
04:37of Tutankhamun
04:41and Ramesses the Great.
04:45Now another Ramesses is on the throne.
04:49He has guided Egypt for 30 years.
04:54Ramesses III reigned at a time when Egypt was powerful and wealthy.
05:01It was in control of people not only in its own country but beyond as well.
05:07On the walls of his temple at Medinet Harbu in Thebes,
05:12Ramesses recorded his achievements as pharaoh for posterity.
05:18And this record is contemporary evidence
05:21for the Bronze Age world's descent into war and chaos.
05:28I think it's fair to say that Ramesses III's reign was a very eventful one.
05:33and this is a time when things seem to have been beginning to change for the worse.
05:40Ramesses' monumental temple gave early archaeologists
05:44a vivid clue about the cause of the Bronze Age collapse.
05:49Inscriptions of the first years of his reign tell of marauders
05:53laying waste to cities and kingdoms, heading for Egypt.
05:59It's survived, fortunately for us, incredibly well.
06:04It's decorated with scenes of pharaoh in battle.
06:30We know from various different sources
06:32that in fact these weren't all campaigns fought on foreign soil.
06:42In other words, Egypt was being invaded.
06:48This isn't something that Egypt often had to deal with.
06:54Beyond her borders was a network of kingdoms and empires.
06:59In modern-day Iraq were the Babylonians and Assyrians.
07:04Along the shores of Israel, Lebanon and Syria was the land of Canaan.
07:11In central Turkey was the capital of another mighty empire, the Hittites.
07:17Along the Turkish shores were many cities and kingdoms, such as Troy.
07:22And across the Aegean Sea was the Mycenaean civilisation of mainland Greece.
07:28But Egypt was the leading power of the day.
07:31And these people, of course, also would have viewed pharaoh
07:35as being an incredibly powerful individual with influence over their lives.
07:40So people all around the ancient world, all around the Mediterranean world,
07:44would have seen Egypt and pharaoh as the great power.
07:52Egypt's success story stretched far back in time to the very beginning of civilisation.
07:59The product of the Nile River, flowing out of the heart of Africa
08:04to where Ramsey's ancestors turned its unique properties into food and wealth.
08:12Astrobiologist Lewis Dartnell has written extensively on the origins of human civilisation.
08:18These primary civilisations that emerged first in our history
08:22are on the banks of major rivers.
08:27The Indus.
08:30The Tigris and Euphrates.
08:34The Nile River Valley.
08:37These are where we see the earliest civilisations on the planet.
08:41And then civilisations spread from those points of origin around the world.
08:47But now it's believed that climate change played a key role
08:51by driving people towards the Nile Valley, where they settled down.
08:56The region in North Africa that today we call the Sahara
08:59was once much wetter.
09:02It was swaying grasslands dotted with lakes.
09:07It was a great environment for hunter-gatherers.
09:11But then, with a shift in Earth's climate,
09:15North Africa began to dry out
09:17and the Sahara Desert emerged.
09:21Desertification of the Sahara region,
09:24this is believed to be one of the drivers
09:26that ended up in the emergence of dense settlements
09:31and civilisation along the banks of the Nile.
09:39By 3000 BCE, the settlements along the Nile Valley
09:44were united into one kingdom.
09:47So successful, it would produce the pyramids,
09:50an awe-inspiring symbol of the scale
09:53on which Egypt's early kings could harness labour and resources.
10:02and Egypt had the wealth to bring in anything
10:05that couldn't be found locally.
10:08A lively trade went on along the coasts of the Mediterranean.
10:14But the trade winds could also blow in unwelcome visitors.
10:22In the years around 1200 BCE,
10:25a succession of marauders were heading for the Nile Delta.
10:33The first attacks were in the reign of Pharaoh Manepta,
10:3730 years earlier.
10:39But by Ramsey's time, things are clearly much more serious.
10:43Egyptian accounts tell us these invaders
10:46have already devastated many lands and cities.
10:50And sure enough, everywhere that archaeologists look,
10:53they find cities destroyed, burned, abandoned,
10:57from Greece and the Aegean to Turkey and Syria.
11:02It's as if the lights were going out
11:04all over the civilised world.
11:07So when Victorian archaeologists
11:09deciphered the inscriptions at Ramsey's Mortuary Temple,
11:12they thought the pharaoh had identified
11:15the most likely suspects
11:16for causing the collapse of civilisations.
11:23They called them the Sea Peoples.
11:27The name Sea People itself is a reflection
11:30of how little information we have even now
11:33about who they were.
11:34And it may well have been that Ramsey's III
11:37was somewhat in the dark about who he was facing.
11:44The Sea Peoples were now the prime suspect
11:47in the violent end of an era.
11:51The Bronze Age catastrophe
11:53was a classic case of barbarians at the gates.
11:59Over time, people's ideas started to morph
12:02and change a little bit.
12:04and in the very recent past,
12:07we've started to think
12:08that maybe they were just part
12:10of a much larger problem
12:13and that while they are in there,
12:16while they are a factor,
12:18I don't think that they are any longer
12:21the only factor.
12:25So what was really going on?
12:28Archaeologists began to look for a deeper set of causes
12:31behind the collapse
12:32and that meant understanding
12:34what had happened in the world
12:35beyond Egypt's borders
12:37where once successful kingdoms and cultures
12:40had been consumed by fire and destruction.
12:50One thing that seemed obvious to Eric Klein
12:52was that the kingdoms of the Late Bronze Age
12:55were all connected.
12:57While relations were not always peaceful,
13:00they probably spent more energy
13:02in trade and diplomacy
13:04than they did on war with one another.
13:07The evidence that we've got
13:09for the interconnectedness
13:10in the Late Bronze Age
13:12is many and varied.
13:14They are writing back and forth to each other.
13:16They are keeping lists
13:17of the goods going back and forth.
13:20They are recording their diplomatic treaties.
13:24This is a period
13:25during which everyone is writing.
13:27So we've got the benefit
13:29of having those texts.
13:32We also have the benefit
13:34of the archaeology.
13:36That is, we've found
13:37the material culture
13:38at sites ranging from Megiddo
13:41to Hatzor to Mycenae
13:43to Knossos to Thebes
13:45to Hattusa.
13:48We are finding the actual objects
13:50that are being traded
13:52and exchanged.
13:57Many of these distinctively shaped
13:59copper ingots
14:00have been recovered
14:01from the wrecks
14:02of Bronze Age merchant ships.
14:06As the key component in bronze,
14:08copper was a vital commodity.
14:11But it wasn't easy to find.
14:16Copper is released
14:18in hydrothermal vents
14:20in the very deep sea floor,
14:23in the middle of the ocean.
14:25And so you've got to have
14:26a particular geological process
14:28that scoops up
14:31that deep oceanic crust
14:33and dollops it
14:34on top of the land
14:35where ancient miners
14:37can get at.
14:40The Mediterranean island
14:42of Cyprus
14:43was a key centre
14:44of the copper trade.
14:48Cyprus even gave its name
14:51to the metal.
14:53The Mediterranean's
14:55restless geology
14:56made a sweet spot
14:57of the Troodos Mountains.
15:00The first miners
15:02excavated here
15:036,000 years ago.
15:06The scars still left
15:07on the landscape
15:08show archaeometallurgist
15:10Basiliki Cassianidu
15:11why Cyprus-powered
15:13Bronze Age civilisations.
15:16Geological studies
15:17have shown
15:17that the Troodos mountain range
15:19was formed
15:20when the Eurasian
15:22tectonic plate
15:23and the African tectonic plate
15:24moved away from each other.
15:27Magma came out
15:28of this rift
15:29and Troodos was born.
15:31Then the two
15:32tectonic plates
15:33came together
15:34and lifted Troodos
15:36to the surface.
15:37So we are standing
15:38on a piece
15:39of the ocean crust.
15:42These Bronze Age tunnels
15:44cut into the mountains
15:45may have been rich
15:47in copper
15:48but to make the metal
15:49that gave the Bronze Age
15:51its name
15:51a much rarer metal
15:54was needed
15:54tin.
15:57Tin is not available
15:58in Cyprus.
15:59We know from
16:00the ancient sources
16:01that tin comes
16:02from the east
16:03and we know
16:04from modern geological
16:06studies that
16:07in Afghanistan
16:08there are rich
16:09tin deposits.
16:11If you put this
16:12all together
16:12it shows how
16:13everybody was
16:14interlinked
16:16and participating
16:17in a very complex
16:18trading network
16:19that brought
16:21these two metals
16:22that were needed
16:22for the society
16:24of that time.
16:28This network
16:29was the lifeblood
16:31of Bronze Age
16:31civilisation
16:32in the Mediterranean.
16:34The trade in metals
16:35and luxury goods
16:36played out
16:37against a background
16:38of diplomatic exchanges,
16:40dynastic marriages
16:41and power plays
16:43between rival empires
16:45over control
16:46of lesser kingdoms.
16:48But at the end
16:49of the Late Bronze Age
16:51the system
16:51completely unravelled
16:53for everybody
16:54at the same time.
16:56So I can give you
16:57a good example
16:57of just how catastrophic
16:59the collapse was.
17:00The Hittites
17:01in Anatolia
17:02modern day Turkey.
17:04This civilisation
17:05that had been
17:06on a par
17:08with the Egyptians
17:09as the two biggest names
17:12in the Late Bronze Age
17:14was gone so completely
17:16that we had no idea
17:18where they were
17:19until the early years
17:21of the 1900s.
17:24The theories
17:26for how this system
17:27broke down
17:27with such catastrophic
17:29consequences
17:30range from
17:31earthquake swarms
17:33in the Aegean
17:34to changes
17:34in warfare
17:35and famine.
17:37But Mediterranean
17:38civilisations
17:39had bounced back
17:40from all of these
17:41before.
17:45Yes there's information
17:47about earthquakes.
17:48Yes for invaders.
17:50Yes for drought.
17:51Yes for famine.
17:52But each of them
17:53is a problem
17:54that even if you have
17:56a drought
17:56it doesn't usually
17:57kill everybody.
17:58Even if you've got
17:59a famine
18:00it doesn't usually
18:01kill everybody.
18:02And then
18:03started thinking
18:05what if you've got
18:06more than one?
18:07What if there's just
18:09too much to survive?
18:11And that was where
18:12I suddenly was thinking
18:13maybe it's
18:14everything.
18:15It really was
18:16I think
18:17a perfect storm
18:19of catastrophes.
18:28But just as Eric
18:30was formulating
18:30his theory
18:31new scientific evidence
18:33was unearthed
18:34by the exact
18:35sciences team
18:36at the University
18:37of Tel Aviv.
18:41They were pioneering
18:43a new technique
18:44for reconstructing
18:45the past
18:46counting pollen grains.
18:51Here at the Dead Sea
18:52in southern Israel
18:53Daphna Langut
18:54made a revolutionary
18:56discovery
18:56in a layer cake
18:59of ancient sediments
19:00that offered
19:01evidence
19:01of a very
19:02different past.
19:08The Dead Sea
19:09lake once
19:10had much higher
19:11lake levels.
19:13For researchers
19:14like me
19:14this is kind
19:15of a heaven
19:16because I can
19:17come to this
19:18beautiful sediment
19:19outcrop
19:20and I can
19:21look at
19:22the laminated
19:23section
19:23and I can
19:24understand
19:25that the
19:27place that I
19:28am sampling
19:29at that moment
19:30used to be
19:31part of the
19:32Dead Sea
19:33lake.
19:35Hidden in the
19:36highly saline
19:37sediments
19:38are microscopic
19:39pollen grains
19:40that have been
19:41preserved for
19:42millennia.
19:44Each plant
19:45species
19:46will use
19:46its own
19:47unique
19:47pollen
19:47form
19:48that
19:48later
19:48can
19:48be
19:48identified
19:49under the
19:50microscope
19:50it's like
19:51its identity
19:51card
19:52and I'm
19:52fascinated
19:53by the
19:54fact
19:54that
19:54this
19:55tiny
19:55microscopic
19:56grains
19:57can tell
19:57us
19:58fascinating
19:59information
19:59about past
20:00vegetation
20:01and climate
20:01changes.
20:05Daphna uses
20:06radiocarbon dating
20:07to find out
20:08when the pollen
20:08was laid down
20:09on the lake
20:10bed
20:10but around
20:12the time
20:12of the Bronze
20:12collapse
20:13she saw
20:14an astonishing
20:15change
20:16in the lake
20:16itself.
20:18When you see
20:19these beautiful
20:20grey sediments
20:21laminated
20:22with these
20:23thin white
20:24layers
20:25that means
20:26that this
20:27was in the
20:28middle of the
20:29lake
20:29so we have
20:30here
20:31high concentrations
20:32and good
20:33state of
20:34pollen
20:34but when
20:35the lake
20:36did not
20:36exist
20:36longer
20:37so all
20:38the pollen
20:39was destroyed
20:40and the
20:41lake level
20:42declined
20:43during the
20:44end of the
20:45late Bronze
20:45Age.
20:49In sediment
20:50deep below
20:51the Sea
20:52of Galilee
20:52Daphna
20:53uncovered the
20:54cause of the
20:55lake's
20:55disappearance.
20:57There
20:57undisturbed
20:58pollen held
20:59evidence of
21:00a huge shock
21:01to plant life.
21:02Tree pollen
21:03had simply
21:04disappeared.
21:07When we
21:08have high
21:08percentages of
21:09Mediterranean
21:10trees such
21:10as pines,
21:11oaks,
21:12pistachio and
21:12so on,
21:13probably we
21:14had high
21:15precipitation,
21:15humid climate
21:16conditions in
21:17our region
21:17and vice
21:18versa.
21:18When we
21:19have a
21:19decline in
21:20the percentages
21:21of the
21:21arboreal pollen,
21:23that means
21:23that at that
21:24period of time
21:24we had
21:25drier climate
21:26conditions.
21:28Could the
21:29apparent drop
21:30in rainfall
21:30have something
21:31to do with
21:32the turmoil
21:33described by
21:34Ramses.
21:38Archaeologist
21:39Israel Finkelstein
21:40is Professor
21:41Emeritus at
21:42Tel Aviv
21:42University.
21:44When he
21:45cross-referenced
21:46Daphna's data
21:46with his
21:47timeline,
21:48they coincided
21:49perfectly with
21:50the period when
21:51cities were
21:52destroyed right
21:53across Bronze
21:54Age Canaan.
21:55The dry
21:56events at the
21:58end of the
21:59Bronze Age
21:59lasted from
22:01around 12
22:011250 B.C.
22:03until 1100 B.C.
22:05This is what
22:06we see in
22:07the pollen
22:08investigation.
22:11Now we
22:12can shift
22:13to the
22:13archaeological
22:14evidence,
22:15the big
22:15wave of
22:16destructions
22:17in the
22:17region.
22:18It starts
22:19farther to
22:20the north
22:20of us,
22:21around 1250
22:22B.C.
22:23And finally
22:24here at
22:25Megiddo
22:25in the time
22:26of Rameses
22:27III and
22:27a bit
22:28later.
22:32when this
22:33new climate
22:34data landed
22:34on Eric
22:35Klein's
22:36desk,
22:36Eric realized
22:37it could
22:38revolutionize
22:39theories for
22:39the causes
22:40of the Bronze
22:41Age collapse.
22:42When I had
22:43been working on
22:43my book and I
22:44had turned the
22:45book in and I'm
22:46told the next
22:47thing you'll see
22:47is in three
22:48months it'll be
22:48out.
22:50About three
22:50days later an
22:51article was
22:52published by
22:54Daphne Langut,
22:55Israel Finkelstein
22:56and Thomas
22:57Litt, which
22:58said that they
22:58had found
22:59evidence for
23:00a drought by
23:02taking samples
23:04in the Dead
23:05Sea and the
23:06Sea of
23:06Galilee.
23:07This was
23:09brand new
23:10evidence and
23:11it was so
23:12compelling that
23:13it basically
23:14catapulted
23:16drought,
23:18climate change
23:19up to the
23:21top of the
23:21list.
23:22But it was
23:23too late.
23:24the book
23:25was in
23:25press.
23:26You can't
23:27change
23:27anything.
23:28And so I
23:29sent a
23:30frantic
23:31email to
23:32my editor
23:32and I
23:33said this
23:34article just
23:35came out.
23:36If we
23:37don't put
23:38it in, the
23:39book is
23:40going to be
23:40outdated even
23:42before it
23:42comes out.
23:43And I
23:44said in
23:44capital letters
23:45stop the
23:47presses.
23:51Eric's book
23:52was amended
23:52and went
23:53on to
23:54become a
23:54bestseller.
23:59What the
24:00Tel Aviv team
24:00had come up
24:01with was
24:02part of a
24:03wider
24:03revolution in
24:05the data
24:05available to
24:07archaeologists
24:07like Eric.
24:09I went to
24:11conferences where
24:12geologists were
24:13presenting papers
24:14and where
24:15climate scientists
24:17were presenting
24:18papers.
24:18and they
24:20were talking
24:20about the
24:20late Bronze
24:21Age and
24:22evidence for
24:23drought and
24:24climate change
24:24and everything.
24:27Detecting the
24:28presence of
24:28drought and
24:29famine in the
24:30archaeology is
24:31very difficult.
24:32Though there
24:33were some
24:34clues hidden in
24:35the ancient
24:35texts that
24:36have survived
24:37down through
24:38the ages.
24:38certainly by
24:401200 BC we
24:42get letters
24:43sent back and
24:44forth between
24:45the Hittite
24:46king and the
24:46Egyptian pharaoh
24:47saying there's a
24:48drought, there's
24:49famine, I need
24:50food, help me
24:51out.
24:55But the
24:56science now
24:57provided powerful
24:58evidence that
24:59these mentions of
25:00food shortages
25:00were in fact part
25:02of a much
25:03bigger picture.
25:04It was soon
25:05clear that
25:06evidence from
25:06across a huge
25:07geographical area
25:08was all pointing
25:09the same way as
25:11the data Daphne
25:12had gathered in
25:13Israel.
25:14Other scholars
25:16who worked for
25:17example in
25:17Lake Van in
25:18Turkey and
25:20that worked in
25:21in Syria and
25:21so on, they
25:23also noticed that
25:25drier climate
25:25conditions occurred
25:27based on their
25:29investigations and
25:30it represents a
25:31climate crisis not
25:33only in the
25:33southern Levant based
25:35on the Dead Sea
25:36pollen and the
25:36Sea of Galilee
25:37pollen, it occurred
25:38in the entire
25:39Mediterranean region.
25:48Lee Drake has
25:50been studying the
25:51impact of climate
25:52on farming through
25:53history.
25:54In regions that
25:54rely on rainfall
25:56instead of rivers,
25:57farming can be a
25:58precarious existence.
26:01It's a very high-risk
26:02venture.
26:02You don't have a lot
26:03of tolerance for
26:04change.
26:05But at the end of
26:05the day, there's not
26:06much you can do if
26:07the rains don't come
26:08or if they come too
26:09early or if they come
26:10too late.
26:12Around 1250 B.C.,
26:14conditions were pretty
26:15good, whereas
26:16conditions in 1150 B.C.
26:18are bad and deteriorating
26:21quickly.
26:22When drought hits
26:23several kingdoms at once,
26:25there may not be enough
26:26stored surplus to go
26:27round.
26:29Prolonged drought could
26:30lead to widespread
26:31famine.
26:34Most people in the
26:35ancient world were
26:36farmers.
26:37We're talking almost
26:3799% of the population.
26:39And so, as a
26:40consequence, small
26:41changes in agricultural
26:42production have
26:43outsized impact on
26:45those societies.
26:47What could cause the
26:49rains to fail across
26:50many kingdoms at once?
26:52Climate scientists
26:53have found a clue in
26:54the remains of ancient
26:55plankton extracted from
26:57the seabed of the
26:58Mediterranean.
26:59They suggest that it
27:01isn't warming, but
27:03cooling that is behind
27:04the increasing frequency
27:06of droughts.
27:07We know the cooling
27:08happened because of the
27:10changes in warm
27:11species and cold
27:11species plankton.
27:12Some like warm water,
27:14some like cold water.
27:15You know, if you take
27:15a core and then you
27:17find that there's warm
27:18species here and cold
27:20species above it, that
27:21would tell you that there
27:22was a change in
27:23temperature that caused
27:24that transition from one
27:26species to another.
27:29In a devastating chain
27:31of events, the
27:32Mediterranean's sudden
27:33cooling threw a switch
27:35in rainfall.
27:36Colder sea surface
27:37temperatures mean less
27:38evaporation, and less
27:39evaporation means less
27:40precipitation, and less
27:42precipitation means poor
27:44agricultural yields, and
27:46poor agricultural yields
27:47mean hungrier people, and
27:49hungrier people means less
27:50stable societies.
27:55The theories for what caused
27:57the sea to cool range from
27:59melting glaciers in the
28:00Alps to cold air pushing
28:02down from Siberia.
28:04But whatever triggered
28:06climate change, its
28:07effects could easily test
28:09relations between Bronze
28:10Age civilizations to
28:12breaking point.
28:14If you go back to the Bronze
28:15Age, most people weren't living
28:17in places that had borders.
28:18You would plant crops, and if
28:20things went wrong, you would
28:21migrate and try a new
28:22strategy.
28:23If you were a farmer, you
28:25would have been dramatically
28:26affected by the drought.
28:28If you had been a merchant,
28:31suddenly you might have found
28:32that the suppliers you had
28:34depended on, they had dried up.
28:37Because the trade between the
28:40royal courts of the different
28:41lands is going to come to an
28:44end, I think the king's going
28:45to be impacted, and therefore
28:47all the courtiers.
28:49And so I would pretty much
28:50guarantee that everyone was
28:52affected.
28:53The question was how and to what
28:56degree.
29:00But there was still one key
29:02region where the case for
29:04serious drought was not
29:05proven.
29:07There was a big missing part.
29:09We had the sea surface
29:11temperatures in the
29:12Mediterranean all over, from
29:14the Adriatic to the Levantine
29:15Basin, but we didn't have a
29:17record in Greece that recorded
29:18the changes that were
29:19happening.
29:25But Martin Finney was about to
29:27find a major piece of the
29:29puzzle.
29:29At the University of Uppsala in
29:32Sweden, he is analysing samples
29:34of stalagmites.
29:35that he is sourced from a cave in
29:37southern Greece.
29:39There are a number of different
29:40ways of recovering information
29:41about the climate of the past.
29:42One way is using spiliothems,
29:45cave stalagmites and cave
29:47stalactites, because they grow in a
29:49sheltered environment so they can be
29:50preserved for a long time period.
29:52And when they are growing, they are
29:53recording information about the
29:56environment.
30:00The growth of stalagmites changes
30:02according to what is happening in the
30:04environment around them.
30:05Like reading the rings in a tree trunk,
30:08they can tell us about the rainfall of the
30:10past.
30:11So once you've collected your stalagmite from the cave, the
30:16first thing you need to do is cut it in half to reveal its
30:19inside, because that's what you're after.
30:21So this is the sort of the raw cutting surface.
30:25But then you go about polishing your sample.
30:27Already you can start seeing some of the structures or the
30:31layers.
30:32It's always exciting when you open it up and you start
30:35polishing it.
30:36Like you're the first one to see this for thousands of years.
30:39Or like you're the only one.
30:45Martin and his team struggle to fill a gap in their climate
30:48data.
30:50Until, in a cave on the tiny island of Skitsa, they found the
30:55key.
30:59This stalagmite comes from Mabri Trepa cave, which is
31:04located just off the southwest coast of the Peloponnese.
31:08And what's very interesting about this cave, and this stalagmite
31:12in particular, is that it has a very high level of uranium.
31:19The uranium in the Mabri Trepa stalagmites makes dating
31:22extremely precise.
31:26After working out exactly when each layer grew, further chemical
31:30analysis can reveal details about climate, rainfall and
31:34evaporation rates.
31:38When Martin and his team zeroed in on the time of the Bronze
31:42Age collapse, they were astounded by what they saw.
31:46The climate during the Late Bronze Age has been a sort of hotly
31:48debated topic in this area.
31:50So this record really helps us sort of understand the climate.
31:54To me, this would indicate that we're going through like a 200
31:58year period with sort of declining amounts of rainfall, which sort of
32:03then leads up to this even longer period of very dry conditions when we
32:09don't see any growth.
32:17Martin's results confirm that this corner of Greece was also subject to
32:22repeated droughts over centuries.
32:26It's often impossible to nail down the precise chronology of events in the
32:30Bronze Age.
32:31So it's hard to be sure if drought took hold before or after the collapse.
32:41Greece was home to the Mycenaean civilisation, named after the important
32:45site of Mycenae.
32:47Every single major Mycenaean centre was destroyed in the Bronze Age collapse,
32:53including one very close to the cave where Martin's stalactite came from,
32:59Pylos.
33:01Here we can see the destruction of Pylos plotted onto this graph showing
33:06drier conditions.
33:08Having this really well dated record from Mavitripa cave allows us to compare
33:14the timing of the destruction of the Pylos with this climate information.
33:20And drier climate conditions has been suggested as being one factor in the
33:24destruction of the Pylos and its inability to recover again.
33:29This specimen was a chronological game-changer.
33:35I remember when I first met Martin Fanet and he said, you know, we found it, we've got a
33:39spiliothim record that shows the impact that this drought was indeed present at that time.
33:44It was a wonderful moment.
33:46You know, first off, because he was excited, but also because when you're a scientist,
33:50what you want more than anything else isn't to be the person to discover something,
33:55but to have someone discover something that is consistent with how you've interpreted the data,
34:00right?
34:00It's not just you.
34:01Someone else is seeing what you're seeing or has found what you expected to find.
34:05And that was that moment for me personally, when Martin Fanet was able to find that record
34:09of drought at that time in Greece.
34:13Every piece of new evidence about Mediterranean climate change brings its impact into ever sharper focus.
34:21A sudden cooling the likes of which Bronze Age civilisations have never seen
34:26heralds a drought that lasts for centuries.
34:31The impact creates a rupture in Western civilisation that we really don't see anywhere else in the
34:37old world.
34:38The complete collapse of multiple societies at the same times means that writing systems
34:43go extinct, languages go extinct.
34:45It's not just that this king is no longer king of the area.
34:49We see massive cultural patterns of change.
34:52So it creates a break in civilisation's history that basically we start over again.
34:58It's like you hit the reset button on human civilisation in the West.
35:05A new Dark Age may have descended upon the kingdoms of the Bronze Age, but Egypt appears
35:11to have had the strength to endure.
35:14Even so, its most northerly possessions were in the land of Canaan.
35:19So how did Pharaoh combat the worst effects of climate change so far into drought-stricken
35:26territory?
35:26At the time of Ramses III, Megiddo was Egypt's stronghold in Canaan.
35:33This place was absolutely important for the rule of the Egyptian empire over Canaan.
35:40And Megiddo is also sitting on the breadbasket of ancient Israel.
35:45As we can see behind us, we see the agricultural land, beautiful land of Megiddo, the Jezreel Valley.
35:56First of all, we definitely see intensification of cattle and cattle for the plow, which means
36:04cattle that was slaughtered at old age and therefore not for meat.
36:09We see this in a very interesting piece of information that comes from ancient DNA.
36:15and we can see introduction of Zebu, cattle, which is more resilient to climatic situations.
36:25So altogether, when you lump all these clues into one picture, there is reason to argue
36:31that the Egyptians, they understood that there is a problem.
36:34They located Megiddo as a place in the valley that can help overcome the problem.
36:40They extended dry farming here in order to supply grain to the marginal regions.
36:50It looks as if Ramses was not just fighting off invaders, but fighting to hold Egypt's empire together too.
37:00The Egyptians were attempting to achieve some kind of food security in Canaan.
37:07Egypt did survive when so many other kingdoms and empires vanished from history.
37:13But the climate had not finished with Egypt.
37:22Mark Macklin is a fluviologist.
37:26His life's work is studying changing river systems through history.
37:31He thinks data from sediments left by the Nile suggests that Egypt's crucial food security was being attacked on yet
37:39another front.
37:413,000 miles from Egypt, Mark finds that a riverbank near his home in Wales is as good a place
37:48as any to explain how he can read the climate of the past.
37:53It's reading these sediments which tells us about past rivers, past floods, and in some cases past societies.
38:03Mark collects buried sediments and examines them to see how long they've been left exposed on the surface.
38:10What we do is we insert a tube into the section, we take out the sample, we make sure it's
38:19not exposed to sunlight,
38:21and some of my very clever colleagues analyse and date these using a technique called optically stimulated luminescence.
38:30What that means in simple terms is that each of these sand grains acts a bit like a geological clock.
38:36So when they're being brought down by the river, deposited on the riverbank, the sun comes down and the radioactive
38:46signal in them is bleached.
38:48It's emptied.
38:49And luminescence dating has revolutionised in the last 25 years or so.
38:55We were the first people to use it in the Nile Valley.
38:58What you can actually do is date the flood sediments itself and give it an exact age.
39:05Mark and his colleagues extracted sediments from the Nile in the south of Ramses Kingdom.
39:11They reveal just how much the annual cycle that brought Nile floodwaters to Egypt could vary across the centuries.
39:20Seasonal monsoon rains falling on the distant highlands of central Africa wash sediments down into the Nile.
39:29When the waters reach the plains, they spill out over the flat desert valleys.
39:36When the flood recedes, it leaves behind nutrients in the freshly soaked soil.
39:43This allows crops to flourish along the desert valley.
39:48But in the century before Ramses III, Egypt's annual flood is failing.
39:54The Nile only covers a few of the fields.
39:57What was once farmland is baked by the sun for years.
40:02There appears to be a major channel drying, major channel contraction, somewhere between 1280 and 1220 BC.
40:11And the mutt of the Nubian Nile runs dry.
40:18Egypt's abundant food stores would have been eaten away year by year.
40:26With food becoming more scarce, records show that Ramses now had to deal with a new problem.
40:34Civil unrest.
40:36It's during Ramses III's reign that we have the first recorded industrial strike in history,
40:42where a group of workmen staged a sit-in in protest at not being paid their wages.
40:48And these were wages that were being paid by the authorities, by the crown.
40:53It's also the time when we have the earliest evidence for tomb robbery occurring on apparently a regular basis
41:02and becoming a real serious problem.
41:04And all of these things together give us a picture of a difficult time for Pharaoh.
41:13A low Nile seems to be destabilizing Egypt.
41:17But were these extended periods of drought a black swan event, a one-off that no-one could see coming?
41:25Or were they part of a bigger pattern?
41:29Ancient records hold evidence of similar events in Egypt a thousand years before Ramses.
41:374,200 years ago, the so-called 4.2ka event, there is a major documented drought recorded in Egypt.
41:49And this records major changes in flow.
41:53And actually one of the stories which is told is that people could actually walk across the Nile because it
41:59had dried up.
42:01This previous drought could have spelled the end of the line for the era of the pyramid-building kings of
42:08Old Kingdom Egypt.
42:10Research by Mark and other scientists is revealing more of these rapid climate change events.
42:17Although thousands of years apart, they coincide with major shifts in human history.
42:23Rapid climate change events last for several centuries and they tend to be characterized by colder periods of the poles
42:32and greater aridity in the equator.
42:36And there are a number of these.
42:39Mark estimates that the climate change events that impacted Ramses could have lasted almost 500 years.
42:47And it was driven by forces no Pharaoh had the power to control.
42:53The major primary control of climate during these periods appears to be weakening in the strength of the sun.
42:59But also there may have been changes in volcanic activity, which could have been important as well.
43:08These planetary cycles can not only change rainfall across the Mediterranean.
43:14They're powerful enough to impact the African monsoon on which the Nile itself depends.
43:22The
43:23Ramses III's reign is challenged both by nature and the human consequences of these events.
43:31Israel Finkelstein believes that it's time to rethink Ramses' characterizations of the Sea Peoples as an invasion force bent on
43:40destruction.
43:41The first wave of violence was followed by a more subtle but more profound change.
43:47The movement of the Sea Peoples should be seen in relation to the droughts and famine in this region.
43:55We used to speak about the movement of the Sea Peoples imagining something that happened similar to the invasion of
44:03Normandy in Second World War.
44:06We know today that this was not the situation.
44:09We do not speak about thousands of people attacking the coast of Canaan.
44:13We are speaking about groups who came with several ships here and there and settled along the coast in several
44:21places.
44:21And the Egyptians then described it in a typical propaganda version of Ramses III that he was the great king
44:31who managed to stop them and prevent them from invading the territory of Egypt and fighting them and so on
44:39and so forth.
44:43The Sea Peoples have been characterized as warlike, opportunistic invaders by Ramses' propaganda.
44:51Thanks to new scientific discoveries, historians now have a chance to take a more nuanced view of who they were
44:59and what they wanted.
45:01What did the Sea Peoples want?
45:04They wanted what every other migrating people wants.
45:08They are in search of a better life.
45:11We've seen migrations like this throughout history.
45:15Look, even now, at all of the Syrians fleeing the civil war.
45:21When you've got migrations, you usually have a push factor, civil war, drought, and then you've got a pull factor,
45:30either better land, more crops, no drought, or whatever.
45:34So, what did the Sea Peoples want?
45:37They wanted what any other peoples that are migrating want.
45:41They want a fresh start.
45:46But with problems at home and with constant troubles abroad, Egypt pulls out of Canaan completely, possibly before the end
45:55of Ramses' reign.
46:00Megiddo, the Canaanite city that gave Armageddon its name.
46:05Here, Israel Finkelstein has discovered evidence that makes its final days a perfect symbol of the end of civilization.
46:15We are now standing at the gate of Megiddo behind me.
46:19What we basically see here is the palace put to the torch, the gate as well.
46:25And when we excavated at the gate, we found evidence for the last moments, for the final days of Bronze
46:33Age Megiddo.
46:36Israel's uncovered a highly unusual site.
46:39Ovens added right by the city gate.
46:42This was no longer a bustling center of commerce.
46:46This was a city under siege.
46:48Ovens, which were constructed within the gate, which means the gate was blocked and people lived inside.
46:55And people from the countryside, probably at a certain moment, had to leave, had to run away from their villages.
47:02They came into the main city hoping to find refuge.
47:06The city was overcrowded and people really settled everywhere, including in places that usually people live vacant, such as the
47:15city gate leading to the palace.
47:22But Megiddo turned out to be less of a refuge, more of a target.
47:30Several hundred people, well-equipped and desperate, can come to a place like this at night and put it to
47:37the torch.
47:38A city put to the torch is a shocking emblem of the end of civilization.
47:44The aftershocks, both violent and peaceful, would be felt for generations, as climate change sets whole populations in motion.
47:55Egypt's glory, too, is waning.
47:58Ramses III's reign was not to end well.
48:02There are a series of documents from the end of Ramses III's reign, which seem to show that there was
48:09a conspiracy to have the king murdered.
48:11And this was perpetrated by one of his wives, apparently in league with one or two others.
48:17For this reason, it's become known as the Haareem Conspiracy.
48:24And the motivation for this seems to have been the desire on the part of the wives to install a
48:30particular son of Ramses III as his successor.
48:36Against his wishes.
48:41And it may be that this might also reflect some of the wider challenges that were experienced in Egypt during
48:48Ramses III's reign.
48:50With all of the invasions going on and economic difficulties, he would have had some very difficult decisions to make.
48:57And it may be that his handling of the situation wasn't very popular.
49:01And by the end of the reign, there were more than one faction involved.
49:06And the Haareem Conspiracy is the result of one of those factions trying to force the issue.
49:12The pharaoh who had saved Egypt while the world collapsed all around him would ultimately fall to an assassin from
49:20the very heart of his own court.
49:44The collapse of Bronze Age civilisations left a darkness lasting centuries.
49:50But from the ashes, new societies eventually began to fall.
49:56Behind this story of the end of civilisation as we knew it, is another uncomfortable truth.
50:03That humans are at the mercy of nature.
50:08There's a narcissism that we project onto the study of archaeology.
50:13And I mean this sincerely, even though I suspect I'll get a little bit of flack for it.
50:16We don't like to live in a world where a subtle change in sea surface temperatures can undo multiple civilisations
50:23in one go.
50:24But that distinction between the natural and the artificial has never been there.
50:29The climatological records of the past and the changes that happened in climate directly affected humans.
50:35Whether we like it or not, we're in it with the trees, the deer and all that.
50:40One could say that we're focused now on climate change as being a big part of the collapse.
50:47Only because climate change is so big in our world today.
50:54Climate change absolutely was a factor back then.
50:57There is no denying it.
50:58If anything, it's because we have problems today and are so aware of it that we are becoming more aware
51:07of it back then.
51:29Keep going!
51:31Keep going!
51:34Keep going!
51:43Keep going!
51:43Ευχαριστώ.
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