1177 B.C. - The Year Civilization Collapsed

At the beginning of the 12th century B.C. the Mediterranean was a rich interwoven society of trade between multiple empires. The kings and queens that ruled these societies traded food, raw resources, finished goods, and ideas with eachother. But for some reason over the course of the 12th century B.C. they all collapsed, save for ancient Egypt. Archeological evidence shows that many of these cities were burned and destroyed over the course of 100 years, and the clay tablet records that survived this era say that an army called the Sea People rampaged across the Mediterranean sea, but it’s unknown where exactly this army came from. This book does a good job describing the interconnected societies that made up the Bronze age empires, the relations between the rulers of these civilizations, and what may have brought them down.