After 1177 BC: The Survival of Civilizations

REVIEW BY SARAH GRIFFITHS In his 2014 book 1177 BC: The Year Civilization Collapsed (reviewed in AE 85) Eric Cline charted the ‘perfect storm of calamities’ that led to the sudden collapse of the thriving interconnected Bronze Age civilisations. In this equally gripping sequel, Cline considers the immediate aftermath, exploring how, over the next 500 years, civilisations responded, and asking why some societies endured while others disappeared. Egypt, Israel, and the southern Levant are considered in the first chapter, beginning with the assassination of Ramesses III (c.1155 BC), as Egypt faced 200 years of low Nile floods, drought, and famine. Egypt as a nation survived the collap