Near East (909 BCE – 819 CE) Early Iron and Antiquity — Greeks of Ionia, Levantine Tyre, Roman–Byzantine Egypt, Arabia’s Caravans
Geographic and Environmental Context
The Near East includes Egypt,
Sudan,
Israel,
most of Jordan,
western Saudi Arabia,
western Yemen,
southwestern Cyprus, and
western Turkey (
Aeolis,
Ionia,
Doris,
Lydia,
Caria,
Lycia,
Troas) plus
Tyre (extreme SW Lebanon).
Climate & Environment
Societies & Political Developments
-
Western Anatolia Greek city-states (Ionia–Aeolia–Doria, with Troad): Miletus, Ephesus, Smyrna, etc.
-
Tyre (sole Near-Eastern Levantine node here) dominated Phoenician seafaring.
-
Egypt (Ptolemaic → Roman → Byzantine): Nile granary and Christianizing hub.
-
Arabian west: caravan kingdoms and Hejaz–Asir oases; western Yemen incense terraces and caravan polities.
-
Southwestern Cyprus embedded in Hellenistic–Roman maritime circuits.
Economy & Trade
Technology & Material Culture
Belief & Symbolism
Adaptation & Resilience
Transition
By 819 CE, the Near East was a multi-corridor world of Nile granaries, Ionia’s city-coasts, Tyre’s Phoenician legacy, and Arabian incense roads — a foundation for the medieval dynamics ahead (Ayyubids in Syria/Egypt next door, Abbasids beyond, and the Ionian–Anatolian littoral under Byzantine/Nicaean arcs).
