The Bronze Age as the First World-System: Theses for aResearch Agenda

Abstract

Bronze Age is traditionally viewed as historical period in the third and second millennia BCE. My key contention is that it is more meaningfully considered in geographic terms, as interconnected space of trade and cultural exchanges encompassing Afro-Eurasia but not Tropical Africa, let alone Australia and the Americas. The Bronze-age world-system extended from Scandinavia and British Isles to Egypt and Mesopotamia, from the Indus valley civilization and ancient Arabia to the Urals and western Siberia, possibly, also China and South-East Asia. Geologically, copper and tin as two metal components of bronze are randomly distributed on the planet which necessitated long-distance trade. In turn, the world trade in metals created whole cascades of logistical needs and opportunities. The consequences included the emergence of social complexity: chiefly powers, diplomacy, merchants, specialist coppersmiths and weapons-makers, professional warriors. New means of transportation emerged such as sailed ship and domesticated pack animals (donkey, camel, horse). The exchange in secondary products (wine, cloth, elaborate pottery) led to a revolution in conspicuous consumption. These theses are intended to generate a discussion about the earliest world-system, its morphology and flows. This may also extend to the comparative analysis of later world-systems known to us Antiquity, the Medieval ‘Silk Roads’, and modern capitalism.

Full text

Analytical Bulletin
ISSN: 1829-4502
Journal homepage: https://analytical-bulletin.cccs.am/index.php/ab/index
Georgi M. Derluguian
THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM:
THESES FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
Գեորգի Մ․ Դեռլուգյան
ԲՐՈՆԶԻ ԴԱՐԸ՝ ՈՐՊԵՍ ԱՌԱՋԻՆ ՀԱՄԱՇԽԱՐՀԱՅԻՆ ՀԱՄԱԿԱՐԳ. ԹԵԶԵՐ
ՀԵՏԱԶՈՏԱԿԱՆ ՕՐԱԿԱՐԳԻ ՀԱՄԱՐ
To cite this article: Georgi M. Derluguian “The Bronze Age as the First World-System: Theses for a
Research Agenda,” Analytical Bulletin (CCCS) 15 (2022): 22-30 DOI: 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
Published online: 27 Dec 2022.
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Georgi M. Derluguian DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
22
THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM: THESES
FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
Georgi M. Derluguian1
DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
Received 5 Aug 2022
Accepted 7 Nov 2022
Keywords: Bronze Age, world-systems, civilizations, trade, archeology,
macrohistorical sociology, Afro-Eurasia, collapse.
Abstract: Bronze Age is traditionally viewed as historical period in
the third and second millennia BCE. My key contention is that it is more
meaningfully considered in geographic terms, as interconnected space of
trade and cultural exchanges encompassing Afro-Eurasia but not Tropical
Africa, let alone Australia and the Americas. The Bronze-age world-system
extended from Scandinavia and British Isles to Egypt and Mesopotamia,
from the Indus valley civilization and ancient Arabia to the Urals and
western Siberia, possibly, also China and South-East Asia. Geologically,
copper and tin as two metal components of bronze are randomly distributed
on the planet which necessitated long-distance trade. In turn, the world trade
in metals created whole cascades of logistical needs and opportunities. The
consequences included the emergence of social complexity: chiefly powers,
diplomacy, merchants, specialist coppersmiths and weapons-makers,
professional warriors. New means of transportation emerged such as sailed
ship and domesticated pack animals (donkey, camel, horse). The exchange
in secondary products (wine, cloth, elaborate pottery) led to a revolution in
conspicuous consumption. These theses are intended to generate a
discussion about the earliest world-system, its morphology and flows. This
may also extend to the comparative analysis of later world-systems known to
us Antiquity, the Medieval ‘Silk Roads’, and modern capitalism.
1 Professor of social research, New York University in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates.
Email: gd44@nyu.edu

THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM: THESES FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
23
A scientific revolution is happening in the study of the origins of
human societies. Its scale is breathtaking. Our textbook maps of early
civilizations depicted them as isolated islands ‘caged’ in the river valleys of
Mesopotamia, Indus, Nile, Huang-He.2 The rest of Afro-Eurasia seemed vast
white spots, the blanks probably once populated by primitive bands and
roaming ‘barbarians’. Today scholars from many countries are filling the
blanks with data from an array of new scientific methods: paleoclimate
geology, comparative linguistics, C-14 chemical dating, osteological and
pollen sampling, strontium in dental enamel and CT-scans, DNA
sequencing, the microscopic traceology of tools.3
A prominent Soviet archeologist once quipped that his discipline is a
forensic investigation coming centuries late.4 Like in the Sherlock Holmes
stories, archeology used to be an individual enterprise. No longer. The
massive mining of data invites social science theory building and testing. A
whole world economy emerges from the depths of the third-second
millennium BCE. It was due to bronze.
Bronze is an alloy of 90% copper and 10% tin. Geologically, the two
metals are usually found far apart. Moreover, river-valley civilizations were
extremely rich in fertile mud and therefore human labor — but hardly any
minerals. Transition to metallurgy necessitated the far-flung networks of
trade because the sources of metals and semi-precious stones (diorite,
cornelian, lapis lazuli used in royal rituals) were typically located beyond the
limited range of conquest. Ancient warriors in the Middle East were limited
in their forays outside the fertile river valleys by the amount of water they
could carry across the deserts in goat skins. The Sinai copper mines directly
controlled and exploited by the Old-kingdom Egypt were a partial exception
which proves the rule. Therefore, peaceful trade, even if disguised as the
exchange of diplomatic gifts or tribute, became a universal necessity.5
2 Michael Mann. The Sources of Social Power. Volume 1: A History of Power from the
Beginning to AD 1760 (Cambridge University Press, 1986).
3 Randall Collins. “Why the social sciences won't become high-consensus, rapid-discovery
science.” Sociol Forum 9, (1994): 155–177.
4 Клейн, Л. С. «Методологическая природа археологии», Российская Археология. 4
(1992): 86—96.
5 William McNeill. The Rise of the West. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1963).

Georgi M. Derluguian DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
24
Cultural exchange, in the broadest sense, certainly accompanied the
extension of trade. This is what was traditionally presented as the diffusion
of cultural patterns, sometimes seen in different and perhaps clumsily
imitational contexts. Instead of the pharaonic beads of precious lapis-lazuli,
the royal tombs of semiperipheral Mycaene (i.e. located halfway between the
mineral-rich mountains of Europe and the civilization centers of Near East)
contained similar beads made from the much cheaper blue glass paste. The
intricate cylindrical seals originating in Mesopotamia, once discarded upon
the death of their original owners, could themselves become beads in the
necklace on some very important and likely illiterate chieftain from the
‘barbarian’ periphery. The goblets made from precious metals and used
probably for drinking wine in the wealthier centers of civilization a couple
centuries later and a few hundred or even thousand kilometers away could
appear in the form of ceramic or horn vessels used probably for some kind
of alcoholic beverages made of honey and berries.6
Trade always requires the protection of caravans and their
merchandise. In turn, this could generate differentiated protection rents that
benefitted some merchants over others.7 Diplomacy is another side of armed
protection. The traveling merchants and powers behind them (empires,
temples, city-states, tribal chiefs) weaved continuously their networks of
mutual obligations fleshed out in treaties, regular gift-giving, hospitality
rituals, confraternization, exchange of brides, or sharing their gods. By the
beginning of the second millennium BCE these networks covered the vast
expanses from Scandinavia to Greece and Egypt, from Siberia to India and
China. Hence the remarkably simultaneous appearance of bronze
technologies all over these places.8
6 Lauren Ristvet. In the Beginning: World History from Human Evolution to the First States.
(New York: McGraw-Hill, 2007).
7 Frederic Lane. Profits from Power. Readings in Protection Rent and Violence-Controlling
Enterprises. (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 1979); Волков, Вадим.
«Новгородская республика как тип охранного контракта», Неприкосновенный запас
№5, 2007
8 Philippe Beaujard. The Worlds of the Indian Ocean: Volume 1, From the Fourth
Millennium BCE to the Sixth Century CE: A Global History (The Worlds of the Indian
Ocean 2 Hardback Book Set) Transl. from French. (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2019)

THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM: THESES FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
25
The United Arab Emirates, or what the ancient cuneiform tablets
called the ‘land of Magan’ (Oman), had a significant role in this earliest
world economy for three reasons. It is located half-way between India and
Mesopotamia. In fact, the objects from both civilizations, Sumer and Indus
(Harappa, the ancient Meluhha), were simultaneously found in the UAE.9
Second, there are accessible copper deposits in Al Ain and elsewhere with
the evidence of mining. Third, Magan was the source of beautiful black stone
called diorite. The splendid Sumerian royal statues, now on display at major
museums like Louvre, would not be possible without a steady supply of
diorite.
World trade, its extensive logistics, opportunities and profits, brought
massive changes. New technologies spread. Pack animals (camel, donkey)
had to be domesticated and bred on a large scale. The new generations of
animals needed specialist breeders and tamers as well as caravan drivers and
guides. Whole artisanal industries must have emerged to supple saddles and
other girding for the animals, possibly, also carts in order to maximize the
weight carried by donkeys. But carts required at least basically paved roads
to protect the valuable and breakable cart axles. Oftentimes the roads had to
cross natural obstacles which required the construction and maintenance of
bridges. Archeologists only recently began systematically looking for such
very ancient bridges — and they were found, at least in the territory of
Greece. These Myceanean-period stone structures have been long known but
mis-identified as much later artefacts of classical Antiquity or even medieval.
Bridges offered excellent opportunities to collect tolls on the roads.
The same must have been true of caravan sarays. It is estimated that nearly
eight tons of water could be consumed every night by a caravan of 500
donkeys, an ordinary size already in the XIXth century BCE, according to
the cuneiform tablets from ancient Кanesh.10 The infamously murderous
9 Peter Magee. The archaeology of prehistoric Arabia: adaptation and social formation
from the Neolithic to the Iron age. (Cambridge University Press, 2014)
10 Gojko Barjamovic. A Historical Geography of Anatolia in the Old Assyrian Colony Period.
(Chicago University Press, 2011)

Georgi M. Derluguian DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
26
Bronze-Age battle in Tollnse, Germany, apparently happened over a
bridge.11
The local societies acquired complexity evidenced in rich burials.
Artisans specialized. Merchants and their self-governing city-states first
appeared. Chieftains equipped the now professional warriors with bronze
weapons which were no longer suitable for hunting like the old disposable
arrowheads of flintstone. This was proven in experimental reconstructions, a
booming new method.12
Gender and rank inequalities become visible for the first time. This
brings more puzzles. In the mounds of copper-rich steppes in Russia,
Kazakhstan, and Ukraine archeologists found prominent males buried in
woman’s dress: a transgender ritual?13
Chariots were also found in large number (over twenty now) in the
burial mounds of Sintashta culture in today’s Chelyabinsk province of
Russia, on the border with Kazakhstan. The swift spoked wheels are now
dated to the 21st century BCE, the earliest known in the world. The DNA of
horses indicates the domestication of this animal between river Don and the
Urals mountains.14
This contradicts received knowledge regarding technological
innovation.15 Apparently, it often spread from the ‘barbarian’ periphery
rather than civilized cores.16
11 Andrew Curry. "Slaughter at the bridge: Uncovering a colossal Bronze Age battle". (24
March 2016). Science. https://www.science.org/content/article/slaughter-bridge-
uncovering-colossal-bronze-age-battle Retrieved 04 October 2022
12 Иван Семьян. Пробиваем доспех из лука: какая стрела уложит противника?
АНТРОПОГЕНЕЗ.РУ Ученые против мифов-17. 22 апреля 2022
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s2l98SrlILw Retrieved 04 October 2022.
13 Епимахов А. В. и коллектив авторов. Южный Урал в начале эпохи металлов.
Бронзовый век. (Челябинск: Издательство Южноуральского государственного
университета, 2021).
14 Librado, P., Khan, N., Fages, A. et al. The origins and spread of domestic horses from the
Western Eurasian steppes. Nature 598, (2021): 634–640.
15 T.D. Hall, Nick Kardulias, P. & Chase-Dunn, C. World-Systems Analysis and
Archaeology: Continuing the Dialogue. J Archaeol Res 19 (2011): 233–279.
16 Kristiansen, Kristian, with Thomas Lindkvist and Janken Myrdal (eds.) Trade and
Civilisation. Economic Networks and Cultural Ties from Prehistory. (Cambridge University
Press, 2018)

THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM: THESES FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
27
Sail had to be invented in the early Bronze Age. At New York
University in Abu Dhabi a team of scholars led by the Dutch marine
archeologist and museum curator Prof. Robert Parthesius reconstructed from
the Mesopotamian seals and material evidence a ship made of bundled reeds
covered in bitumen and under a woolen sail.17 We now know why the
Sumerian sources praised the ‘black-sailed ships’ — the natural color of goat
wool.
Still more significant was the invention of keeled ship.18 Its origins so
far remain contested. Perhaps, it was in the Eastern Mediterranean, and
certainly long before the Viking drakkar previously considered the earliest
prototype.
The caravan trails and shipping lanes connected what now emerges as
a much bigger space of interactions than what was cautiously believed just a
couple decades ago. The remnants of brightly colored cotton cloth of
indubitably Indian origin were identified in the southern Urals, so rich in
copper and gold deposits, and also in the Caucasus, the source of metals and
earliest wines. It now seems incontrovertible that wine was a major
innovative export of Kuro-Arax culture to the (traditionally beer-drinking)
Mesopotamia and Levant.19
Once again, we might be seeing in this instance a backflow of
innovation from periphery to the core of the contemporary world-system.
This furthermore extends on the famous (and therefore often criticized)
concept of the ‘secondary products revolution’ of the prominent British
archeologist Andrew Sherratt.20
17 The Má II Project: Ancient Boat Lab. NYUAD https://nyuad.nyu.edu/en/research/faculty-
labs-and-projects/ma-the-ancient-boat-lab.html Retrieved o4 October 2022
18 Sherratt, S. & Sherratt, A. “From luxuries to commodities; The nature of Bronze Age
trading systems.” Bronze age trade in the Mediterranean: Papers presented at Rewley
House. (Oxford, December, 1989).
19 Patrick E. McGovern. Ancient Wine: The Search for the Origins of Viniculture.
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006); Yasur-Landau, Assaf. “Levant”. Pp. 832-848
in: Cline, E. H. ed. The Oxford Handbook of the Aegean Bronze Age. (Oxford: Oxford
University Press, 2010).
20 Marciniak, A. “The Secondary Products Revolution: Empirical Evidence and its Current
Zooarchaeological Critique.” Journal of World Prehist 24, 117–130 (2011).

Georgi M. Derluguian DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
28
In Denmark, the big data sets of things as mundane as the teeth of
ancient cows and cattle urine saturating the floors of cowsheds correlate with
the volumes of copper and tin imports. There had to be a trade balance. Did
Denmark specialize in dairy exports two millennia prior to the Viking age?21
Curiously, copper ingots from the Uluburun shipwreck near the southern
coast of Anatolia were shaped as cowhides. The ingots also had the
standardized weight of 26 kg, i.e. the Biblical talant.22
Silver, a rather impractical metal, assumes the earliest function of
global money.23 This English word itself might be traced to the Babylonian
measure of precious weight, the mina. Moreover, trade brought the cultural
abstraction of standard colors: green, blue, red.24 In an illustrative anecdote,
the American archeologist Eric Cline cites the instance when Babylonian
king Hammurabi (the same of the famous laws inscription) ordered to send
back the pair of red shoes of Creto-Minoan manufacture that he for some
reason disliked. Just like on Amazon.com today! (Cline, 2020.)
The ongoing excavations in ancient Kanesh, a trading town in
Anatolia whose population proved unexpectedly large (20-35 thousand) and
ethnically mixed. Judging by the personal names, toponyms, and the scant
word borrowings, the local natives were some of the earliest known Hittites
or, perhaps, the speakers of other Indo-European languages of ancient
Anatolia. The expat Assyrian merchants wrote and apparently spoke in a
western Semitic language delivered a treasure-trove of correspondence from
the 19th century BCE. This subverts the common assumption that literacy
was confined to priests and scribes. Evidently, many more Assyrians than
previously assumed were literate. Importantly, this included women, at least
21 Timothy Earle. How Chiefs Come to Power: The Political Economy in Prehistory.
Stanford University Press, 1997
22 Pare, C. “Weighing, commodification, and money”, pp. 508–527 in: H. Fokkens, A.
Harding (eds.) Oxford Handbook of the European Bronze Age, (Oxford University Press,
2013).
23 Colin Renfrew. “Systems of value among material things: The nexus of fungibiligy and
measure”, pp. 249–260 in: J. K. Papadopoulos, G. Urton (eds.) The Construction of Value in
the Ancient World, Cotsen Institute of Archaeology Press, 2012.
24 Kristiansen, Kristian, with Thomas Lindkvist and Janken Myrdal (eds.) Trade and
Civilisation. Economic Networks and Cultural Ties from Prehistory. Cambridge University
Press, 2018

THE BRONZE AGE AS THE FIRST WORLD-SYSTEM: THESES FOR A RESEARCH AGENDA
29
from the merchant households. Some 9000+ cuneiform letters were
recovered so far, an archive rivaling the medieval Medicis. It is being
translated by the team of Harvard-based Danish assyriologist Gojko
Barjamovic. The data call for a socio-economic interpretation.
Much attention was drawn to the mysteriously sudden and
simultaneous demise of no less than seven Bronze-age great powers ca. 1177
BCE. This event constitutes the main focus in the eponymous international
bestseller.25 But what was that had collapsed? How did it emerge in the first
place? And what came after it? Urartu and the neo-Assyrian empire, classical
China and Rome. What were the successor world-systems? Ian Morris and
Walther Scheidel suggested pioneering formulations in this regard.26 The
space can no longer be called uncharted.
Our focus might be on the earlier, still coalescing world economy of
Bronze Age and, inter alia, the place of Armenian highlands in this big
picture. A lot is to be excavated and interpreted. But no less is to be gleaned
from the connections transpiring in the panoramic view of the earliest known
world-economy. The founders of world-systems analysis, Fernan Braudel
still in the 1940s-1970s and later Immanuel Wallerstein in the 1980s-2000s
on various occasions hypothesized that world-economis could have existed
in much earlier epochs. But Braudel and Wallerstein chose to focus of the
early modern origins of capitalism. Evidently, diging deeper in history in
their lifetimes was hardly supported by archeological and epigraphic
evidence. This situation has been rapidly changing in the early twenty-first
century. An exciting scientific revolution is happening today in the study of
earliest complex societies. I call on you to become part of this intellectual
movement.
25 Eric Cline. 1177 B.C.: The Year Civilization Collapsed. (Princeton University Press,
2014).
26 Ian Morris. Why the West Rules—For Now? New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux,
2010; Idem, The Measure of Civilisation: How Social Development Decides the Fate of
Nations. (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010).

Georgi M. Derluguian DOI 10.56673/18294502-22.15-22
30
ԲՐՈՆԶԻ ԴԱՐԸ՝ ՈՐՊԵՍ ԱՌԱՋԻՆ ՀԱՄԱՇԽԱՐՀԱՅԻՆ
ՀԱՄԱԿԱՐԳ. ԹԵԶԵՐ ՀԵՏԱԶՈՏԱԿԱՆ ՕՐԱԿԱՐԳԻ ՀԱՄԱՐ
Գեորգի Դեռլուգյան
Ամփոփագիր
Բրոնզի դարը ավանդաբար դիտվում է որպես մ.թ.ա. երրորդ և
երկրորդ հազարամյակների պատմական ժամանակաշրջան: Իմ
հիմնական պնդումն/ամաձայնությունը այն է, որ Բրոնզի դարը ավելի
իմաստալից է դիտարկվում աշխարհագրական առումով, որպես
առևտրի և մշակութային փոխանակումների փոխկապակցված
տարածք, որն ընդգրկում է Աֆրո-Եվրասիան, բայց ոչ արևադարձային
Աֆրիկան, էլ չասած Ավստրալիան և Ամերիկան: Բրոնզեդարյան
համաշխարհային համակարգը տարածվում էր Սկանդինավիայից և
Բրիտանական կղզիներից մինչև Եգիպտոս և Միջագետք, Ինդոսի
հովտի քաղաքակրթությունից և Հին Արաբիայից մինչև Ուրալ և
Արևմտյան Սիբիր, հնարավոր է նաև Չինաստան և Հարավարևելյան
Ասիա: Աշխարհագրական առումով, պղինձը և անագը, որպես բրոնզի
երկու մետաղական բաղադրիչներ, պատահականորեն բաշխված են
մոլորակի վրա, ինչը պարտադրեց առևտուրը երկար
տարածությունների վրա: Իր հերթին, մետաղների համաշխարհային
առևտուրը ստեղծեց լոգիստիկ կարիքների և հնարավորությունների
ամբողջ համակարգեր։ Հետևանքները ներառում էին սոցիալական
բարդ կառույցների առաջացումը՝ իշխանություններ,
դիվանագիտություն, վաճառականներ, մասնագետ պղնձագործներ և
զենքեր պատրաստողներ, պրոֆեսիոնալ ռազմիկներ: Ի հայտ եկան նոր
փոխադրամիջոցներ, ինչպիսիք են առագաստանավը և ընտանի
կենդանիները (էշ, ուղտ, ձի): Երկրորդական ապրանքների (գինի,
կտորեղեն, մշակված խեցեղեն) փոխանակումը հանգեցրեց
հեղափոխության սպառման մեջ։ Այս թեզերը նպատակ ունեն
քննարկում առաջացնել ամենավաղ աշխարհակարգի, նրա
մորֆոլոգիայի և հոսքերի մասին: Սա կարող է տարածվել նաև ավելի
ուշ համաշխարհային համակարգերի համեմատական վերլուծության
վրա, որոնք մեզ հայտնի են Հին շրջան, միջնադարյան «Մետաքսի
ճանապարհ» և ժամանակակից կապիտալիզմ եզրերով: