Thus Egyptian independence was a by-product of the end of the Peloponnesian
War and its maintenance was dependent upon tensions between Greeks and Persians;
the Persians were able to recover Egypt after Philip II of Macedonia made peace with
the Achaemenids. In effect, during the Iron Age, Egyptian policy and independence
were mere relics contingent on Greek politics and bore no relation to Egyptian
strength or Persian weakness.
ANCIENT EMPIRES: GEOGRAPHICAL AND
INTELLECTUALThere were historical differences which determined that, in the Bronze Age, Egyptian
activity in the Levant had an impact on Babylonian policy whereas, in the Iron Age,
Egypt was responding to events abroad. These historical differences reflect the growth
and decline of Egyptian power more than anything else.
There is, however, another phenomenon unrelated to Egyptian power which created
the fundamental differences between the empires of the Bronze and Iron Ages. This
lay in Mesopotamia itself where power structures were subject to constant revision
and renegotiation. Egypt was a land with clear boundaries, defined by geography:
the cataracts in the south, the Mediterranean Sea in the north, the deserts to the east
and west. The lines of the Nile Valley – demarcated by the mountains and the deserts
to the east and west – were very much both the highway and the public space of
ancient Egypt.
The situation was quite different in Mesopotamia. Whereas Egypt was the Nile,
Mesopotamia not only was not the two rivers, but it was not really even the land
between the two rivers. It is difficult for a modern observer to understand that the
Diyala and the Hamrin were essential arteries of the Mesopotamian world, precisely
because they were actually outside of it. Travel between southern and northern
Mesopotamia depended upon leaving the rivers and moving along the foothills of the
Zagros. And the first part of the trip to the north meant proceeding along the Diyala
which thus actually entailed setting off along one of the major international routes.
The cities along this route – Eshnunna and the others – were both essential parts of
the Babylonian world and also the gateways to the routes leading on to Iran and
Central Asia. In the same fashion, following the Euphrates into Syria meant that the
river would take one outside of what we consider to be the ‘Mesopotamian’ world,
although strictly speaking more ‘Mesopotamian’ than the Hamrin and Diyala.
Obviously the same types of arguments could be applied to both the Gulf and Assyria,
as each of these regions simply lacks any clear boundaries and any clear, easily
recognisable regions which developed an identity.
The result of these structures was permeable borders, and thus constant contact.
Socially, it meant that the constant exchanges between the rural and urban areas
were complemented by the movements of traders and nomads. Above, we noted
that the stimulation of this contact contributed to the intellectual development of
Babylonia.
The defensive responses necessary when surrounded by neighbours assured that
political developments in Mesopotamia differed quite remarkably from the experience
in Egypt. Each of the individual states in Mesopotamia was in constant conflict:
survival alone depended upon constant defence; expansion was the logical corollary,
— Egypt and Mesopotamia —