Battles of Alashiya | |||||||
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Part of the Hittite Wars | |||||||
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Belligerents | |||||||
Hittite Empire | Kingdom of Alashiya | ||||||
Commanders and leaders | |||||||
Hittite Kings | Unknown |
The Battles of Alashiya were a series of two naval engagements and one joint land and naval operation fought between the Hittite Navy and the Hittite Army of the Hittite Empire and the Alashiyan Navy and Alashiyan Army of the Kingdom of Alashiya [1] (Cyprus); they took place between 1275 BC and 1205 BC. [2]
The Hittite Empire had laid claim to the Kingdom of Alashiya, located in modern-day Cyprus, since the late 14th century BC. [3] In 1370 BC, the Hittites were attacked by the forces of Lukka and Kizzuwatna, later known in ancient history as the regions of Lycia and Cilicia. This attack provoked the Hittites into sending an invasion force against Alashiya on three occasions between 1275 BC and 1205 BC. [4] The Hittite Navy engaged the Alashiyan fleet off the coast of Cyprus whilst the Hittite Army engaged Alashiyan land forces on the beach under the command of Great King Suppiluliuma II. [5] The Battles of Alashiya were one of the earliest series of sea battles in recorded history; they resulted in a Hittite victory. [6]
Year 549 (DXLIX) was a common year starting on Friday of the Julian calendar. The denomination 549 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years.
Human habitation of Cyprus dates back to the Paleolithic era. Cyprus's geographic position has caused the island to be influenced by differing Eastern Mediterranean civilisations over the millennia.
The Sea Peoples were a group of tribes hypothesized to have attacked Egypt and other Eastern Mediterranean regions around 1200 BC during the Late Bronze Age. The hypothesis was first proposed by the 19th century Egyptologists Emmanuel de Rougé and Gaston Maspero, on the basis of primary sources such as the reliefs on the Mortuary Temple of Ramesses III at Medinet Habu. Subsequent research developed the hypothesis further, attempting to link these sources to other Late Bronze Age evidence of migration, piracy, and destruction. While initial versions of the hypothesis regarded the Sea Peoples as a primary cause of the Late Bronze Age collapse, more recent versions generally regard them as a symptom of events which were already in motion before their purported attacks.
Caphtor is a locality mentioned in the Bible, in which its people are called Caphtorites or Caphtorim and are named as a division of the ancient Egyptians. Caphtor is also mentioned in ancient inscriptions from Egypt, Mari, and Ugarit.
The Cypriot or Cypriote syllabary is a syllabic script used in Iron Age Cyprus, from about the 11th to the 4th centuries BCE, when it was replaced by the Greek alphabet. It has been suggested that the script remained in use as late as the 1st century BC. A pioneer of that change was King Evagoras of Salamis. It is thought to be descended from the Cypro-Minoan syllabary, itself a variant or derivative of Linear A. Most texts using the script are in the Arcadocypriot dialect of Greek, but also one bilingual inscription was found in Amathus.
Alashiya, also spelled Alasiya, also known as the Kingdom of Alashiya, was a state which existed in the Middle and Late Bronze Ages, and was situated somewhere in the Eastern Mediterranean. It was a major source of goods, especially copper, for ancient Egypt and other states in the Ancient Near East. It is referred to in a number of the surviving texts and is now thought to be the ancient name of Cyprus, or an area of Cyprus. This was confirmed by the scientific analysis performed in Tel Aviv University of the clay tablets which were sent from Alashiya to other rulers.
The ancient history of Cyprus shows a precocious sophistication in the Neolithic era visible in settlements such as at Choirokoitia dating from the 9th millennium BC, and at Kalavassos from about 7500 BC.
A kettle hat, also known as a war hat, was a type of combat helmet made of iron or steel in the shape of a brimmed hat. There were many design variations, with the common element being a wide brim that afforded extra protection to the wearer. It gained its common English language name from its resemblance to a metal cooking pot. The kettle hat was common all over Medieval Europe, and was called Eisenhut in German and chapel de fer in French.
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The Late Bronze Age collapse was a time of widespread societal collapse during the 12th century BC associated with environmental change, mass migration, and the destruction of cities. The collapse affected a large area of the Eastern Mediterranean and the Near East, in particular Egypt, eastern Libya, the Balkans, the Aegean, Anatolia, and, to a lesser degree, the Caucasus. It was sudden, violent, and culturally disruptive for many Bronze Age civilizations, and it brought a sharp economic decline to regional powers, notably ushering in the Greek Dark Ages.
This is a timeline of Cypriot history, comprising important legal and territorial changes and political events in Cyprus. To read about the background to these events, see History of Cyprus. See also the list of presidents of Cyprus.
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The ancient Near East was the home of early civilizations within a region roughly corresponding to the modern Middle East: Mesopotamia, ancient Egypt, ancient Persia, Anatolia and the Armenian highlands, the Levant and the Arabian Peninsula. The ancient Near East is studied in the fields of ancient Near East studies, Near Eastern archaeology, and ancient history.
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The Achaeans were one of the four major tribes into which Herodotus divided the Greeks, along with the Aeolians, Ionians and Dorians. They inhabited the region of Achaea in the northern Peloponnese, and played an active role in the colonization of Italy, founding the city of Kroton. Unlike the other major tribes, the Achaeans did not have a separate dialect in the Classical period, instead using a form of Doric.
Urshu, Warsuwa or Urshum was a Hurrian-Amorite city-state in southern Turkey, probably located on the west bank of the Euphrates, and north of Carchemish.
The Pompeian–Parthian invasion of 40 BC occurred after the Pompeians, backed by the Parthian Empire, had been defeated during the Liberators' civil war by Mark Antony and Octavian.
The Hittite Navy was the main naval force of the Hittites from ca. 16th–12th century BC. The navy took part in three land and sea military campaigns of the Hittite Kingdom against the Kingdom of Alashiya between 1275 and 1205 BC. It was also one of the main adversaries of the Egyptian Navy.
The Hittite Plague or Hand of Nergal was an epidemic, possibly of tularemia, which occurred in the mid-to-late 14th century BC.