Ancient Societies Collapse Research Paper

“America’s ‘Oh Sh*t!’ Moment”, written by Niall Ferguson, a historian who teaches at Harvard University, in 2011, explores why civilizations collapse, and how America can avoid this. He does not focus only on America, but many civilizations in the past that have collapsed. Niall Ferguson is the author of Civilization: The West and The Rest. The article is creatively and cleverly written using the metaphor of modern technology to describe the way in which the societal collapse occurs. This shows that the article was written for adults who are highly educated and understand and relate to technology. The article discusses the possibilities of what complete collapse would look like in American society. I believe the author successfully

Many civilizations fail due to human's activity. A famous example would be the Easter Island who failed to see the long-term effects they had on their island. But other civilizations decline is not directly related to human activity.

Eric H. Cline the author of the book,”1177 The year Civilization Collapsed,” is a professor of classics and anthropology, and the director of the Capitol Archaeological Institute at George Washington University. Some of the many other books that he has wrote are, From Eden to Exile: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Bible and The Trojan War: A Very Short Introduction, Sailing the Wine-Dark Sea: International Trade and the Late Bronze Age Aegean, and Three Stones Make a Wall: The Story of Archaeology. Eric H. Cline has also won numerous amounts of awards for his outstanding teaching, and his informative books. Some the awards he has won include, winning

Jared Diamond is a world renowned scientist, author, Pulitzer Prize winner, and currently a geography professor at UCLA. Of his six books published, we will be looking at the last chapter of his fourth book, Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed. In this book Diamond utilizes the comparative method to find resemblance in past societal collapses with our current society. In the chapter entitled, "The World as Polder: What Does it Mean to Us Today," Diamond points out that there are indeed many parallels between past and present societies and that our modern day society is currently on a path of self destruction , through examples such as globalization and the interdependency of each country.

Ancient civilizations made some important contributions to our life today. They started around 3500 BC. Ancient civilizations also achieved many things. Some of those things were new inventions, the use of new technology, writing systems and architectural skills. Two of the many civilizations that did these things were the Chinese and Egyptians.

Jared Diamond's "The Last Americans: Environmental Collapse and the End of Civilization" draws conclusions between past civilizations and today's global civilization. His essay deals with the Analyzing the similarities in our actions to key turning points for other civilizations right before their fall. The main example stems from a civilization that Americans are acutely aware of, the Mayans. Diamond links ideas ranging from politics, environmentally unfriendly practices, and globalization as factors leading to the downturn of societies.

Many ancient civilizations have changed the way we live today. Sumerians invented the first language, Hammurabi invented the first set of laws, Egyptians created pyramids, and so many other ways that ancient people made the building blocks of the way our society lives today. It amazes me how God gave us brains to figure out ways to make life so much easier!

There are other theories that tie into the Bronze Age collapse such as other devastating natural disasters (earthquakes in Mycenae), large social revolutions that toppled leaderships, and the possibility of a total system-wide societal collapse that ended everything within that city/empire/civilization(s). All of the factors noted above may have all played a part in the overall collapse, but none of them were the sole exact cause of why it happened. The Bronze Age Collapse was mostly likely caused by the combination of multiple factors and outside sources which brought about the downfall of multiple civilizations such as Egypt, Hatti and Mycenae. However, despite all the violence and chaos the Bronze Age Collapse brought upon the affected empires, there was some good to come out of it. The end is not always just the end, it is sometimes just the beginning. At the end of the chaos, new civilizations rose to power underneath the dust of the old ones, including the prodigious Biblical Israelites, it was also the time said civilizations entered the next major age of civilization, the Iron

purpose: Highlights the collapse of several historical societies and the factors that caused their collapse.

Ever wondered what it would be like to live in a “perfect” society? Truth is, there are no “perfect” societies due to the many reasons that lead them to fall. So why do societies fall? Many great societies have fallen due to corrupt leaders, scarcity in necessary resources, and sickness. Germany, China, Sierra Leone, and the fictional society of Ember, are all examples of how once great societies fall. All of these societies fell due to corrupt leaders, resource scarcity, and sickness.

The word “collapse” has a number of connotations associated with it. Some view it exclusively the degradation of societies of the highest order. Others see it as the complete disintegration of economic prospects and commerce. Some even think of it political ruin with the demise of states and ruling factions that maintain order. The most general definition for collapse can includes elements from these three viewpoints. American anthropologist and historian Joseph A. Tainter is best known for his writings on societal collapses. In 1988 he published his most widely recognized work, The Collapse of Complex Societies.

Thesis: Fear of impending decline, as the result of ineffective leaderships and external threats, resulted in infighting and lack of cohesion. Ultimately, this resulted in the fracturing of empires under the stresses of having disloyal and hopeless people.

Every unit or organization in this world has its ruins and sometimes only stones can tell the tale of fallen or stumbled civilizations. Their history might be laid or buried deep within the surface of the Earth, hidden in the shade of the oldest tree in the forest or among the rise of industries of a modern city. (Why do Civilizations Collapse. Retrieved from http://science.howstuffworks.com/environmental/green-science/civilizations-collapse.htm). We have questions or thoughts rolling in our minds as we try to study and understand the beginnings of our society or civilizations. Sometimes, we can ask “How come an advanced civilization in the early times experience such break down or fall?” or “What contributed to such loss?” Many civilizations have flourished and rise up to the top

Early civilization consisted of core values that defined the communities that resided within it. These communities were driven by numerous factors in which would decide the overall outcome of the civilization. Geography, social and economic values, and they’re culture all played an important role in the makeup of these civilizations.

     A pattern that was common among the ancient civilizations of China, Rome, Greece, Mesopotamia, Egypt, and India was that most of them started as a dictatorship, a monarchy, or a dynasty. Eventually, most of them changed to a democracy, republic, or to class systems. Almost all of the civilizations had one or two great leaders. For example, Egypt had King Tut, Greece had Alexander the Great and Rome had Julius Caesar.