The Geopolitics of the Phoenician Littoral in the Early Iron Age

At the end of the 13th century B. C., the land of Canaan was permanently transformed by a series of upheavals that ended the Canaanite Bronze Age. Only along a narrow coastal strip north of Akko-a region the Greeks termed Phoenicia-were Canaanites able to maintain their independence. There a remarkable rebirth took place, primarily in the harbors of Tyre, Sidon, Byblos, and Arwad, as those city-states succeeded in reasserting their maritime interests. Despite their rivalries, they were able to fill the vacuum created by the dissolution of the internationalism that had characterized the Amarna Age. By the end of the 11th century B. C., Tyre was already engaged in overseas colonization.