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.On the Syrian coast and in the interior "we find a stratigraphic and chronological rupturebetween the strata of the Middle Bronze and Late Bronze at Qalaat-er-Rouss,Tell Siroiriyan, Byblos, and in the necropoles of Kafer-Djarra, Oraye, Majdalouna." All thenecropoles examined in the upper valley of the Orontes ceased to be used, and habitation of thegreat site of Hama was interrupted at the moment the Middle Kingdom in Egypt went down.Alsoin Ras Shamra there is a marked gap between the horizons of the Middle and the Late Bronze.In Palestine, at Beth Mirsim, there was an interruption in the habitation of the site after the fall ofthe Middle Kingdom in Egypt.In Beth-Shan, between the layers of the Middle Bronze and LateBronze, the excavators came upon an accumulation of debris a meter thick."It indicates that thetransition from the Middle Bronze to the Late Bronze was accompanied by an upheaval thatbroke the chronological and stratigraphical sequence of the site." A similar situation was found atTell cl Hesy by Bliss.Earth tremors played havoc also with Jericho, Megiddo, Beth-Shemesh,Lachish, Ascalon, Tell Taanak.The excavators of Jericho found that the city had beenrepeatedly destroyed.The great wall surrounding it fell in an earthquake shortly after the end ofthe Middle Kingdom. Concussions devastated the entire land of the Double Stream.The Russian-Persian borderlandalso shows that there was no continuity between the Middle Bronze and Late Bronze.In theCaucasus not an archaeological vestige was found ol the centuries between these two ages.A sea tide broke onto the land, as on the coast of Ras Shamra, bringing further destruction in itswake.It appears also that the end of the Middle Kingdom was marked by volcanic eruptions and lavaflows.On the Sinai Peninsula, at an early and undisclosed date, a flow of basaltic lava from thefissured ground the Sinai massif is not a volcano burned down forests, leaving a desertbehind.In Palestine lava erupted, filling the Jezreel Valley.Early in this century a Phoenicianvase was found imbedded in lava.Geologists have asserted that volcanic activity in Palestineceased in prehistoric times."The assertion of the geologists thus becomes very questionable,"wrote an author at that time.The vase found in lavaproves volcanic activity there "in historicaltimes." The verdict of the archaeologists is that the vase "dates from the fifteenth century beforethe present era," and thus the eruption must have taken place in the middle of the secondmillennium.*Egypt, according to Schaeffer, was conquered by the Hyksos, coming from the East, when it fellin a catastrophe caused by natural elements.In other countries, too, not conquerors or migratinghordes but earthquakes and fire were the agents of destruction."Our inquiry has demonstratedthat these repeated crises which opened and closed the principal periods of the third and secondmillennia were caused not by the action of man.Far from it, because compared with thevastness of these all-embracing crises and their profound effects, the exploits of conquerors.would appear only insignificant.Schaeffer finds indications that the climate changed abruptly in the wake of the catastrophes; thephenomenon was ubiquitous: "At the same time in the Caucasus and in certain areas ofprehistoric Europe, changes of climate have caused, as it appears, transformations in theoccupation and economy of the countries." 'The catastrophe that served as the starting point for two of my works, Worlds in Collision andAges in Chaos, left archaeological imprints on biblical and Homeric lands, from the Dardanellesto the Caucasian barrier, the Persian highland, and the cataracts of the Nile.The most severeand devastating upheaval took place exactly at the end of the Middle Kingdom in Egypt, asclaimed in these two books.6 Schaeffer, Stratigraphie comparie p.565.7 Ibid., p.556.What was the nature of the perturbations that caused the end of the Old Bronze Age and then ofthe Middle Bronze Age, and changed the entire aspect of the known world from Europe to Asiaand Africa? Fire raged, lava flowed, tremors traveled across whole continents, and climate wentthrough revolutions.Schaeffer wondered at the vast extent of the earthquakes, unknown inmodern annals.He asked: Could it be that in earlier times earthquakes were of very muchgreater force and wider spread than they are now because geological strata, originally out ofequilibrium, were settling with the passing of time? This explanation of the readjustment ofgeological strata as time goes on is not valid if we keep in mind that geology ascribes to thisplanet three billion years of existence, and three thousand years is just one millionth of thisperiod.The earth would have adjusted its strata long before, in the geological ages.Apparentlythe earth was thrown out of equilibrium only a few thousand years ago, which also explains thechange in climate simultaneous with the upheaval.Schaefler's investigation reaches Persia in the East; inquiring in lands beyond Persia, we findthat a rich Indus Valley civilization, with many fortified cities, came to a sudden end in thefifteenth century before the present era, shortly before the arrival of the Aryans.The cause ofthis sudden termination, conveniently equated with the fifteenth century B.C.," is not known; butthe facts brought forth by R.E.Mortimer Wheeler strongly suggest to various scholars *® that a natural catastrophe engulfed the area in those early Vedic times.In its wake the Aryans cameinto the country; a Vedic Dark Age ensued, and on the ashes of the effaced world Aryans, stepby step, built a new civilization.Times and DatesThe evidence of this and preceding chapters should not be interpreted as proving that therewere global catastrophes only in the first and second millennia before the present era; but assubstantiating the claim that in those times, too, there were global disturbances: these wereactually the last in a line that goes back to much earlier times.10 A written communication of H.K.Trevaskis, author of The Landof the Five Rivers (Oxford University Press, 1928).According to the narrative of Worlds in Collision, two series of world catastrophes took place inrecent times! "one that occurred thirty-four to thirty-five centuries ago, in the middle of thesecond millennium before the present era; the other in the eighth and the beginning of theseventh century before the present era, twenty-six centuries ago." The first of thesecatastrophes occurred at the end of the Middle Kingdom in Egypt and actually caused itstermination; in A.ges in Chaos further details were given of the closing hours of the MiddleKingdom, which went down under the blows of nature.The second series of
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