1000-550 BC Iron Age

The term Iron Age refers to period during which iron was increasingly used to make weapons and tools, although bronze remained widely in use. During this period many small kingdoms emerged such as those of Israel, Judah, Ammon, Moab, and Edom in Israel and Jordan. Around 1000 BC the Assyrians from northern Mesopotamia launched military campaigns into the north and west to rebuild their diminished territories. On the coast in the area of modern Syria, Lebanon and northern Israel, descendants of the Canaanites (known to the Greeks as Phoenicians) re-established maritime trade with Egypt and the eastern Aegean. From 850 to 612 BC, the armies of Assyria attacked the Levantine cities and eventually incorporated territory into their empire stretching south as far as the borders of Egypt.

In eastern Anatolia (modern Turkey) the powerful kingdom of Urartu threatened Assyria from the 9th until the end of the 8th century BC. To the east lay a powerful set of tribes on the Iranian plateau which eventually merged into larger states. The best-known of these are the Medes. In 612 BC the Medes, in alliance with the Babylonians of southern Mesopotamia, sacked the major Assyrian cities including the capital Nineveh. The Babylonians took control of Mesopotamia and much of the Levant while the Medes dominated Iran and Eastern Anatolia.