diplomacy in antiquity

Review Article
DIPLOMACY IN ANTIQUITY
Potts, T. Mesopotamia, and The East. An Archaeological and Historical Study of Foreign Relations
ca. 3400-2000 B.C. Oxford, 1974.
Cohen, R. & Westbrook, R. Amarna Diplomacy. The Beginnings of International Relations, 2000.
Maria Eugenia Aubet Phoenicians and the West Politics, Colonies and Trade, 1993.
Frank Adcock & D.J. Mosley Diplomacy in Ancient Greece, Thames & Hudson, 1974.
Edward Luttwark The Grand Strategy of the Roman Empire, John Hopkins University Press, 1976.
The source of our civilization is Mesopotamia, the first river civilization in the Middle East. It is
also here we see the first system of city-states emerged, organized around three clusters of citystates
in the Sumerian south centered on Ur, Uruk, Eridi & Larsa, in the Babylonian middle
centered on Babylonia, Nippur, Isin, and Akkad. At the same time, the Assyrians led the north out
of Nineveh, Ashur, and Khorsabad. Potts (1994:87) recounts how Mesopotamia between the Third
and First Millennium was characterized by a steady exchange and ethnolinguistic divisions between
the alluvial plains and highlands of Iran, occasionally marked by the invasion of the highlanders of
the alluvial people’s thief but more often the securitization of Mesopotamia’s eastern frontiers, if
necessary by occupation, aggression and attempts at imperial dominance. Summer was supreme in
this endeavor, ruling out of southern Iraq at that age a fertile ground and population mixture of
Semi-tic, proto-Iranian and Babylonian peoples, connected to Sush, Elam, and Ansan by trade, a
system of roads and written correspondence. Trade and natural resources by the summer-akkadian
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dynasties were sourced mainly from Oman, Bahrain, and even the Indus Valley. Trade between
Mesopotamia and Iran was in stones, metals, timber, and horses in return for foodstuffs, textiles,
and luxury items. This trade played an essential role in state formation in early Mesopotamia. The
Gulf corridor between Mesopotamia and the Sush area in southern Iraq also helped develop a
system of writing to deal with the administration & calculations. Summer even extended her realm
into Iran proper on the premise that it could deliver Sush security against Elamtu highlanders living
in the Zagros mountains. Babylonian ascendency spelled a high civilization and Assyria turbulence
in the Near East system. The contributions the Mesopotamians had made to mankind by then were
already impressive. The writing was invented in Mesopotamia. The Babylonian Hammurabi
undertook the codification of law. It conceived the bi-cameral system combining aristocratic and
popular elements under a chief ruler in Sumer by a fusion of the office of the High Priest and King.
Taxes or tributes were imposed, and a social purpose was first invented in Mesopotamia. A deluge
occurred in ancient times, so man created not only Noah but also Humanity’s first hero.
Mesopotamia is the bosom of the first Moshe, the first legend of resurrection was crafted in
Mesopotamia, and songs of lamentations were put together and proverbs instituted to make sense of
everyday life. These heritages have been diffused to Persia and the West to Greece via Semitic
peoples. The reception, adaptation, and transformation of this heritage as conditioned by material,
social and cultural factors are not only what make us what we are today but also betray the common
heritage of Europe and the Middle East. Thomson (2004) captures the dynamics in terms of a world
system proper that existed in Mesopotamia and takes pain to factor in the political-economic crisis,
climate deterioration, urban population, centralization-decentralization, and center-periphery
relations in explaining the burst and boom of diplomacy among the city-states of the Mesopotamian
plain and the attendant shift be-tween power centers in the south, middle, and north of the
Mesopotamia. In the end, he contends, a pattern of fragmentation of the state system occurred not
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so much due to the priority given to opportunity and the loss of power but the failure to address
internal and external challenges within a coherent policy framework. The perception of the
complexity this entailed led to a diminished margin of return given to the decision-makers, which is
why the endeavor of unity continuously failed.
Egypt, the first and most important of the Middle East’s classical empires next to Persia, is the
store-keeper of the Amarna letters, discovered in 1887 during an excavation. The letters testified to
the development of a fully-fledged diplomatic system in the Late Bronze Age from 1500-1100 B.C.
The great power of this age: were Egypt, Babylonia, Assyria, Mittani, and the Hittites. Amarna
entered this club due to successful military campaigns on the Syro-Palestinean plains, Tri-politania
suppression, and Sudan's occupation. Egypt was the sole source of gold, ivory, ebony, and alabaster
which it traded in return for supplies of silver, lapis lazuli, and copper, and, as we have seen, horses,
which Babylonia could deliver thanks to its relationship with the Elamites of Iran. The diplomatic
language was Akkadian, and if the Egyptian sanctuary differed from the religions of the near
eastern plain, the shared polytheism helped underpin the identification of several gods under
different names, homologous with the nature of the international system, Amarna fostered. The
Pharaohs were mostly the object of divination. Egypt nurtured close diplomatic relations with
Mittani, a former foe. It had to off-set the Hittites, a serious contender for influence in the Near East
with that of Assyria ruled out of Ashur, a power in steady ascendance with the relationship of that
of Babylonia, a trusted ally of old. Egypt maintained training links with the Cypriote rulers. It stood
in close contact with the Arzawa in Western Turkey to safeguard against Hittite inroads into the
Egyp-tian sphere of influence, a policy deemed the more urgent following a devastating long war of
fifty years essentially over rulership of vassals and control over strategic nodal points on the Syrian
plain. This provoked the signing of the Peace Treaty after the final battle at Qadesh. “Relations with
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Hatti were troubled, as the two states vied for control of the former territory Mittani, with Hatti
reluctant to admit Assyria into the Great Powers’ club.” The liberation of Assyria under Ashuruballit
in the 14 th century from Mittani led to a tense rapprochement between Babylonia and
Assyria, following a brief interlude of flirtations between the Hittites and Babylonia. Control of
resources and the supply lines lay at the heart of these conflicts. When the empire of Mittani
collapsed, Babylonia started meddling in Assyrian affairs to keep it from expanding while the
Hittites asserted their independence. To Babylonia's dismay, this spelled trouble for the Amarna-led
international system as it initially titled Assyria into Egypt’s orbit. It ultimately resulted in a much
closer relationship between Babylonia and Assyria following the war. Moreover, the relationship
with the unruly vassals, primarily on the Syro-Palestinean plain, took more and more time for the
Egyptian ruler’s time. The relationship between the Greater Kings and lesser kings dominated by
Egypt differed. The vassals primarily served as agents of the Empire. The motives underlying the
behavior of members in the Amarna-centered international society, Cohen (2000:53) accepts, were
more often than not informed by the desire for (1) physical security and differentiation from other
states (2) ontological security or predictability in relationships with the world, implying a desire for
stable social identities (3) recognition by other actors, over and above survival through brute force
(4) development, in the sense of realizing human aspirations for a better life, for which states were
repositories at the collective level’. Thus life on the savannah was eased by shared ideas, mutual
perceptions, and joint expectations that helped maintain the system into a system based on the
mutual adjustment and diplomatic interaction based on gifts, marriage, and a continuous
engagement between equals-in-power. “Distance, we may add, was intelligible in terms of traveling
time, not spatial extension.” During its later reign, Egypt developed an ideology that excluded the
notion of brotherhood among members of the system, instead emphasizing its hegemonic ideology,
sanctioned by the Gods and based on a system of center-periphery, apposite to Amarna’s sense of
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security and sense of the greatness of the great families, ruling and composing its elite. In the end, it
appears that the very thing that served to uphold the system also facilitated the demise of the
Amarna-led international society. Ultimately, Egyptian procrastination and reluctance to engage in
the give-and-take of normal business undid the system. This may have been hampered by the
frequent killings of envoys and the rivalry over influence on the Syro-Pale-stone plains. A chief
concern was the proxy battle fought out of the palaces in Hattusha, Amarna, and not least
Washukanni over influence in Southern Syria, resulting more often than not in a stand-off and a
reluctance to both engage and mediate disputes other than those of the subjugated vassals in the
immediate vicinity. Egypt’s abandonment-cum-demise of Mittani, along with mismanagement of
the relationship with Babylonia, the chief rival of Assyria, is thought to have prompted a virtual
break-down in the Near East system.
Ever the intermediaries between Europe and the Middle East, the Phoenicians lived in the main
cities of Byblos, Tyros, Sidon, Berytos, Megiddo & Ugarit. The Phoenician moment in history
reflected a breakdown in the Near East system, which allowed nimble merchants to flourish from
cities on the slopes of the Lebanese mountains. The oldest city-states, Byblos, was founded in the
sixth millennium B.C. This small seafaring person in Europe is often remembered as the transmitter
of the Alphabet, onto which the Greeks added vowels. Ugarit Phoenicia, however, is also the home
of the sanctuary of Baal (Melqaert) and of El (Jahve), the rites of whom are at the core of our
inkling towards sharing and participation in the exercise of power and the benefits conferred upon
man by the gods if we do so as organized in families. Monarchs, Merchants, and Shipowners not
only founded Carthago, Cadiz, Malaka, and Sardinia. They also helped monetarize trade and refined
navigational and shipbuilding techniques. Temples, more often than not, served as store-house for
the polity’s trade in goods. Sitting at a trading hub between Egypt, Mesopotamia, and the Aegean,
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the Phoenicians succeeded during its apogee between 2750-2300 B.C, and following a major crisis
during invasions from the Mesopotamian plain, notably Aleppo and Mari, again in 1800BC-600BC,
in a socio-economic expansion in the Mediterranean. In 850 B.C., Tyre resoundingly whipped the
Assyrian navy, establishing itself along with Byblos as the military and commercial strongholds of
the Canaanites. The Mediterranean unified the Phoenicians jointly; common political institutions
among the port cities hardly existed. Eugenia Aubet (1996) then attributes the Phoenician expansion
to a mixture of territorial reduction, overpopulation, agricultural shortfall and demands for its
manufactured goods, international trading circuits, relations with Assyria, and the infrastructure of
long-distance trade. The relationship between the mother cities and the commercial diasporas varied
according to the customs of the home city-state – all colonies had to contend with the presence of
the native population. The scattered nature of the enterprise often meant those farthest afield closer
resembled the center than those in proximity. The Phoenician’s place in history as a great trading
nation conditioned by the relationship with the Assyrian hinterland ultimately failed to escape the
role of power politics. It fell victim to its success, even though the Canaanite venture lived on in the
cloak of the Carthaginians. Carthago caused a shift in the ball balance of power in the
Mediterranean as of 550 B.C., long after the demise of Assyria-Babylonia – the central demand
centers of Phoenician goods - and stands out as the more enduring satellite state, initially dueling
with Greek merchants before it came close to finish off Rome before the latter’s emergence as the
superpower of the Mediterranean was even contemplated. The Phoenicians were virtually absorbed
and entered a permanent decline as a people when invaded by the Muslim armies only in the sixth
century.
Ancient Greece started by invading Troy of Minor Asia. This set the scene for the Greek’s epic
battle to attain independence and maintain the integrity of their civilization. They were departing
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from the Myca-mean palaces run by a king called Wanax, notable local basileus, who was assisted
by a council of elders – gerontes. The Mycenaean age was characterized by a warrior culture and
trade relations with the neighboring Sicily, Italy, Anatolia, and Macedonia. Dorians quickly overran
the Mycenaean civilization of the Peloponnese. It spelled the end of the fortress age, the beginning
of a rural wilderness from 1100-900 B.C. until the urbanized polis emerged due to the dislocation
and the integrity of the political institutions of the Mycenaean age in the eighth century. This
dispersal gave rise to the particularism of the Greek poleis comprising different institutions, cults,
calendars, dialects, and alphabets. This organization also resulted in a specific kind of colonization
reflecting the various political systems in Greece: Monarchy, Oligarchy, and Democracy.
Moreover, the colonies often organized themselves as independent sovereign polis. This helped
contribute to the development of the political institution known as tyranny when wealthy aristocrats
got elected as monarchs by the popular assembly in competition with other nobility. The
administration was mainly maintained by tribes and clans and helped mitigate conflicts between the
aristocracy and the people. This helped ensure the colonial enterprise was agricultural in nature and
direct popular democracy to be an even more cumbersome process than usually admitted. In ancient
Greece, a diplomatic system slowly emerged to the effect of regulating territorial rights and right of
access through a combination of legalization of links, a method of envoys, and exchange between
political leaders, leading to a complex of city-states, more often than not organized in Leagues
around a leading state such as Sparta ( Lacedemonian) or Athens (Delian), Corinth ( Aetolian) or
Thebes (Archaen). This state system existed between the Sixth century-second century B.C. Here, a
method of balance of powers proper was invented and applied to the art of diplomacy. The reason
for this lay like the system: The need to coalesce and forge alliances for status and influence among
the members of the Greek state system to attain economic growth and military prowess. From
Sparta’s pre-eminence in the Peloponnese and later using an alliance with Persia over Athens’ rise
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as a naval power and hegemony over the Delian association to Macedonia’s hegemony over the
Hellenes, the Hellenes practiced regime change, alliance diplomacy, financial bribery, and political
leadership as they pulled one another over the counter. Greeks thus introduced metropolis, urban
planning, and coinage into the world, magnifying the enterprise considerably. This system was
instituted and worked from the sixth century-second century B.C. At heart, this was an arrangement
of political leadership as much as coercion. It was, however, also a system that made strategizing
necessary and the deft use of military power paramount for providing security and political
leadership against external dangers, including northern marauding tribes. Adcock & Mosley (1974)
recounts how Rome gradually came to underwrite Greek freedom through a process of divergence
of interests among the Greeks – the Aetolian, and Athens-led alliances, Rhodos, Macedonia, and
the Archaen League resulting in a policy ‘devised with no ulterior motive in view’ but still leading
to the assumption of control through an administrative process of rule-and-divide, even as attention
had to be paid to Carthago, Egypt, and Persia. Whereas the Persian system never failed to back up
its dominion, it always relied on the indirect rule through reliance on Militus and Athens; the
Roman system came with administrators and a method of governance well-suited to assert
administrative control and claim physical presence. Rome thus came to dominate the Greeks
through deft armed intervention, not to mention outright destruction of city-states in disregard of the
logic and interdependencies of the Hellenic system’ (Adcock & Mosley, 1975:109). More often
than not, this would lay to Roman claims of a settlement.
The Roman Empire applied for the conduct of its foreign relations during its reign from the 1 st
Century to the 3 rd Century, a system of strategic relationships organized into a grand strategy. In
ascendance since the domination of the Greeks, the Romans went on to forge a system based on the
management of clients, the tactical organization of the army, and the strategic deployment of forces.
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Ro-man strategy was thus initially characterized by a distinct economy-of-force and the use of
subsumed clients as auxiliary forces. A constant presence at the borders created a psychology of the
empire, which helped instill a sense of security. The neighbors always remembered who was in
charge and could always count on massive retaliation, if not annihilation, as a last option from the
citizen army of the Roman Senate and People. Luttwark ( 1976) recounts how “diplomatic relations
were less stable, partly because the power of those who dealt with Rome was itself less stable;
moreover, these clients, who were migratory if not nomadic, had a last resort that the territorial
client states of the East never had – migration beyond the reach of Roman power.” In a later stage,
this grand strategy ceased existing as Rome took on the quality of an empire. Rome then adopted a
perimeter defense, linked up with Via Romana, communications, and troop basing. The total
deployment, including expeditionary forces, never exceeded 350,000 men, and they all and each of
them had to contend with requirements of strategic depth, rear-area security, and economy of
deployment. Despite the Augustan principate, the mixture of poor and scattered border defense and
internal turmoil in conjunction with administrative inefficiency and venality, the dispersal of the
Realm and the lack of a logic of collective security, popular foundation, and the pressures on the
borders got the better of the Roman empire. The Roman Empire ended its career by adopting a God
called Christ, which, through the Church of Christ, perpetuated the empire’s life beyond the age of
the realm its rites were meant to serve. At the time, God’s son appeared like an odd figure. In the
late Roman and Byzantine empires, God’s son became a God proper and was subsequently
reincarnated as part of the Holy Trinity. To posterity, it ensured that Rome was never forgotten.
The lessons learned: Diplomacy is about the relativization of borders. Diplomacy is an evolving
enterprise whose manifestation and origin may be captured in terms of both a regional system over
the long haul and the personalities that inhabit it. Diplomacy always proceeds from actors, not the
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regional state system per se. Great powers are endowed with natural resources – Babylonia and
Egypt –and if not, it is a commercial enterprise – Mycennae and Phoenicia - needing military
protection. Concern for maintaining the regional system has not always been at the forefront of
policy-makers’ concerns. Strategy plays an increasingly important role throughout the history of
diplomacy. If an apex to History exists, the past is not always taken on board as a guide for the
conduct of diplomatic strategy. In contrast, the transformation of the Middle East from a system to
an Egyptian-led international society took place during the Amarna period. A well-functioning
central administration is, more often than not, a para-mount to successful diplomacy. Utopias are
integral in the development of polities. Yet, history becomes History on the script of great powers.
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