Brotherhood of Kings: How International Relations Shaped the Ancient Near East

by Amanda H. Podany

Podany portrays Near Eastern history, from 2300 to 1300, paying particular attention to royal interactions. Allowing them to speak in their own words, she reveals how they & their ambassadors devised a sophisticated system of diplomacy & trade. What the kings forged were fraternal friendships across hundreds of miles. They worked out ways for ambassadors to travel safely, created formal rules of interaction & conflict resolution & abided to treaties. Their efforts paid off with the exchange of goods. Tied to one another thru peace treaties & obligations, they were also often bound together as in-laws, by marrying one another's daughters. They'd almost never met, but they felt a strong connection, a brotherhood, which gradually made wars less common. Any one of the great powers of the time could have tried to conquer others, but diplomacy usually prevailed. Instead of fighting, they learned from one another & peacefully cooperated. An account of international diplomacy thousands of years before the UN. Brotherhood of Kings is a vibrant history of the "the cradle of civilization."
A Word about Chronology & Translation
Cast of Characters
Time Line
Acknowledgments
Introduction
The first evidence for diplomacy
Traders & ships from distant lands
War & allegiance
Long journeys away from home
Attack on Babylon by a distant enemy
A clash between expanding empires
Diplomatic overtures between the great powers
Brother kings united & at peace
Diplomatic marriages
Luxury goods from everywhere
A crisis in the brotherhood
The end of an empire & the restoration of peace
Epilogue
Abbreviations
Notes
Further Reading
Bibliography
Index

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Ancient History, Middle East, International Relations, Egyptology, Politics

432 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2010

About the author

Dr. AMANDA H. PODANY is a historian and author specializing in the study of the ancient Near East, and a professor emeritus of history at Cal Poly Pomona. She has written several books on ancient Near Eastern history for a wide readership, most recently the critically acclaimed Weavers, Scribes, and Kings: A New History of the Ancient Near East (Oxford UP, 2022). In the book she recounts more than 3,000 years of history through the eyes of people of all walks of life: rich and poor, female and male, young and old. She is also the narrator of the audiobook version, available from Audible.

Podany's other books include The Ancient Near East: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford UP, 2014), Brotherhood of Kings: How International Relations Shaped the Ancient Near East (Oxford UP, 2010), and The Land of Hana: Kings, Chronology, and Scribal Tradition (CDL Press, 2002). The Land of Hana pertains to Podany's scholarly research (also discussed in many articles), which focuses on Syria in the second millennium BCE, with attention to chronology, scribal practice, international relations, and kingship.

She has a particular interest in making recent findings in her field accessible to a wider audience and, in that spirit, co-wrote (with Marni McGee) a book for young adult readers called The Ancient Near Eastern World (Oxford UP, 2004). She is also the author and presenter of a 24-part series of lectures for Wondrium/Great Courses called Ancient Mesopotamia: Life in the Cradle of Civilization (also available on Audible). She has been the recipient of a research award from the NEH and received the Norris and Carol Hundley Award from the American Historical Association for her book, Brotherhood of Kings. Recently, Weavers, Scribes, and Kings was selected as a finalist for a PROSE award from the Association of American Publishers. Podany received her MA in archaeology of Western Asia from the Institute of Archaeology, University of London, and her PhD in history of the Ancient Near East from UCLA. She was also the original bass player for the band that became the Bangles.

Reviews

[Sense of History]

This is a really excellent introduction to a matter virtually unknown to me, namely, the extensive correspondence and diplomatic dealings between the rulers of the earliest states in Southwest Asia, particularly in the period 2300 to 1300 BCE. I thought that the only writings that remained of that age were boring accounting records or self glorifying royal inscriptions. But Podany makes it clear that the rulers of that time, in the area that is now formed by Egypt, Israel-Palestine, Syria, Turkey, Iraq and Iran, maintained quite intense formal contacts. This is evident from finds of 10,000ths clay tablets in very diverse places. These contain not only the actual correspondence between the monarchs, but also information about the gifts they exchanged and the marriages they entered into.

Of course, not everything has been preserved. Podany rightly suspects that this "diplomatic system” existed well before 2300 BCE, and that there was - with some ups and downs - a fairly large continuity in it. A very important nuance in this is that, curiously enough, Egypt remained almost completely out of the picture until about 1500 BCE. The correspondence initially took place mainly between monarchs in Mesopotamia and surrounding areas (Anatolia, the Levant, Southwestern Iran). Apparently, Egypt deliberately chose to remain aloof until 1500 BCE, although by then it already had a highly developed civilization for more than a thousand years. But that culture was so self-centered and so self-sufficient that formal political-diplomatic contacts with the outside world were not considered necessary.

Podany beautifully portrays how that changed drastically after the shock of a short foreign occupation (the so-called Hyksos period). The bulk, and most interesting, of her book focuses on the subsequent 1500-1300 BCE period, when Egypt became the central hub of the diplomatic system. And then you immediately notice the asymmetry: Egypt was recognized by the other great powers (the Hittite, the Mitanny, the Assyrian and Kassite/Babylonian states) as the leading empire and almost every monarch offered a princess of his own to supplement the already richly filled harem of the pharaoh, in exchange for gold and other luxury products. The reverse was not the case: no Egyptian princess has ever been married off to a foreign monarch, indicating that Egypt still continued to see itself as the center of the world.

Podany describes how the correspondence with the pharaoh also reveals quite a few personal traits of those rulers. Because they too were not immune to the needs of recognition, flattery and strategic games. And some had their own unsophisticated style, such as the Babylonian king in particular, who dared to complain like a small child when he presumed to have received too little attention (and gifts) from the pharaoh. It's also wonderful how Podany describes how envoys try to get out of such a diplomatically uncomfortable situation.

So this is definitely a very intriguing, interesting and well-researched book, but it also has some weaknesses. Due to the focus on the correspondence between the then great powers, it ignores the fact that there were also numerous other empires, city-states and peoples (whether or not nomadic) that had an impact on the balance of power at that time. Podany also gives the impression that the intense diplomatic contacts were a guarantee for peaceful relations, while the fact that this book contains at least as much a summary of successive battles and military expeditions clearly refutes this appearance. In my opinion, she could also have emphasized a little more how women (princesses in this case) were used as instruments by the male rulers in establishing diplomatic ties. Despite those weaknesses, this is absolutely recommended reading.

[Marc Lamot · Rating 4 out of 5]

My rating may be a bit too flattering (3.5 would be more in accordance to my harsh rating system), but I absolutely enjoyed this book. I already read Amanda Podany's The Ancient Near East: A Very Short Introduction, and that was a rather boring book. This, on the other hand, gives a vivid insight into the psychology of the rulers of the time, roughly the period between 2300 and 1300 BCE, so very early in human history. In that period there was a relatively intense correspondence between the kings of the different Mesopotamian, Northern Syrian and Egyptian empires. And with correspondence you must indeed imagine very heavy, rather large clay tablets with cuneiform inscriptions, almost always in Akkadian, the diplomatic language of the time. This communication was not so much formalistic, on the contrary, the tone and content of the messages reveal quite a bit about the power relations and psychological attitude of those involved, and even their petty sides. Interesting ànd amusing. More on that in my History account on Goodreads https://www.goodreads.com/review/show...

[Iset · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is one of the best academic texts I’ve read so far this year. Amanda Podany is well-known in her field, and this book is highly detailed and very well-referenced. But it is unlike most other academic texts I’ve read, inasmuch as it is so well-written. By that, I don’t mean professional and accurate – though it is. A lot of academic texts have a tendency to be written in a very dry style that is just very dull and fails to engage the reader. No wonder general readership stays far away, and as a trained historian myself I can attest to the fact that plenty of times I’ve had to blink back the tide of sleep as I re-read a paragraph that’s as dry as dust and frankly requires intense concentration to get anything intelligible out of. It’s a problem in the fields of history and archaeology; failure to engage the audience. It may be something to do with that training; we’re trained to be problem-solvers, sifting through vast amounts of evidence, utilising hard scientific methods, and then providing analysis an interpretation all while striving to be accurate and not misrepresent the findings. Making our scribblings an interesting and fluid reading experience tends to get forgotten, unless you’re specifically setting out to write a popular history, and then there’s the danger of oversimplification – but that’s a different issue.

I have a particular interest in public engagement, so I consider that writing style of books just like this one is an important concern and that they can and should absolutely be written with greater lucidity. Luckily, Podany’s book is one of those rare few. Considering all the information she has crammed in, Podany’s look at international diplomacy in the ancient Near East is both engrossing and accessible. Anyone could pick this up and have no trouble grasping the concepts laid out, and I certainly wouldn’t hesitate to recommend it to my non-historian friends. The fascinating back-and-forth of state relations is not only explained, but brought to life, with both the individuals and the administrative systems coming to the fore as the driving mechanisms of some extraordinary events in the Bronze Age.

9 out of 10

[Bryn Hammond · Rating 5 out of 5]

Not ‘just’ about diplomacy but rather tells the history of the ancient Near East through the successes and failures of diplomacy, instead of with the focus on conflicts, as our history-writing often chooses.

The record only begins when diplomacy was already up and running; it is older than we can establish.

As she says in her intro, the kings who feature here are quite obscure – her story hinges on three Syrian royals most of us have never heard of – whose common endeavour of diplomacy, although a world first, has not remained in historical memory. It was early forgotten, in fact, so that Irkad-damu of Ebla, Zimri-Lim of Mari and Tushratta of Mittani are not celebrated ‘with marble busts at the entrance to the United Nations’ or taught like the makers of the Magna Carta. But to know that diplomacy is as ancient as war, she does not hesitate to suggest, might yet influence us today.

One thing that stood out for me was how individual personalities affected the system. One war-minded king can spoil happily existing arrangements for everybody else. We have churlish kings and affectionate ones, cheats and the conscientious. But even aggressors and posturers were drawn into the system because there was more profit for less exertion: it was a robust tradition.

Queens held their own converse, with messengers separate to those who went between the kings; and the exchange of royal daughters was a major strategy. These were differently treated in different states, but women’s voices are not absent here.

It’s a pity her three Syrian kings don’t have busts at the UN as inventors of the international peace treaty. I became fond of King Tushratta, whose emotionality comes out in his letters – letters he couldn’t shut up in, so that his clay tablets weighed much more than the average for kingly correspondence at the time.

[Charles R · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have read quite a bit of history over the years, both popular and academic; probably several hundred volumes. Podany's "Brotherhood of Kings" sticks in my memory like few others.

Don't be fooled by the dry, academic subtitle ("How International Relations Shaped the Ancient Near East"). It is an academic history, and the author is an academic historian. But don't fear: the book is exceptionally readable. It is knit together by stories, as told in letters passed back and forth between the kings of the ancient kingdoms of Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Asia Minor. Amazingly, in some cases, both sides of a correspondence survive (even if at sites hundreds of miles apart"), and we can get a little bit of an idea of the actual personalities of particular people who lived 3000-4000 years ago. A memorable example are the letters between King Zimri-Lin of Mari, and his daughters, who were sent off to marry foreign kings; his daughter Kirum complains that her husband (king of Ilan-Sura) "never cares about me", that he threatens her, and she eventually begs to be allowed to return home to her father.

Ancient history is often a story of warfare, because records and monuments commemorating military triumphs are often what has best survived the years. Podany tells a parallel story about negotiation and peacemaking, in which kings would declare each other "brothers", and cement their ties with gift-giving and marriage links. This story is surprisingly well represented in archives of cuneiform tablets found all over the middle east. Podany uses this to put together a great narrative, which I wholeheartedly recommend to anyone interested in the period.

[Troy Goodfellow · Rating 5 out of 5]

I will be thinking about Podany's book for a long time. Amazing archival work surfaces a deep and sophisticated diplomatic system with as many alien rules as familiar ones.

Drawing heavily on Mittani sources as well as the Amarna letters, Podany centers kingdoms and rulers with names not many will recognize but their newness is often an asset; the angry letter of a minor Babylonian king wondering why the Pharaoh hasn't asked about his health proves illuminating.

A triumph of history and story-telling.

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this wonderful book in conjunction with a course called Diplomacy and Conflict in the Ancient Middle East. It gives a whirlwind tour through some of the most famous ancient diplomatic documents of the first three millennia of human civilization, from Ebla and Mari to the code of Hammurabi to the Amarna letters from the reigns of Amenhotep III and Akhenaten, the crazy sun-obsessed father of Tutankhamen. Podany writes elegantly and explains everything to a lay audience, weaving the sometimes broken treaties and administrative texts with explanations that wade through the quagmires of the five thousand years since passed. Recommended as an introduction to Near Eastern Studies and as a wonderful guide to the foundation of the diplomatic system.

[Giacomo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amanda H. Podany's "Brotherhood of Kings: How International Relations Shaped the Ancient Near East" is a delightful book. I know that delightful is not a word used very often for history books but this was one of the best books, of any kind, that I've read in the past few months.

Ancient Mesopotamia and Syria are not very fashionable: if you’ve ever visited a museum that has artefacts from Egypt and Mesopotamia on display you will have noticed that a lot more visitors crowd the rooms dedicated to the former than to the latter. In a way this is understandable because Egypt has its pyramids, its temples, its colossal statues and Tutankhamon's splendid grave goods, and everybody knows them, but not much of what survived of the ancient civilisations of Mesopotamia and Syria is so visually striking. The ancient people of these regions tended to build their cities with mud bricks and the climate of the area isn’t as favourable to the preservation of organic materials as the dry Egyptian weather. What separates them from others is their choice of writing implements: for millennia they recorded their lists, their contracts, their mythological tales and their prayers on clay tablets and the apparently humble clay tablet is surprisingly durable even in normal conditions and with some luck it can survive even the most destructive events, like the pillaging and burning of a city. So we may not have so many enigmatic statues or vast and imposing temples but we have something that’s arguably even more important: archives.

In this book Podany uses these materials, texts from clay tablets belonging to state and private archives and retrieved in all the lands influenced by Mesopotamia as well as more quintessential archaeological findings, like inscriptions on monuments, to tell the story of centuries of diplomacy and trade first in Mesopotamia and then in the larger Near East. Her narration is centred on three figures, king Irkab-Damu of Ebla, a Syrian city who rose to prominence in the Early Dynastic period but was then destroyed around 2250 BCE, king Zimri-Lim, who in the eighteenth century BCE ruled Mari, another Syrian city who had been Ebla's arch-enemy, until it was absorbed into the growing Babylonian Empire of Hammurabi, and Tushratta of Mittani, king of one of the most powerful states of the Amarna era in the fourteenth century BCE until it was defeated by a resurging Hittite empire. Podany reconstructs the rise and decline of city-states and empires and the development of an international system that grew from early short-lived agreements between neighboring cities to encompass almost the whole known world, with shared customs and protocols regulating everything, from the treatment of envoys to the appropriate way to address a ruler. Through this time diplomacy’s scope changed from just one of the many tools available to rulers, mostly to find ad-hoc allies that could help waging war against an enemy but could also at any time become enemies themselves, to a refined system through which the kings of the great powers of the Amarna age maintained contact and peace between each other. Tushratta, Amenhotep IV of Egypt, Burna-Buriash I of Babylon, and the others great kings at the top of a hierarchy that included some other smaller powers and a multitude of client states, called each other “brother” (while their vassals were at best “sons”), wrote letters and sent envoys, professed their reciprocal love, asked for and freely gave expensive gifts of both luxury objects and raw materials, organised marriages between their families and, just for a few decades, seemed to have decided that after all there was no need of wars to settle matters between them.

In the same fashion trade became the other pillar of the system. Precious and semiprecious stones from faraway lands were known in Mesopotamia even before recorded history began, and already in the Early Dynastic Period there were records of merchants and traders coming from and going to places as distant as Dilmun (modern Bahrein), Magan (modern Oman), and Meluhha, which has been identified with the Indus Valley Civilization that flourished in modern Pakistan and Northwestern India. By the Amarna period the trade networks extended from the Aegean Sea to Afghanistan and the kings of Cyprus, a major copper producer, came up often in the Pharaohs’ letters, while shipwrecks like the one found in Uluburun on the coast of Turkey can give us an impression of the cargo of these 14th century BCE ships, from copper and tin ingots to Canaanite jars full of glass beads and resins, to Egyptian jewellery and even the personal kit of some Mycenaean envoys that happened to be on board at the wrong time. Ideas and artists traveled too, as shown by the Minoan style frescoes found in palaces in Syria and even Egypt, and some cities, like Ugarit on the Syrian coast or Kanesh in Anatolia, became cosmopolitan places where people from all over the known world lived, traded, and left traces of their stories behind. Sometimes thanks to this we can still catch some glimpses of the lives of these people from so many millennia ago, like Ea-Nasir, the merchant from Ur who regularly traveled by boat to Dilmun bringing back copper in exchange for textiles and silver, or Kunnaniya, the local wife of a rich Assyrian trader who lived in an Anatolian city, who after his death traveled to his distant homeland to settle matters with her in-laws and on her return months later discovered that her sister had moved to her house, probably thinking she would never come back again, or princess Kirum, daughter of king Zimri-Lim, who married for political reasons the violent and abusive king of another city, was threatened and humiliated in front of the whole court for years but in the end (we can hope, the documents don’t tell us explicitly) managed to go back to her father's house after having been divorced.

I could probably go on because there was so much I loved in this book: I was already acquainted with the broad lines of the history of this time but it felt like there was some surprising discovery or new insight every other page. In conclusion though this was a thoroughly interesting and well written work, rigorous from a scholarly point of view and at the same time always accessible, and the author successfully painted a comprehensive, vivid and always fascinating painting of life in the Near East and eastern Mediterranean during the Bronze Age. I wholeheartedly recommend this book to every reader with even the slightest interest in history.

[Scriptor Ignotus · Rating 4 out of 5]

While Professor Podany's portrait of the ancient near east is scholarly, meticulously researched, and uses good intuition in filling in gaps in the archaeological record, reading Brotherhood of Kings gives one the impression that they are being exposed to as much a treatment of international politics in the early twenty-first century as they are an account of a remote antiquity.

One could probably open an introductory textbook on international relations or global issues and find that many of the issues covered could be applied to case studies found in this book. Podany does not shy away from using modern terminology in describing the affairs of her ancient subjects, describing the development of an international community in the ancient near east among kings who, far from constantly warring and plotting against one another in a Hobbesian milieu, as one might assume to have been the norm at a time when civilization was young, instead attended to each other's material needs, promoted ties of kinship (both biological and metaphorical, as Podany points out), and formed networks of alliances and tributary relationships that regulated one another's behaviors.

It is difficult to read Podany's description of events without thinking of some modern equivalent. Reading of trade relations between rulers who sought after luxury goods as a means of distinguishing themselves from their subjects, I couldn't help but think of G-8 summits and their protesters, or the classic Marxist creed that people are more divided by class than by nationality. Likewise, the book seems to invite the reader to view the effort of the "international community" of Mesopotamia to bring expansionist Hittites and Egyptians into the fold and curb their dangerous behaviors in the modern context of our contemporary international community's efforts to pacify rogue states.

It is difficult to give a value judgement regarding whether this modern terminology and equivalency is beneficial or detrimental, because it is what gives the book some of its more interesting insights, while at the same time it makes one skeptical that it may fall into the trap of looking at the distant past through a modern prism and consequently getting a distorted view, as some of the implied equivalencies seem to fit almost too perfectly.

Regardless, a recommended read for anyone interested in the ancient Near East, and certainly for anyone wanting to look toward the "origins" of international relations by looking at some of the earliest recorded international interactions, and what the implications might be for the true "nature" of world politics.

[Erik Graff · Rating 4 out of 5]

Brotherhood of Kings is an engaging study of what, to most, are remote times, places and personalities. The periods covered range from 2300 to 1300 B.C.E. The locales, ranging from Egypt and Nubia in the southwest to the Indus in the East and Anatolia in the north, focuses on the Syrian crossroads of those ancient lands. The personalities range from kings and queens to vassals, from diplomatic envoys to commercial traders, but the discussion focuses on three, presumably representative, rulers: Irkad-Damu of Ebla of the Early Dynastic (23rd c.), Zimri-Lim of Mari of the Old Babylonian (18th c.) and Tushratta of Mittani of the Amarna ( 14th c.) periods. These choices were determined as much by the availability of source materials—mostly fortuitously baked tablets, mostly in Akkadian—as by the importance of their reigns, if not more so.
The theme of the book is, as the subtitle indicates, diplomacy, and specifically as to how diplomacy contributed to peaceful coexistence. The text, as might be expected, is built upon surviving correspondence, treaties, marriage contracts and commemorative inscriptions, which together represent a millennium of evolving statecraft. The charm of the book, however, that which makes it an exceptionally readable portrayal of topics usually confined to specialists, is how author Podany fleshes out the record with anecdotes, stories and background descriptions which go beyond the official texts. Thus the reader learns a bit about Egyptian etiquette, some things about trade goods and luxuries, and some more about the hardships of travel for merchants, professional envoys and diplomats.
What is lacking from this book are maps sufficient to the text, not all place names given in the text being displayed on its handful of maps, as well as more reference to events and figures familiar from that most popular collection of ancient texts, the bible—Canaan, for instance, is barely mentioned and while holding religious statuary hostage plays an important part in Hittite history (p. 128), the parallels to the fate of the Ark of the Covenant are given no notice. Granted, the relevant cities and peoples of the bible are more satellites than central players, but they are familiar, they are culturally important and they would intelligently engage a broader readership.
Still, given what she does discuss, Podany does a wonderful job at bringing the distant so close to hand that even the general reader can begin to grasp it.

[Erik Champenois · Rating 5 out of 5]

A very well-written book that covers much of the history of the Ancient Near East from ca. 2300-1300 BC through the prism of great power diplomacy. The book shows how a diplomacy of brotherhood dominated international relations, prior to the time of empire ushered in by the Neo-Assyrian period. Strongly recommended for those interested in both geopolitics and history.

[Matt · Rating 5 out of 5]

Manages to present an interesting and coherent thesis while simultaneously giving enough general background and narrative to not leave behind someone like me with very limited knowledge of the Ancient Near East. Wonderful from start to finish and highly recommended!

[Rob Marshall · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an excellent and highly readable introduction to the political scene across the ANE - fully recommended as a first step into the amazing world of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East.

[Leena Maria · Rating 5 out of 5]

Definitely a very informative and interesting book for anyone who wishes to have an overall view of the power structures between the ancient kingdoms of Near East.

[Ryan Schaller · Rating 4 out of 5]

Prof. Podany has wonderfully approachable prose for how considerably well researched this book is. Brotherhood has the detailed endnotes and citations of an academic work, but Podany presents her diverse cast of kings and messengers in language and with an ease that a novice will appreciate.

While the rulers are presented chronologically, the book is much more of a detailed examination of a few specific periods that we have surviving diplomatic correspondence and treaties for than a narrative of ancient. The surviving letters usually don't correspond to the most famous of the ancient Mesopotamian Kings. For me, at least, most of these rules were names I had not encountered or read before. I've read books before where the plethora of unfamiliar names and locations makes them hard to follow. That's not the case here. Podany does a terrific job of contextualizing everything.

Definitely recommend. Will eventually read her other works.

[Maya Laundry · Rating 3 out of 5]

I had to read this for class, so it definitely was not a pleasure read for me personally. However, I was able to get through everything I needed to read for my class without too much trouble. Considering I am not a big history buff, I did not hate the content. One of the best books I have had to read for class, for sure!

[Jonathon Karagiannis · Rating 5 out of 5]

Easy to read and very engaging as well as intellectually stimulating.

[Read by Fred · Rating 3 out of 5]

Brotherhood of Kings is the story of diplomacy between the empires and kingdoms of the ancient near east between 2300 - 1300 BCE. Podany does a great job weaving a story based on the evidence currently available to us from cuneiform tablets; not an easy task as tablets are not time-stamped :p

The book is divided into 4 eras - each era discussing diplomacy through extensive trade, alliances, family ties, war and the common language used between very different cultures.

[Lynne · Rating 4 out of 5]

This well-written book casts a wonderful light on the history of the Near East. Wars have been going on a looooonnng time there - but once upon a time, there were actually occasional intervals of near-peace. Podany quotes a lot from ancient sources - clay tablets that hardened in the fires of conquest and remained buried in the rubble of history for millennia, from Egypt to Asia Minor. The letters from one to king to another are very enlightening, and entertaining. The cultural milieu for each section is well-described, and reflects why the kings were communicating, and the results, as well as can be determined after all this time. If you are interested in the Cradle of Civilization and the expansion of diplomacy, this is the right book.
Note that the Goodreads description says the book covers from 2300 to 1300 - that's BCE/BC, if anyone wonders.

[Madeline McCrae · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fascinating topic! Podany writes an accesible, well written, and interesting narrative about one of the first documented international systems in Mesopotamia called the Club of Great Powers. It functioned on a system of brotherhood between great kings, and spanned from 3000 BC to about 1177 BC, ending with the catastrophic Bronze Age Collapse. She focuses on the most important details, such as trade, diplomacy, and war while choosing a prominent king (appears the most in cuneiform tablets) to tell each phase of the system. I’m super excited to write my undergrad thesis about it!

[Booklover73 Gonzalez · Rating 5 out of 5]

Loved the book. One of my all time favorite books on ancient history. I highly recommend it.