I do not see WHY Barry gills should be disappointed by this envirnmental
explanation, except that he sought to demurr on such like every time i
bourhgt them up in our joint work. But in the face of more evidence, far
from wasnting to reject the environmental factor, we should incorporatre
it more and more. Moreover this does not mean that it acts entirel;y
"independently", since the environmenbtal effects - if they are not
tnemselves man made as some may not be - still are mediated through the
social structure [as at least discussed in my Bronze Age world System
cycles article in curent Anthropogy 1993. The more Anderi can tell us the
better!
regards
gunder frank
On Tue, 1 Oct 1996, Korotaev A. wrote:
> Date: Tue, 1 Oct 1996 17:57:07 +0300
> From: Korotaev A. <andrei@rsuh.ru>
> To: WORLD SYSTEMS NETWORK <wsn@csf.colorado.edu>
> Subject: 3/FOSS, GILLS AND THE 6TH CENTURY AD WORLD SYSTEM CRISIS
>
> 3/FOSS, GILLS AND THE 6TH CENTURY AD WORLD SYSTEM CRISIS
>
> Now I have to explain my understanding of one of the main deep
> causes of the 6th century AD World System crisis mentioned
> neither by Foss (incidentally, I am really sorry he is leaving
> us now) nor by Gills - I am afraid Barry Gills will be a bit
> disappointed as he seems to be looking not quite in the same
> direction (though the model he implies seems to be relevant
> with respect to some other crises and at least partly relevant
> for the 6th century crisis too).
>
> In any case there seems to be a sort of consensus on the point
> that the main causes of the Arabian 6th cent. crisis should be
> looked for outside Arabia - and I quite agree with this.
>
> PART 3. SOME NEGLECTED CAUSES OF THE CRISIS
>
> The answer to the Arabian puzzle which I would like to discuss
> now was offered to me by one of the leading Russian specialists
> in the environmental history, Dr. Dmitriy Prusakov (Oriental
> Institute, Moscow) who also supplied me with all the necassary
> literature. It appears that the 6th century AD evidenced the
> peak of the seismic activity in the Mediterranian region. Of
> course, on the spot of it it is not quite self-evident what it
> has to do with the 6th century AD Arabian crisis. Of course,
> the earthquackes affected in some way the evolution of the 6th
> - erly 7th cent. AD Arabian societies, leaving even some trace
> in al-Qura:n - cf. e.g. the beginning of the famous Earthquake
> su:rah (Idha: zulzilati l-ard*u zilza:la-ha: wa-rafa`ati l-
> ard*u athqa:la-ha wa-qa:la l-insa:nu ma: la-ha When the earth
> is shaken with an earthquake, and the earth lifts its loads,
> and the man asks: `What has happened to it? &c). Stookey and
> Gryaznevich have already proposed to connect the final decline
> of the pre-Islamic South Arabian civilization with the seismic
> activity - indeed it may well have produced the final deadly
> blow for the most ancient civilization centres of the edges of
> the internal Yemeni desert, which were already on the brink of
> final collapse by the 6th century AD and which depended heavily
> on relatively large-scale irrigation structures that could be
> significantly affected by the earthquakes. But this does not
> seem to be the case with the kingdoms and chiefdoms of the
> Arabian North which could not be apparently affected by the
> earthquakes to a critical extent. Thus, the most significant
> outcome of the seismic activity seems to be volcano eruptions
> rather than earthquakes. Again, it is not self-evident how,
> say, the volcano eruptions on the Lipar Islands near Italy
> could affect the evolution of the Arabian communities. Again,
> what is significant here is not the direct effect - though some
> of the South Arabian sites were destroyed just in this way
> (though not necessarily in the 6th century). What is really
> important is the ashes which are thrown to the atmosphere in
> great quantities during such eruptions. And this could affect
> significantly really hude areas. E.g. volcanic dust would halt
> some of the sun rays and accumulate the humidity, causing
> various disbalances in the ecological systems, which could
> result in the outbursts of the numbers of the epedemic disease
> bearing animals, and the causal link between the seismic
> activity and the epidimics was noticed long ago.
>
> However, the most significant factor seems to be the
> accumulation of the atmosphere humidity by the volcanic dust
> causing severe draughts in the parts of the world rather
> distant from the active volcanos themselves - and there are
> documented cases when, say, the volcano eruptions on the Lipar
> Islands near Italy caused severe draught in Mesopotamia
> (naturally, North Arabia could not have been affected in such
> cases either).
>
> Hence, the peak of the seismic activity in the Mediterranean
> region produced such an array of primary, secondary, and
> tertiary factors (earthquakes and volcano eruptions themselves,
> epidemics, draughts, barbarian invasions caused by the socio-
> ecological crises on the barbarian peripheries) which could
> pose a deadly threat for the survival of most of affected
> civilizations of the time. I myself have come to terms with the
> sudden death of the 1500 year old pre-Islamic South Arabian
> civilization when I realized that this happened simultaneously
> with the severe crisis in the Byzantian Empire which put it on
> the brink of an almost complete collapse (the early 7th - early
> 6th century comparison would produce for Byzantine results
> rather similar to the ones obtained above for the Arabian North
> and South in any case). And what was an almost deadly blow for
> strong Byzantine appeared to have been just a deadly blow for
> the weaker South Arabian civilization as well as to the most
> Arabian kingdoms.
>
> This is not a mere speculation, especially fot the Arabian
> North. Indeed, as was mentioned above the second half of the
> 6th century history of South Arabia is documented very badly
> (especially, in comparison with the earlier periods). But this
> is not true for the Arabian North. It is not that by the early
> 7th - early 6th century comparison we can deduce that most
> North and Central Arabian kingdoms has desintegrated without
> knowing what happened in between. No, it is possible not only
> to deduce this desintegration, but also to get to know in some
> detail how this desintegration proceeded. Indeed, we have at
> our disposal e.g. the wonderful pre-Islamic Arab historical
> tradition, the so called Ayya:m al-`Arab The Days of the
> Arabs. And one of the typical Days can be rendered as
> follows: there was some Arabian strongman (a head of a kingdom,
> or a chiefdom) who behaved sometimes in a bad and arrogant
> manner. Such a behavior could consist of, say, shooting an
> arrow (just for fun) at a she-camel of some poor women
> (incidentally, an action which once precipitated 40 year long
> violent hostilities), but, very noticeably, it could be
> manifested in attempts to collect taxes in a lean year
> (usually caused by a draught). A typical reaction to royal
> misbehavior would be that some tough bedouin guys would go to
> such a chief and just kill him, which would provoke the revenge
> attempts on the part of the murdered chiefs relatives, thus
> producing one more Arab Day which could last for years filled
> with series of violent actions on both sides. However, at the
> end we find original chiefdoms or kingdoms desintegrated with
> free true tribes on their places.
>
> A few words should be added with respect to the very
> interesting adaptation of the Arabs to the 6th century AD socio-
> ecological crisis which had very important consequences for the
> evolution of the World System as a whole. I hope to do this in
> my next posting.
>
> (Dr) Andrey Korotayev, Senior Research Fellow
> Oriental Institute of the Russian Academy of Sciences
> (Sector of Theoretical Problems of Oriental History)
> 12 Rozhdesrvenka, Moscow 103753, RUSSIA
> Fax: (7) (095) 975 2396; E-MAIL: andrei@rsuh.ru
>