1600-1401 BCE (Grand Union)

The 16th and 15th Centuries are the ninth section of the Bronze Age of history.

Bronze Age Pt. 8:
1800-1601 BCE

Bronze Age Pt. 9
1600-1401 BCE

Bronze Age Pt. 10 and Iron Age Pt. 1:
1400-1201 BCE

Egypt[]

Achillas looked up to a previous ruler in the Pharaoh lineage, Gilukhipa. He admired her cunning tactic and ability to stand up to the nobility who challenged her power. Though these traits were admirable in Gilukhipa, when they were applied to Achillas, they did not compliment him well. Instead of being a calm and collected ruler, those stories of nobles challenging the throne drove him to paranoia. Achillas was paranoid not just of the other nations around him, but of the other nobles in his kingdom. His paranoia got the better of his judgment, and the results were disastrous for the Empire. As he made it a point to execute those nobles and their family who he even suspected of being disloyal or even the slightest hints of treachery, he made it a point to make a public example of them. This mass murdering of the nobles would continue until his death.

Achillas' son, Dagi, would suffer a very tragic fate, as he was murdered by an unknown assailant in his sleep. Blamed for the murders his father committed, he was murdered instead to atone for it. In the aftermath of his death an emergency council of various high advisors and nobles was assembled to help run the Empire until a legitimate heir could be found. A legitimate heir could never be found, as most eligable heirs were killed off due to Achillas' paranoia. The Empire would spend 10 years without an actual ruler, instead led by a council of advisors and nobles. It was not until a heavy disagreement between various nobles and advisors, ending up with two advisors dead and one noble dead, that many nobles would leave the Empire, claiming their own remote sections of the empire, while the Advisor Council kept a firm hold of the Capital provinces.

Great Noble War of Egypt[]

What would follow suit would be a over a sixty year conflict between the de facto independent nobles living at the edge of the empire, and the noble council that ruled Egypt from Memphis. Sixty-seven years would be spent vying for power and control. It was not until the son of a noble by the name of Baskakeren was able to politic and conquest his way to the top of the heirarchy of the ruling council of Egypt. When he conquered the capital province controlled by the ruling council, it was the end of the Egyptain Civil War. Baskakeren was left with a broken Empire riddled with destroyed infrastructure, rebellious nobles, and a wrecked economy. Baskakeren spent the rest of his remaining life trying to repair Egypt. Meanwhile, the nations on his borders were growing stronger, due to a period of relative peace, while the Egyptian heartland remained devastated. Not even the Egyptian trade juggernaut could relieve Egypt of its troubles, so Baskakeren had to greatly reduce the amount of pay people were earning, cut the size of the military down, and even had to break into his personal coffers to help drive his Empire. Despite his efforts, his death would still leave a giant burden on his son to fix.

Osorkon II was left with the hefty task of still trying to fix the still-devastated Empire he had inherited. Egyptian trade remained hindered, yet Osorkon II decided to rebuild the roads in Nubia and his remaining southern provinces with his own personal gold for the betterment of the nation. He would see fit through most of his reign trying to rebuild and improve the infrastructure to allow faster trade in the region, which would eventually become a major boon to the Egyptian Empire, though he would never live to see his country recover from the Civil War that plagued the nation.

Eneti & Hittite[]

In the 1500s BCE, Eneti focused almost completely on eastern expansion and building up its core military force. The nearby Hittite Empire was reluctant to invade Eneti a second time, as they needed more time to raise a new army. However, that did not stop rogue hordes of tribal Hittite invaders from entering Enetian lands. The Enetian Border War was a major series of fights from 1560-1559 BCE, when these rogues formally fought with the Enetian troops stationed at the periphery of Enetian lands. After the skirmishes ended, it would be almost another century before the next major war between the two powers.

Second Hittite-Eneti War[]

The end of Eneti was foreshadowed by twenty years of constant conflict rising near their border. The Enetian Emperor, who had been extremely popular with the Enetian people, did not like the fact that the Hittite Emperor was also raising troops. To prepare for eventual conflict, the Hittite Emperor decided to send a warband to the edge of Enetian territory. Eneti, seeing this as a threat, did the same. Before long, a skirmish broke out, and a new war began. The Hittite forces quickly swarmed the heartland of Eneti, and, before long, they took the city of Eneti itself in the Second Sack of Eneti. The Hittites were much more prepared for the sack, and Hittite warriors made sure to kill every Enetian they saw. After four years of fighting, (1442-1438 BCE), the Hittites conquered Eneti. It wouldn't be until the rise of the Neo-Enetians that things would finally change for the better.

Rest of the World[]

While the Egyptians were fighting amongst themselves in a deadly civil war, the surrounding nations bordering them would use this period to build up their kingdoms. One surprising rise to power in the region would be the Hurrians, a group of simple nomadic peoples in the Northern Mesopotamia region. Uniting under a strong central leader, the various tribes would be brought under his rule. The Hurrians would raid and capture various cities and lands from the now collapsed Akkadian Empire, Hittite land, and even Egyptian frontier territories. The Egyptian government, too preoccupied with the civil war and rebuilding, mostly ignored these issues.

Another nation was taking its opportunity to gain some ground while the Egyptians were at entrenched in its civil war. The Assyrians made great progress, after ousting the Ur dynasty in Mesopotamia. Securing great swaths of land from the disunited Sumerian city states, just to the east of OTL northwestern India. A great migration of both Indian and Aryan peoples began, a journey to the west into what would be present day Persia, and would be the direct ancestors to the future Persian Empire.

Among the recent changes within the eastern world, came the changing of power in China, as the Shang Dynasty ousted the Xia Dynasty in the 18th century BCE. The destruction was total, and the Shang Dynasty was finally able to establish their dynasty with the destruction of the final Xia nobles and the establishment of their own lineage in China. The Shang were known as the first Chinese nation to effectively begin using the ocean to trade with other nations. During this time, historians date this timeframe as the rise of the Greek city states and then the subsequent rise of the Greco-Macedonian culture itself.