Getting Rid of the Interface: East Aegean / Western Anatolia and the Role of Seha River Land and Arzawa/Mira in Late Bronze Age Cultural Interaction

Western Anatolia and the islands of the north-east Aegean were the meeting point of different civilizations and peoples during the LBA. The Hittite sources inform us on the historical and political developments in the region, which, as they report, was subjugated to them. On the coastal sites of the region, we find the material remains of another LBA civilization, the Mycenaeans (Ahhiyawa), who according to the Hittites, challenged their control over western Anatolia control not only by cooperating with the local kingdoms but also by attacking them. This LBA picture led the academic world to treat western Anatolia and the islands of the north-east Aegean as a region in-between, a peripheral cultural and political world to the Hittites and the Mycenaeans. The academic focus on the 'old foes', however, follows to a large degree the nationalistic discourses of the early 20th century and at the same time does not sufficiently acknowledge the capability of the local kingdoms and their inhabitants to actively participate in the cultural interplay of the LBA eastern Mediterranean. This study demonstrates that, rather than passive receivers of foreign materials and customs, the peoples of western Anatolia can better be understood as actors in their own right; with their own particular material cultures, socio-political structures and identity. Rather than merely being the subject of 'foreign' influence, the people of western Anatolia largely plotted their own course through history, building their own societies and states - some of which, as evidenced by contemporary texts (supported by archaeological data) were not only influenced by, but also had a profound impact on other, better known (great) states, such as the kingdom of the Hittites. The region's identity (and the shaping thereof), in short, is far more complex than previously thought, formed by autochthonous developments as much as mobility among the eastern Aegean / western Anatolian communities (micro-regional mobility) and by contacts with more distant regions (macro-regional). The intense and diverse mobility rates of this era contributed to a fluid and everchanging sense of identity in eastern Aegean / western Anatolia during the LBA. In this framework, the locals actively chose which objects and identities to adopt, adjust, portray and reject.