Research Assistant Lillian Bartlett Stoner details the turbulent chain of events that unfolded after the death of Alexander the Great.

Our civilization is rooted in the forms and innovations of societies that flourished in the distant lands of Western Asia more than six thousand years ago. These earliest societies, established millennia before the Greco-Roman period, extended from Egypt to India. The earliest among them was the region known to the ancients as Mesopotamia, located between the Tigris and the Euphrates Rivers and occupying what is today Iraq, northeastern Syria, and southeastern Turkey. In Mesopotamia arose the first cities, believed by their inhabitants to be the property of the gods, who granted kings the power to bring prosperity to the people. Here urban institutions were invented and evolved. The need to record and manage the distribution and receipt of goods led to the invention of writing, monumental architecture in the form of temples, and palaces were created, and the visual arts flowered in the service of religion and royalty. These extraordinary innovations profoundly affected surrounding areas in Anatolia, Syria-Levant, Iran, and the Gulf, and Mesopotamia was in turn influenced by its neighbors. As Mesopotamia turned to outlying lands for such rare and precious materials as lapis lazuli, carnelian, diorite, gold, silver, and ivory, these regions were linked by networks of trade that encouraged cultural exchange. This volume, which accompanies a major exhibition at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, explores the artistic achievements of the era of the first cities in both the Mesopotamian heartland and across the expanse of western Asia. More than fifty experts in the field have contributed entries on individual works of art and essays on a wide range of subjects. The first book that encompasses a study of the entire region during a single period, this publication break new ground in particular in its examination of trade and interconnections. In texts that will be of interest to both specialists and the general public, the social and historical context of the art of the first cities is explored. Many objects presented display the pure style of Mesopotamia, others from outlying regions adapt from them a corpus of forms and images, and still others embody vital regional styles. Included are reliefs celebrating the accomplishments of kings and the pastimes of the elite; votive statues representing royal and other privileged persons; animal sculptures; and spectacular jewelry, musical instruments, and games found in tombs where kings, queens, and their servants were buried. The volume opens with a focus on the cities of southern Mesopotamia, among them Uruk and Nippur; the cities of the north, Mari and Ebla; and the Akkadian Dynasty. Next follow sections devoted to art and interconnections from the Mediterranean to the Indus, in which Egypt, the Aegean and western Anatolia, the North Caucasus, the Gulf, Iran, and the Indus area are studied. Finally, a section on literature and legacy treats the invention of cuneiform writing and the heritage of Mesopotamian literature and ideas. More than five hundred reproductions of the works in the exhibition as well as comparative materials are included in the lavish illustrations, and landscape photographs offer a sense of place. Maps, a chronology, a bibliography, and an index are provided.

The exhibition "Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.," held in 2008–2009 at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, demonstrated the cultural enrichment that emerged from the intensive interaction of civilizations from western Asia to Egypt and the Aegean in the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. During this critical period in human history, powerful kingdoms and large territorial states were formed. Rising social elites created a demand for copper and tin, as well as for precious gold and silver and exotic materials such as lapis lazuli and ivory to create elite objects fashioned in styles that reflected contacts with foreign lands. This quest for metals—along with the desire for foreign textiles—was the driving force that led to the establishment of merchant colonies and a vast trading network throughout central Anatolia during the early second millennium B.C. Texts from palaces at sites from Hattusa (modern Bogazköy) in Hittite Anatolia to Amarna in Egypt attest to the volume and variety of interactions that took place some centuries later, creating the impetus for the circulation of precious goods, stimulating the exchange of ideas, and inspiring artistic creativity. Perhaps the most dramatic evidence for these far-flung connections emerges out of tragedy—the wreckage of the oldest known seagoing ship, discovered in a treacherous stretch off the southern coast of Turkey near the promontory known as Uluburun. Among its extraordinary cargo of copper, glass, and exotic raw materials and luxury goods is a gilded bronze statuette of a goddess—perhaps the patron deity on board, who failed in her mission to protect the ship. To explore the themes of the exhibition—art, trade, and diplomacy, viewed from an international perspective—a two-day symposium and related scholarly events allowed colleagues to explore many facets of the multicultural societies that developed in the second millennium B.C. Their insights, which dramatically illustrate the incipient phases of our intensely interactive world, are presented largely in symposium order, beginning with broad regional overviews and examination of particular archeological contexts and then drawing attention to specific artists and literary evidence for interconnections. In this introduction, however, their contributions are viewed from a somewhat more synthetic perspective, one that focuses attention on the ways in which ideas in this volume intersect to enrich the ongoing discourse on the themes elucidated in the exhibition.

The ancient Greeks were active seafarers seeking opportunities for trade and founding new independent cities at coastal sites across the Mediterranean Sea.

Contribute to The Met's future by planning for a special gift, such as a bequest in your will or a trust that pays you income.

The artistic expressions of the Wari and Tiwanaku societies dominated the Central Andes for nearly five hundred years (600–1000 CE).

Contribute to The Met's future by planning for a special gift, such as a bequest in your will or a trust that pays you income.

During the Late Bronze Age, Cyprus was also an important center for the manufacture of works of art that show an amalgam of local and foreign influences. Stylistic features and iconographic elements borrowed from Egypt, the Near East, and the Aegean are often mixed together in Cypriot works.