1'''.e collapse ofcomplex societies
52
moisture between 1250 and 1 350 A.D. led to the spread of grasslands , and increased local availability of bison. Childe ( 1 942) and Needham ( 1965) followed a variant explanation. Childc sug gested that with the introduction of iron, cheaper and easier to acquire than bronze, peasants Hnd barbarians could obtain weapons that alIo'wed them to challenge the armies of civilized states. The Mycenaean and Hittite collapses accordingly followed (ChiMe 1942 : 177-8 , 191-3). Needham (1 965 : 93) suggests that in China, the spread of iron in the middle Chou period led to the disintegration of Chou feudalism and the rise of independent stales (although he is less dear than Childc about specific causal mechanisms) . Assessment To an integration theorist, Harner's ( 1 970) stress¡¡aUeviation argument has some appeal, but much less to a confliel theorist. In any event it is mainl.y restricted to simpler societies. It has no power to explain the fall of Rome, much less many other cases . Catastrophes Single-event catastrophes , such things as hurricanes , volcanic eruptions, earthquakes, Of
major disease epidemics, are enduring favorites for explaining collapse (e. g . , Easton 1965a: 82-3) . There is something so appealing in simple solutions to complex processes that it is not likely such ideas will ever go out of fashion. (It is interesting to nole that students of paleontology are as attracted to simple catastrophe theories to explain the disappearance of the dinosaurs; or other life forms, as social scientists are for understanding collapse [e .g. , Gould 1983: 320-4J .) There is no clear-cut dividing point between catastrophe and resource depletion arguments, only a subde dit1erence in emphasis. Catastrophe scenarios are old. Plato's Critias and Timaeus characterize the demise of the mythical Atlantis in sllch terms. The Biblical flood, and similar stories, fall into this theme. Mesoamerica Earthquakes , hurricanes, and disease epidemics figure occasionally in studies of the Mayan collapse (summarized in R . E. W . Adams [ 1973a1 and Sabloff [1973a)). Sph.den (1 928), for example, suspected that the sudden appearance of yellow fever was involved. Mackie ( 1 96 1 ) argued that signs of strucmral collapse at Benque Viejo indicate an earthquake , followed by socia! upheaval. More recently, Brewbaker (1979) has indicted maize mosaic virus, which he brings to the Maya Lowlands from the eastern Caribbean by hurricane, subsequently causing repeated crop failures. He cites by comparison the 1 845 potato blight in Ireland, which led to the death or emigration of half the island's 4,000,000 inhabitants. Earthquakes and plagues have also been implicated in the collapse of Teotihuacan (discussed in Katz [1972 : 7 7]).