Assyrians transported elements of the Late Bronze Age culture of the Near East to Iron Age Greece and Italy, but also further afield to Northwestern Africa and to Iberia, initiating the beginning of Mediterranean history now known as Classical Antiquity. They notably spread alphabetic writing, which would become the hallmark of the Mediterranean civilizations of the Iron Age, in contrast to the cuneiform writing of Assyria and the logographic system in the Far East (and later the abugida systems of India). The Iron Age made large stands of timber essential to a nation's success because smelting iron required so much fuel, and the pinnacles of human civilizations gradually moved as forests were destroyed. In Europe the Mediterranean region was supplanted by the German and Frankish lands. In the Middle East the main power center became Anatolia with the once dominant Mesopotamia its vassal. In China, the economical, agricultural, and industrial center moved from the northern Yellow River to the southern Yangtze, though the political center remained in the north. In part this is linked to technological developments, such as the mouldboard plough, that made life in once undeveloped areas more bearable. The civilizations in China, India, and the Mediterranean, connected by the silk road, became principal civilizations in Eurasia in early CE times. Later development of Eurasian history is told in other articles. See also Bibliography of the history of Central Asia History of Asia History of Europe History of the Middle East History of South Asia History of East Asia History of Southeast Asia History of Central Asia History of the World Indo-European studies Indo-Aryan migration hypothesis Steppe Route Turkic migration References Beckwith, Christopher I. (2009): Empires of the Silk Road: A History of Central Eurasia from the Bronze Age to the Present. Princeton: Princeton University Press. . Schafer, Edward H. The Golden Peaches of Samarkand. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985 (1963). . External links Eurasia Eurasia