In the west, the first Greeks - the Achaeans - entered the country and founded the MycenaeanCivilization?. This was partially derivative from the older MinoanCivilization? on Crete, but soon came to dominate it. Further west, various groups - mostly notably the CelticPeoples? - spread over Europe, almost entirely displacing the original cultures.
Various Iranian groups appeared across the MiddleEast?, including the nomadic Scythians, the Kassites who conquered Babylonia, the Mitanni who pushed the Hurrians into northern Mesopotamia, and the IndoAryans? who destroyed the civilization of Harappa. The HittiteKingdom? was established in Anatolia (modern Tukey), and the semitic Hyskos adopted the new technology and overran Egypt, though they were ejected soon after.
Around this time, too, the first civilization in China - the ShangDynasty? - appears. This probably was influenced by yet another group of IE migrants, the Tocharians, but not enough work has been done to confirm this hypothesis.
Around 1200 BC most of the bronze age kingdoms collapsed and urban centers all across the eastern meditteranean were sacked by raiders, all within a few decades. The following few centuries were dark ages for Greece and the Near East. By the time civilization had recovered, iron tools had become common, and a new era had begun.
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