107 The Rise of Bronze Age Peripheries and the Expansion of Internatonal Trade 1950 – 1100 BC. Kristian Kristiansen Introduction While early Bronze Age centers of Civilization, Mesopotamia and Egypt, were highly productive and therefore could sustain urban populations, they lacked metals needed in the economy for tools, weapons and ornaments, just as they lacked precious metals and highly valued products such as Lapis lazuli, gold, silver and amber. Tin needed for bronze is extremely rare and had to be traded in from distant sources as well. All of this meant that more peripheral regions with access to such materials had to be enrolled into the commercial networks of these early Bronze Age states. Te implications of this center-periphery structure have not been dealt with in a systematic way until more recently (Kristiansen and Larsson 2005; Beaujard 2012), and it is therefore the theme of this contribution. I shall begin by formulating the basic questions. What role did the more distant and peripheral regions of the Bronze Age world economy play for the reproduction of that system, and did these peripheries and margins change their outlook and became more “civilized” in the process? Did they only provide raw materials? How do we explain that they sometimes turned against these very same centers of civilization? To understand this demands that the relationship between the rise of peripheries and their relationship to the dynamics of the centers of civilization be analyzed, as we are dealing with a regional, globalized, division of labor for the frst time in world history. Tis investigation, however, also demands an analysis of the civilizing efect on Bronze Age peripheries in terms of their adaptation of selects traits/technologies and values/lifestyles from the centers. We must also understand that among