SCIENCE What happened about 3,200 years ago to bring about the collapse of not just one but a number of flourishing civilizations—Egyptian, Hittite, Mycenaean—on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean? Wars, pestilence, and sudden natural disasters have all been postulated as possible causes, but now, thanks to sophisticated pollen-sampling techniques and advances in radiocarbon dating, scientists think they know the primary culprit: drought. (National Geographic … Continue reading Pollen Down: Clues about Civilizations’ Collapse