Classical antiquity
Two of the most notable Mediterranean civilizations in classical antiquity were the Greek city-states and the Phoenicians. The Greeks expanded throughout the Black Sea and south through the Red Sea. The Phoenicians spread through the western Mediterranean reaching North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula. From the 6th century BC up to including the 5th century BC, many of the significant Mediterranean peoples were under Persian rule, making them dominate the Mediterranean during these years. Both the Phoenicians and some of the Greek city-states in Asia Minor provided the naval forces of the Achaemenid Persian Empire. Persian dominance ended after the Greco-Persian War in the 5th century BC and Persia was crippled by Macedonia in the 4th century BC. The Odrysian Kingdom existed between the 5th century BC and the 1st century AD as the most important and powerful Thracian state formation.
Persian period
From the 6th century BC up to including the first half of the 4th century BC, many of the significant Mediterranean peoples came under Achaemenid Persian rule, making them dominate the Mediterranean during all these years. The empire, founded by Cyrus the Great, would include Macedonia, Thrace and the western Black sea coast (modern-day southeastern and eastern Bulgaria), Egypt, Anatolia, the Phoenician lands, the Levant, and many other basin regions of the Mediterranean later on. Darius the Great (Darius I) is to be credited as the first Achaemenid king to invest in a Persian fleet. Even by then, no true “imperial navy” had existed either in Greece or Egypt. Persia would become the first empire, under Darius, to inaugurate and deploy the first regular imperial navy. Both the Phoenicians and the Greeks provided the bulk of the naval forces of the Achaemenid Persian Empire, alongside the Cypriots and Egyptians. Full Persian dominance in the Mediterranean ended after the Greco-Persian War in the 5th century BC, and Persia eventually lost all her influence in the Mediterranean in the late 4th century BC following Alexander’s conquests.
Hellenistic period
In the northernmost part of ancient Greece, in the ancient kingdom of Macedonia, technological and organizational skills were forged with a long history of cavalry warfare. The hetairai (Companion cavalry) was considered the strongest of their time. Under Alexander the Great, this force turned east, and in a series of decisive battles, it routed the Persian forces and took over the dominant empire of the Mediterranean. Their Macedonia empire included present-day Greece, Bulgaria, Egypt, the Phoenician lands, and many other basin regions of the Mediterranean and Asia Minor.
The major centers of the Mediterranean at the time became part of Alexander’s empire as a result. His empire quickly disintegrated, and the Middle East, Egypt, and Greece were soon again independent. Alexander’s conquests spread Greek knowledge and ideas throughout the region.
Roman–Carthaginian rivalry
These eastern powers soon began to be overshadowed by that farther west. In North Africa, the former Phoenician colony of Carthage rose to dominate its surroundings with an empire that contained many of the former Phoenician holdings. However, it was a city on the Italian Peninsula, Rome, that would eventually dominate the entire Mediterranean basin. Spreading first through Italy, Rome defeated Carthage in the Punic Wars, despite Hannibal’s famous efforts against Rome in the Second Punic War.
After the Third Punic War, Rome then became the leading force in the Mediterranean region. The Romans soon spread east, taking Greece, and spreading Latin knowledge and ideas throughout the place. By this point, the coastal trading cultures were thoroughly dominant over the inland river valleys that had once been the heart of the great powers. Egyptian power moved from the Nile cities to the coastal zones, especially Alexandria. Mesopotamia became a fringe border region between the Roman Empire and the Persians.
Roman Mare Nostrum
When Augustus founded the Roman Empire, the Mediterranean sea began to be called Mare Nostrum (Latin: “Our Sea”) by the Romans. Their empire was centered on this sea and the area was full of commerce and naval development. For the first time in history, an entire sea (the Mediterranean) was free of piracy. For several centuries, the Mediterranean was a “Roman Lake”, surrounded on all sides by the empire.
The empire began to crumble, however, in the fifth century and Rome collapsed after 476 AD.
Sasanian and Byzantine times
The Eastern Roman or Byzantine empire began its domination of the Levant during its wars with neighboring Sassanid Persia. The rule through the 6th century AD saw climatic instability, causing inconsistent production, distribution, and a general economic decline. The Sasanians gained territory on Mediterranean land regularly, but the Eastern Romans remained superior in the Mediterranean sea for centuries. In the first quarter of the 7th century CE, the Sasanians took swaths of the Mediterranean region from the Eastern Romans during the Byzantine–Sasanian War of 602–628, though the Sasanians lost territories by the end of the war. Ultimately, Byzantine domination in the region was forever finished by invasions of the Arabs and later the Turks.