Tag Archives: Ancient Near East

Conference program: “The Strange and the Familiar: Identity and Empire in the Ancient Near East” (Aug 23–24)

The international conference “The Strange and the Familiar: Identity and Empire in the Ancient Near East” will take place at the University of Helsinki on August 23–24, 2019. The location of the conference is Porthania P673, Yliopistonkatu 3. The conference is generously hosted by the Centre of Excellence in Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions (CSTT), the Centre of Excellence in Ancient Near Eastern Empires (ANEE), and the Finnish Institute in the Middle East (FIME).

Friday, August 23

9:10 – 9:30 – Gina Konstantopoulos; University of Helsinki
Defining Others, Defining Ourselves: Constructing Identity in Empire

Center and Periphery in the Late Bronze Age:

9:30 – 10:15: Müge Durusu-Tanrıöver, Bilkent University
The Identities of an Empire: The Case of the Hittite Empire and its Borderlands

10:15 – 11:00: Phillip Strosahl, University of Pavia
Identity and Place: The Use of Ālu and Mātu to Define People in Syria Under the Hittite Empire

11:00 – 11:15: Coffee Break

11:15 – 12:00: Jacob Lauinger, Johns Hopkins University
Imperial and Local: Audience, Identity, and the Idrimi Inscription

12:00 – 12:45: František Válek, Charles University
Foreigners and Religion at Ugarit

12:45 – 2:00: Lunch Break

Assyria and Babylonia
Moderator: Caroline Wallis, University of Helsinki

2:00 – 2:45: Jonathan Valk; Universiteit Leiden
An Empire State of Mind: Domesticating the Other in the Assyrian Empire

2:45 – 3:30: Johannes Bach; University of Helsinki
On the Use of Similes in MA Royal Texts

3:30 – 4:00: Coffee Break

4:00 – 4:45: Ben Dewar, University of Birmingham
The Burning of Captives in the Assyrian Royal Inscriptions and Early Neo-Assyrian Conceptions of the Other

4:45 – 5:30: Eva Miller, University College London
Drawing Distinctions: Assyrians, Enemies, and Others in Neo-Assyrian Art

7:00: Dinner for Conference Participants

 

Saturday, August 24:

Assyria and Babylonia
Moderator: Johannes Bach; University of Helsinki

9:00 – 9:45: Güzin Eren, Boston University
Imperial Identity by Architecture: The Fortifications of Sardis in the Late 7th and 6th centuries BCE

9:45 – 10:30: Marta Lorenzon and Melanie Wasmuth, University of Helsinki
Where is the Border? Shifts in the South-Western Fringe Zone of the ANE Empires in the 1stMillennium BCE

10:30 – 10:45: Coffee

10:45 – 11:30: John P. Nielsen, Bradley University
Assyrian Engagement with Chaldea and the Emergence of Chaldean Power in Babylonia

11:30 – 12:15: Michael Kozuh, Auburn University
The Roving Other: Shepherds, Ungovernable Spaces, and Imperial Authority

12:15 – 1:30: Lunch

Successors of Mesopotamia: Later Empires and Biblical Traditions
Moderator: Jason Silverman, University of Helsinki

1:30 – 2:15: Silvia Balatti, Kiel University
Being Yauna: the Limits of Imperial Integration at the Western Margins of the Achaemenid Empire

2:15 – 3:00: Jennifer Finn, Marquette University
Making a Third Space in Susa: Achaemenid Displays of the Periphery in the Center

3:00 – 3:30: Coffee

3:30 – 4:15: Ehud Ben Zvi, University of Alberta
The Art of Bracketing Empire Out and Creating Parallel Worlds: The Case of late Persian Yehud

4:15 – 5:00: Hanna Tervanotko; McMaster University
“You Must Now Learn to Imitate the Abhorrent Practices of those Nations:” Ancient Jewish Texts and Polemics against Divination

5:00 – 5:45: Martti Nissinen and Saana Svärd; University of Helsinki
Response and Final Discussion

For further information and questions, please contact Gina Konstantopoulos: gina.konstantopoulos@helsinki.fi

 

Cover photo by Osama Shukir Muhammed Amin FRCP(Glasg), CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.m.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Assyrian_king_Shalmaneser_III_receives_tribute_from_Sua,_king_of_Gilzanu,_The_Black_Obelisk..JPG

Call for papers – The Strange and the Familiar: Identity and Empire in the Ancient Near East (Helsinki)

The call for papers for the conference “The Strange and the Familiar: Identity and Empire in the Ancient Near East”, University of Helsinki, August 22-29 (2019) is now open!

This conference analyzes the interaction of identity and empire in the ancient Near East during the second and first millennia BCE. Identity is often created through contrast with the foreign or unfamiliar, and this conference considers how the frontier and the lands and peoples beyond it could be used as that marker of “otherness” necessary for identity construction. Empires could, and did, alter the identity of the areas and peoples under their imperial dominion, but they did not emerge from such new encounters completely unchanged. Instead, interaction with the other can similarly alter the identity of the imperialists.

It centers on such questions as:

  • How do empires construct their own internal and external identity?
  • How are the borders of empire constructed and defined? How may a border be considered not only geographically, but also culturally, legally, and politically?
  • How is the foreign ‘othered’ within the space of empire? How are the inhabitants of conquered territories assimilated by empire? Alternatively, how do they maintain their own unique identity
    under empire?
  • What mechanics of power are employed by the empire to control its more peripheral regions? How is this control represented across textual genres?
  • How can we trace the impact of empire in the areas under imperial control? What can other avenues of evidence, such as archaeological and material finds, tell us about the influence of empire on identity?

The conference invites papers that consider such questions, as well as the more general topic of identity and empire, in the context of the areas that lie within the broad heading of the ancient Near East. This includes papers that examine empire in the context of Assyria and Babylonia; the interactions between Mesopotamia and Egypt; connections between Mesopotamia, the Levant, and Eastern Mediterranean; and the impact of empire on the historical context of the Hebrew Bible. Papers may evaluate the conference topic from the perspective of textual, archaeological, or art historical methods, and papers combining such approaches, or integrating anthropological or sociological methodologies, are particularly welcome.

Funding has been secured to cover the cost of housing for conference speakers, with further funds dedicated to defray, if not entirely cover, the cost of travel to Finland. The organizers welcome proposals from scholars outside of Europe, but regret that the available funding may not be able to fully cover the cost of transatlantic or similarly long-distance flights. This conference is hosted by the University of Helsinki Center of Excellence: Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions; the Center of Excellence: Ancient Near Eastern Empires, and the Finnish Institute for the Middle East.

Paper proposals of up to 350 words should be sent to Gina Konstantopoulos (gina.konstantopoulos@helsinki.fi) by March 15 2019. Any questions may also be sent to Gina Konstantopoulos.

Summer Symposium on the Construction of Identity in the Ancient Near East (Helsinki, 24-25 Aug)

Host: Project “Construction of gender in Mesopotamia from 934 to 330 BCE”, University of Helsinki
Organizers: Saana Svärd (Phd) & Joanna Töyräänvuori (Thd)
Venue: University Main Building (Fabianinkatu 33), Room 5 (”Sali 5” in Finnish)

Thursday August 24th 2017

9.00-10.30: panel 1
9.00-9.15: Töyräänvuori & Svärd: Welcome and introduction
9.15-10.00: Keynote: Brigitte Lion, “Questions of Identity in Nuzi: Another Look at Tulpun-naya’s Archive”
10.00-10.30: Laura Cousin, “Onomastics and Personality Traits in Babylonian Sources” Continue reading Summer Symposium on the Construction of Identity in the Ancient Near East (Helsinki, 24-25 Aug)

New book “Insights into Editing in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East” (Peeters, 2017)

Reinhard Müller and Juha Pakkala, eds (2017) Insights into Editing in the Hebrew Bible and the Ancient Near East. What Does the Documented Evidence Tell Us about the Transmission of Authoritative Texts? Contributions to Biblical Exegesis & Theology 84. Leuven: Peeters.

Documented evidence has shown that the Hebrew Bible was edited by successive scribes for centuries, and the impact of editing on the resulting text has proven to be crucial. A better understanding of any issue in the Hebrew Bible and ancient Israel requires a deep understanding of the editorial processes. As a consequence, the editorial processes of the Hebrew Bible have come to the fore in the most recent scholarly debates.

Nevertheless, editorial processes in the Hebrew Bible are still poorly understood and a methodological overview is lacking. It is apparent that collaboration between scholars of different fields is needed, and a methodological discussion that takes into account all the editorial techniques witnessed by documented evidence in the Hebrew scriptures and the rest of the ancient Near East is required. This book is a step in this direction. Contributions in this volume by leading scholars approach the issue from various perspectives, including methodology, textual criticism, redaction criticism, Dead Sea Scrolls, Assyriology, and Egyptology.

For more information and to order the book, please visit Peeters Publishers.

Video lectures of 2nd Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East

The video lectures of the 2nd workshop on Gender, Methodology, and the Ancient Near East, which was held in Barcelona in February 2017 (full program here and a report here), are now online.

The Youtube playlist has the following presentations:

  • Welcome to the Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East – Adelina Millet Albà (IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona)
  • Presentation and introduction to the Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East Agnès Garcia-Ventura (IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona) & Saana Svärd (University of Helsinki)
  • “Dressing the Whore of Babylon for the 21st Century: Sex, Gender and Theory in Mesopotamian Studies” – Ann Guinan (Babylonian Section, University of Pennsylvania, Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology)
  • “Queering šà-zi.ga Therapy. Considerations on the Relations between Masculinity, Sickness and Anatomy” – Gioele Zisa (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München)
  • “Domesticating the Female Body: Ancient Mesopotamian Discourses on Fertility and (Re)production” – M. Erica Couto-Ferreira (Universität Heidelberg)
  • “Nefertiti and the ‘Docile Agent'” – Jacquelyn Williamson (George Mason University)

Report on the “Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East”

By Saana Svärd and Agnès Garcia-Ventura

The “Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East” took place in Barcelona February 1-3, 2017. The workshop was hosted by IPOA, the Institute of Ancient Near Eastern Studies of the University of Barcelona (Spain), and organized in cooperation with the Centre of Excellence in “Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions” (University of Helsinki, Finland). Organizers were Agnès Garcia-Ventura (IPOA, University of Barcelona) and Saana Svärd (University of Helsinki). The workshop was a continuation of the “First Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East.” The first workshop was organized by the same two scholars at the University of Helsinki in October 2014 and hosted by the Centre of Excellence in “Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions.”

The aim of both meetings was to discuss different methodological and theoretical approaches to gender within the framework of ancient Near Eastern studies (including archaeology, art history and text studies) and to enable fruitful dialogue between these approaches. Moreover, for this second workshop, colleagues from neighboring disciplines were also encouraged to submit proposals, in order to enrich these conversations further. As a result, the second workshop included colleagues from the disciplines of Assyriology, Archaeology, Egyptology, Phoenician and Punic studies, and Biblical studies (see the full program).

The conference lasted three days and featured 33 communications, a poster session where six posters were presented, and a projects panel where nine new and ongoing projects where discussed. The event was well attended and all in all included roughly 90 participants, including speakers and poster presenters. The speakers and poster presenters came from various universities in twelve countries, namely Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Holland, Italy, Japan, Malta, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States of America.

The results of such a rich and diverse conference cannot be summed up in a short blog post. Suffice it to say here that the sheer chronological, geographical and methodological scope, as well as the general high quality of papers, promises good things for the future of gender studies within the context of ancient Near Eastern studies.

The organizers: Agnès Garcia-Ventura and Saana Svärd

Since both workshops have been well received and the number of participants has increased, the organizers decided to plan a third workshop in the series, hoping the initiative will have continuity as a biannual conference. Thus, the third edition of the meeting, co-organized in cooperation with Professor Katrien De Graef, will be hosted by the University of Ghent (Belgium) in 2019. More information will be published in due time. Please feel free to contact us if you have any questions and/or if you want us to keep you posted on other future ventures related to gender studies and ancient Near Eastern studies we may launch. You may contact us at: agnes.ventura[AT]gmail.com or saana.svard[AT]helsinki.fi.

Programme for 2nd Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East

We have the pleasure to invite participants to the  “Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology, and the Ancient Near East.” The workshop will be held in Barcelona, February 1-3, 2017 and hosted by the IPOA (University of Barcelona) and organized in cooperation with The Centre of Excellence in ‘Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions’ (University of Helsinki). The aim of the meeting is to discuss different methodological and theoretical approaches to gender within the framework of ancient Near Eastern studies (including archaeology, art history and text studies) and to enable fruitful dialogues between these approaches and between different fields.

The provisional program of the meeting can be seen below. It is free for participation, but registration is needed. If you are planning to join us, please send an email to one or both of us: Dr. Saana Svärd and Dr. Agnès Garcia-Ventura
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Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East
Universitat de Barcelona, February 1-3, 2017
Hosts: IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona / Centre of Excellence “Sacred Texts in Change” in the University of Helsinki
Organizers: Agnès Garcia-Ventura (“Sapienza”, Università degli Studi di Roma / IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona)  / Saana Svärd (University of Helsinki)

Wednesday February 1st 2017
9.00-9.45: welcome and introduction
9.00-9.15: Welcome: Adelina Millet Albà, director of the IPOA
9.15-9.45: Presentation and introduction to the workshop: Agnès Garcia-Ventura & Saana Svärd, “Studying Gender in the Ancient Near East: An Introduction”

9.45-11.15: panel 1 (Chair: Adelina Millet Albà)
9.45-10.15: Ann Guinan, “Dressing the Whore of Babylon for the 21st Century: Sex, Gender and Theory in Mesopotamian Studies”
10.15-10.45: Gioele Zisa, “Queering šà-zi.ga Therapy. Considerations on the Relations between Masculinity, Sickness and Anatomy”
10.45-11.15: M. Erica Couto-Ferreira: “Domesticating the Female Body: Ancient Mesopotamian Discourses on Fertility and (Re)production”

11.15-11.45: coffee break

11.45-13.45: panel 2 (Chair: Katrien De Graef)
11.45-12.15: Helga Vogel: “Is ‘Harem’ a Useful Category for Describing and Analysing the Living Conditions of ancient Near Eastern Women?”
12.15-12.45: Leire Olabarria: “Kinship and Gender in Dialogue: Approaching Relatedness in ancient Egypt”
12.45-13.15: Jacquelyn Williamson: “Nefertiti and the ‘Docile Agent’”
13.15-13.45: Thais Rocha da Silva: “Gender Studies and Daily Life in ancient Egypt: Theoretical Problems and new Perspectives”

13.45-15.00: lunch break (catered lunch for speakers and poster presenters)

15.00-16.30: panel 3: poster session (Chair: Agnès Garcia-Ventura)
15.00-15.30: presentation of posters (plenary, room 0.1)
15.30-16.30: discussion of posters (individually, with each presenter, room 0.3; the poster room will be also open during breaks on Thursday and Friday).

Confirmed poster presenters (by alphabetical order): Mina Dabbagh, Sara González, HESTIA research group (Ana Delgado, Meritxell Ferrer and Mireia López-Bertran), Elena Martínez Rodríguez, Michèle Meijer, Omar N’Shea, TÀCITA MUTA research group (Cristina Yúfera, Georgina Rabassó and David Muñoz).

16.30-17.00: fruit break (room 0.3)

17.00-19.00: panel 4 (Chair: Jacquelyn Williamson)
17.00-17.30: Katrien De Graef: “A Room of Her Own? On the Origin, Meaning, and Functioning of the Gagûm in Old Babylonian Sippar”
17.30-18.00: Josué J. Justel: “Remarkable Women from Tikunani: The Role of Women in Palatial Administration”
18.00-18.30: Anne-Isabelle Langlois: “The Princess Iltani’s Archives uncovered at Tell al-Rimah (18th century BC)”
18.30-19.00: Laura Cousin / Yoko Watai: “Onomastics of Women in the Neo-Babylonian Period: An Approach from Gender Studies”

Thursday February 2nd 2017
9.30-11.30: panel 5 (Chair: Ann Guinan)
9.30-10.00: Sophus Helle: “The Dynamics of a Three-sex Model”
10.00-10.30: Ilan Peled: “Identifying Gender Ambiguity in Texts and Artifacts”
10.30-11.00: Megan Cifarelli: “Problematizing Masculinity and Militarization at Hasanlu, Iran”
11.00-11.30: Laura B. Mazow: “Of War and Weaving: ‘Swords’ and the Complexities of Archaeological Reconstructions of Gender”

11.30-12.00: coffee break

12.00-14.00: panel 6 (Chair: Josué J. Justel)
12.00-12.30: Jana Matuszak: “Assessing Misogyny in Sumerian Advice Literature, Dialogues, and Diatribes”
12.30-13.00: Frauke Weiershäuser: “Narrating about women, narrating about men”
13.00-13.30: Vanessa Juloux: “Philosophy of action and pragmatic approach: a concrete example with ʿAnatu of Ugarit”

13.30-13.45: group photo

13.45-15.30: lunch break

15.30-17.00: panel 7 (Chair: Frances Pinnock)
15.30-16.00: Stephanie Lynn Budin, “Potent Images: The Nude Female Icon as Locus of Power”
16.00-16.30: Elisa Roßberger: “The gendered body as symbolic artefact. Changes in terracotta production in early second millennium Mesopotamia”
16.30-17.00: Erin Darby: “Sex Symbols: Ritual Production and Performativity in Female Near Eastern Terracottas”

17.00-17.30: fruit break (room 0.3)

17.30-19.00: panel 8 – projects panel (Chair: Saana Svärd)
In this panel some current ongoing (or just launched projects) will be presented. In addition, participants will be encouraged to discuss networking possibilities and development of future projects to promote the study of gender in the ancient Near East. The following projects (provisional list) will be presented:
Beth Alpert Nakhai: “Field Safety: Middle East, North Africa, and the Mediterranean Basin”
Katrien De Graef: “GAND = Gender and Assyriology: New Developments”
Anne Katrine de Hemmer Gudme: “Food and Identity in Biblical Literature”
Amy Gansell: “Introducing a Queen to the Virtual Reality Simulation of Nimrud’s Northwest Palace”
Josué J. Justel & Agnès Garcia-Ventura: “Editing a handbook on women in the ancient Near East in Spanish”
Ilan Peled: “LaOCOST – Law and Order: Cuneiform Online Sustainable Tool”
Stephanie Budin“Women in Antiquity. Real Women across the Ancient World”

20.00 Conference dinner (for speakers and poster presenters, by invitation)

Friday February 3rd 2017
9.30-11.30: panel 9 (Chair: Beth Alpert Nakhai)
9.30-10.00: Anne Katrine de Hemmer Gudme: “Death at the Hand of a Woman: Hospitality and Gender in the Hebrew Bible”
10.00-10.30: Sandra Jacobs: “’The Disposable Wife’ and Her Status in the Hebrew Bible”
10.30-11.00: Federico Dal Bo: “Women are like cattle”. Some Remarks on early Jewish Juridical Vocabulary on Women and Nature
11.00-11.30: Adelina Millet Albà: “Real characters or literary characters? The Matriarchs in the Bible”

11.30-12.00: coffee break

12.00-14.00: panel 10 (Chair: Saana Svärd)
12.00-12.30: Natalie N. May: “Female Scholarship in Mesopotamia?”
12.30-13.00: Sanae Ito: “Female and Male Scribes related to the Queen’s Household in the Assyrian Empire”
13.00-13.30: Frances Pinnock: “Amorite ladies at the Neo-Assyrian Court: building up an image, deconstructing an image, transmitting an image”
13.30-14.00: Amy Gansell: “Introducing a Queen to the Virtual Reality Simulation of Nimrud’s Northwest Palace”

14.00-15.30: lunch break

15.30-16.30: panel 11 (Chair: Stephanie Lynn Budin)
15.30-16.00: Anne-Caroline Rendu Loisel: “Gender, Sense and Sensitivity in Ancient Mesopotamian Rituals”
16.00-16.30: Mónica Palmero Fernández: “Inanna/Ishtar: religion, gender and power in the 3rd millennium B.C., or how to weave interdisciplinarity into the socio-political and socioeconomic analysis of belief”

16.30-17.00: fruit break (room 0.3)

17.00-18.30: panel 12 (Chair: Megan Cifarelli)
17.00-17.30: Beth Alpert Nakhai: “The Women of Jerusalem: Capital City Life in Israel’s Iron Age”
17.30-18.00: Helen Dixon: “Locating Phoenician Women: Space, Gender, and Social Roles in the Iron Age Central Levant”
18.00-18.30: Mireia López-Bertran: “Shrines for women?: Phoenician-Punic sanctuaries as feminine arenas”

18.30-19.00: concluding remarks and farewell

Call for papers: “Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East” (Barcelona, 1-3 Feb 2017)

Group photo of participants in the first meeting in Helsinki, 2014.
Group photo of participants in the first meeting in Helsinki, 2014.

Organisers: Agnès Garcia-Ventura (“Sapienza”, Università degli Studi di Roma / IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona) & Saana Svärd (University of Helsinki)

When and where: IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona (Spain), February 1-3 2017

Hosts: IPOA, Universitat de Barcelona / Centre of Excellence in Changes in Sacred Texts and Traditions, University of Helsinki Continue reading Call for papers: “Second Workshop on Gender, Methodology and the Ancient Near East” (Barcelona, 1-3 Feb 2017)

New Book “Being a Man: Negotiating Ancient Constructs of Masculinity” (Routledge, 2016)

Being a Man: Negotiating Ancient Constructs of Masculinity (London: Routledge, 2016) is the first-ever collection of essays on masculinity in the ancient Near Eastern textual and iconographical sources. It is a formative work which reveals the myriad and complex negotiations for constructionsBeing a Man_cover 1 of masculine identities in the greater ancient Near East and beyond. Through a juxtaposition of studies into Neo-Assyrian artistic representations and omens, biblical hymns and narrative, Hittite, Akkadian, and Indian epic, as well as detailed linguistic studies on gender and sex in the Sumerian and Hebrew languages, the book challenges traditional understandings and assumed homogeneity for what it meant “to be a man” in antiquity. Being a Man is an indispensable resource for students of the ancient Near East, and a fascinating study for anyone with an interest in gender and sexuality throughout history. Continue reading New Book “Being a Man: Negotiating Ancient Constructs of Masculinity” (Routledge, 2016)

Faces From The Past: Ancient Near Eastern Figurines

On September 17-18 2015, a colloquium on Ancient Near Eastern Figurines took place in the old city of Tallinn (see programme). It was focused on the figurines of Iron Age Palestine and Transjordan, aiming to bring together scholars who study clay figurines from different periods and parts of the southern Levant. Continue reading Faces From The Past: Ancient Near Eastern Figurines