Perspectives on the History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies

The present volume collects eighteen essays exploring the history of ancient Near Eastern studies. Combining diverse approaches—synthetic and analytic, diachronic and transnational—this collection offers critical reflections on the who, why, and how of this cluster of fields. How have political contexts determined the conduct of research? How do academic agendas reflect larger social, economic, and cultural interests? How have schools of thought and intellectual traditions configured, and sometimes predetermined, the study of the ancient Near East? Contributions treating research during the Nazi and fascist periods examine the interpenetration of academic work with politics, while contributions dealing with specific national contexts disclose fresh perspectives on individual scholars as well as the conditions and institutions in which they worked. Particular attention is given to scholarship in countries such as Turkey, Portugal, Iran, China, and Spain, which have hitherto been marginal to historiographic accounts of ancient Near Eastern studies.

In addition to the editors, the contributors are Selim Ferru Adali, Silvia Alaura, Isabel Almeida, Petr Charvát, Parsa Daneshmand, Eva von Dassow, Hakan Erol, Sebastian Fink, Jakob Flygare, Pietro Giammellaro, Carlos Gonçalves, Katrien de Graef, Steven W. Holloway, Ahmed Fatima Kzzo, Changyu Liu, Patrick Maxime Michel, Emanuel Pfoh, Jitka Sýkorová, Luděk Vacín, and Jordi Vidal.

“Perspectives on the History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies is an incredibly elucidating volume on the history of scholarship pertaining to the ancient Near East.”—Jeffrey L. Morrow, Review of Biblical Literature

Agnès Garcia-Ventura is Ramón y Cajal Fellow at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona. She is the coeditor of Studying Gender in the Ancient Near East, also published by Eisenbrauns.

Lorenzo Verderame is Associate Professor of Assyriology at Sapienza University of Rome. He is the author and coeditor of several books, including Receptions of the Ancient Near East in Popular Culture and Beyond.

Introduction: Perspectives on the History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies: An Introduction

Lorenzo VERDERAME / Agnès GARCIA-VENTURA

Part I. The Edge of the Abyss: the Study of Antiquity under the Totalitarism Threat

1. Hittite Studies at the Crossroads: Albrecht Goetze’s and Hans Gustav Güterbock’s Flight from Nazi Germany

Silvia ALAURA

2. Language and Race in Assyriology: from Benno Landsberger to Wolfram von Soden

Sebastian FINK

3. Assyriology in Nazi Germany: the Case of Wolfram von Soden

Jakob FLYGARE

4. Carthage the Deceitful and Perfidius Albion: the Phoenicians and the British in Fascist Italy

Pietro GIAMMELLARO

5. The sharing out of Antiquities in Syria during the Interwar Period: Sir Leonard Woolley’s Excavation at Tell Sheikh Yusuf (Al Mina).

Patrick Maxime MICHEL

6. “Die Assyriologie nicht weiter unberücksichtigt bleiben dürfte…”: On the (Non-)Existence of Assyriology at the German University in Prague (1908–1945)

Ludìk VACÍN / Jitka SÝKOROVÁ

Part II. Intellectual History and Ancient Near Eastern Studies: some Case Studies

7. Notes on the History of the Historiography of Cuneiform Mathematics

Carlos GONÇALVES

8. Feudalism and Vassalage in Twentieth-Century Assyriology

Emanuel PFOH

9. Nation-building in the Plain of Antioch, from Hatti to Hatay

Eva VON DASSOW

Part III. From our Stories to the History of Ancient Near Eastern Studies

10. The Historiography of Assyriology in Turkey: A Short Survey

Selim Ferruh ADALI / Hakan EROL

11. Ancient Near Eastern Studies and Portuguese Academia: a Love-affair under Construction

Isabel ALMEIDA

12. Near Eastern Archaeology and the Czech-speaking Lands

Petr CHARVÁT

13. Tintin in Mesopotamia. The Story of Belgian Assyriology (1890-2017)

Katrien DE GRAEF

14. Assyriology in Iran?

Parsa DANESHMAND

15. Assyriology in China

Changyu LIU

16. Looking for a Tell. The Beginnings of Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology at the University of Barcelona

Jordi VIDAL

Part IV. Current Prospectives, Future Perspectives

17. Big Data, Big Deal: Use of Google Books Ngram Viewer and JSTOR Data for Research for Charting the Rise of Assyriology

Steven W. HOLLOWAY

18. The Future of the Past. How the Past Contributes to the Construction of Syrian National Identity

Ahmed Fatima KZZO

Notes on Contributors

Index of Authors

Download a PDF sample chapter here: Introduction