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A concise, yet thorough study of early Mesopotamia before c.1500 BC. The history of this area of modern-day Syria and Iraq and the people that inhabited it are discussed alongside some wonderful photographs of objects from the British Museum collection. Mesopotamia was a leading centre for literacy and spear-headed innovation and change in the 3rd-2nd millennium BC. Julian Reade discusses the archaeological and textual evidence for early agriculture, the development of social and political complexity, the emergence of the city-states and later empires.
For almost three centuries, until 612 B.C., the small kingdom of Assyria dominated the Middle East, its empire at one point extending from Iran to Egypt. The story of those years--the triumphs of the Assyrian kings in war and peace, their exploits in the hunting field, and the gods who watched over them--were recorded in stone on the walls of a succession of royal palaces. These sculptures, offering eyewitness views of a long-lost civilization, were not rediscovered until the nineteenth century. The finest collection, transported with great difficulty to Europe, is now preserved at the British Museum. This book describes how the sculptures were found and what they meant to those who created them. It is both a richly illustrated history of Assyrian sculpture in general and a guide to the outstanding collections of the British Museum. For this Second Edition of Assyrian Sculpture, in a new format, the author has updated the text and bibliography.
The exhibition "Assyria to Iberia at the Dawn of the Classical Age" (The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, 2014) offered a comprehensive overview of art and cultural exchange in an era of vast imperial and mercantile expansion. The twenty-seven essays in this volume are based on the symposium and lectures that took place in conjunction with the exhibition. Written by an international group of scholars from a wide variety of disciplines, they include reports of new archaeological discoveries, illuminating interpretations of material culture, and innovative investigations of literary, historical, and political aspects of the interactions that shaped art and culture in the in the early first millennium B.C. Taken together, these essays explore the cultural encounters of diverse populations interacting through trade, travel, and migration, as well as war and displacement, in the ancient world. Assyria to Iberia: Art and Culture in the Iron Age contributes significantly to our understanding of the epoch-making exchanges that spanned the Near East and the Mediterranean and exerted immense influence in the centuries that followed.
Zwischen dem 9. und 7. Jahrhundert v. Chr. stellten assyrische Konige zahlreiche Bilder, Reliefs und Stelen an offentlichen Platzen, in Tempeln und an Palastmauern aus. Welche Bedeutung und Funktion hatten diese Bildnisse? Allen Beitragen liegt die These zugrunde, dass sie der assyrischen Propaganda dienten, um die politische Haltung und das Verhalten am koniglichen Hof, in Assyrien sowie im riesigen, kulturell vielfaltigen assyrischen Reich zu beeinflussen und zu steuern.
The Late Assyrian Empire (c. 900 - 612 BCE) was the first state to rule over the major centres of the Middle East, and the Late Assyrian court inhabited some of the most monumental palaces of its time. The Architecture of Late Assyrian Royal Palaces is the first volume to provide an in-depth analysis of Late Assyrian palatial architecture, offering a general introduction to all key royal palaces in the major centres of the empire: Assur, Kaluhu, Dur-Sharruken, and Nineveh. Where previous research has often focused on the duality between public and private realms, this volume redefines the cultural principles governing these palaces and proposes a new historical framework, analysing the spatial organization of the palace community which placed the king front and centre. It brings together the architecture of such palaces as currently understood within the broader framework of textual and art-historical sources, and argues that architectural changes were guided by a need to accommodate ever larger groups as the empire grew in size.
Preliminary Material -- Introduction -- The Tyrian King List: An External Synchronism from Phoenicia -- The Chronological Evidence from Egypt: A. Dating the Invasion of Shishak -- The Chronological Evidence from Egypt: B. Dating 'Tirhakah King of Ethiopia ' -- A Critique of Shea's Recent Defense of the two Campaign Theory -- The Identity of 'So, King of Egypt ' -- The Judahite King List Hypothesis -- A Chronology for the United and Divided Monarchy of Israel -- Bibliography -- Reference Index -- Author Index.
This book investigates the practice of constructing cities in the ancient Near East, bringing together architecture and cultural history.
This collection, presented to Michael Friedrich in honour of his academic career at of the Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, traces key concepts that scholars associated with the Centre have developed and refined for the systematic study of manuscript cultures. At the same time, the contributions showcase the possibilities of expanding the traditional subject of ‘manuscripts’ to the larger perspective of ‘written artefacts’.
The only critical guide to the theory and method of Mesopotamian archaeology, this innovative volume evaluates the theories, methods, approaches and history of Mesopotamian archaeology from its origins in the nineteenth century up to the present day. Ancient Mesopotamia (modern Iraq), was the original site of many of the major developments in human history, such as farming, the rise of urban literate societies and the first great empires of Akkad, Babylonia and Assyria. Dr. Matthews places the discipline within its historical and social context, and explains how archaeologists conduct their research through excavation, survey and other methods. In four fundamental chapters, he uses illustrated case-studies to show how archaeologists have approached central themes such as: * the shift from hunting to farming * complex societies * empires and imperialism * everyday life. This will be both an ideal introductory work and useful as background reading on a wide range of courses.
An insider's look at the iconography and history of Assyrian reliefs and the West's fascination with these ancient monuments