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Christian communities flourished during late antiquity in a Zoroastrian political system, known as the Iranian Empire, that integrated culturally and geographically disparate territories from Arabia to Afghanistan into its institutions and networks. Whereas previous studies have regarded Christians as marginal, insular, and often persecuted participants in this empire, Richard Payne demonstrates their integration into elite networks, adoption of Iranian political practices and imaginaries, and participation in imperial institutions. The rise of Christianity in Iran depended on the Zoroastrian theory and practice of hierarchical, differentiated inclusion, according to which Christians, Jews, ...
This handbook provides a comprehensive account of the languages spoken in Ethiopia, exploring both their structures and features and their function and use in society. The first part of the volume provides background and general information relating to Ethiopian languages, including their demographic distribution and classification, language policy, scripts and writing, and language endangerment. Subsequent parts are dedicated to the four major language families in Ethiopia - Cushitic, Ethiosemitic, Nilo-Saharan, and Omotic - and contain studies of individual languages, with an initial introductory overview chapter in each part. Both major and less-documented languages are included, ranging from Amharic and Oromo to Zay, Gawwada, and Yemsa. The final part explores languages that are outside of those four families, namely Ethiopian Sign Language, Ethiopian English, and Arabic. With its international team of senior researchers and junior scholars, The Oxford Handbook of Ethiopian Languages will appeal to anyone interested in the languages of the region and in African linguistics more broadly.
A convenient, portable paperback derived from the acclaimed Cambridge Encyclopedia of the World's Ancient Languages.
A "geadl" or hagiography, originally written by Gealawdewos thirty years after the subject's death, in 1672-1673. Translated from multiple manuscripts and versions.
Has appendices.
• Mongolian shamaness Sarangerel provides a hands-on guide for serious students of the shamanic path. • Includes complete directions for traditional Siberian rituals, meditations, and divination techniques never before published. • Shows how to recognize and acknowledge a call from the spirits. • Offers traditional wisdom for nurturing a working relationship with personal spirit helpers to promote healing and balance in a community. The shaman's purpose is to heal and restore balance to his or her community by developing a working relationship with the spirit world. Mongolian shamanic tradition maintains that all true shamans are called by the spirits--but those who are not from sham...
The first full-fledged critical edition and historical study of the Erdeni Tunumal Sudur, the Mongolian history of Altan Khan and his descendants, offering a full-range English-written historical and literary evaluation of this unique and fairly reliable, but long neglected discovery in Mongolian studies. With transcription, word index and English translation, as well as extensive commentary on the historical events of Altan Khan’s reign, especially the 1550 attack on Beijing, the 1571 peace accord with the Ming, and the 1578 meeting with the Dalai Lama and the subsequent Buddhist conversion. In particular, the author shows how Altan Khan’s reformulation of the boundaries of Dayan Khan’s Mongol nation and state catalyzed the political fragmentation of the Mongols with dire consequences in relation to the rising Manchu state. Vital for a better understanding of Mongol history during the late Ming.
The Tungusic Languages is a survey of Tungusic, a language family which is seriously endangered today, but which at the time of its maximum spread was present all over Northeast Asia. This volume offers a systematic succession of separate chapters on all the individual Tungusic languages, as well as a number of additional chapters containing contextual information on the language family as a whole, its background and current state, as well as its history of research and documentation. Manchu and its mediaeval ancestor Jurchen are important historical literary languages discussed in this volume, while the other Tungusic languages, around a dozen altogether, have always been spoken by small, l...
Presenting modern devotional perspectives that are rarely covered in other works, this premium hardcover offers comprehensive profiles of more than one hundred Egyptian gods, goddesses, and other divine beings. This thoroughly researched, full-color tome provides detailed descriptions and illustrations of well-known deities, like Anubis, Horus, Isis, Ra, and Sekhmet. It also features demigods, spiritual beings, and deities of neighboring regions who were also honored by the Egyptians, such as Menhyt (the lioness-headed goddess of Nubia) and Harmachis (the spirit that resides in the Giza Sphinx). Each entry includes a remarkable cache of information, including the deity's name in hieroglyphs, festivals, relatives, personality, domain, and more. Also featuring photographs of important sites and antiquities, this impressive collection is the only resource on Egyptian deities you will ever need.
This study is the first wide-scope morpho-syntactic comparative study of North-Eastern Neo-Aramaic dialects to date. Given the historical depth of Aramaic (almost 3 millennia) and the geographic span of the modern dialects, coming in contact with various Iranian, Turkic and Semitic languages, these dialects provide an almost pristine "laboratory" setting for examining language change from areal, typological and historical perspectives. While the study has a very wide coverage of dialects, including also contact languages (and especially Kurdish dialects), it focuses on a specific grammatical domain, namely attributive constructions, giving a theoretically motivated and empirically grounded account of their variation, distribution and development. The results will be enlightening not only to Semitists seeking to learn about this fascinating modern Semitic language group, but also for typologists and general linguists interested in the dynamics of noun phrase morphosyntax.