The Dawn of the Bronze Age: The Pattern of Settlement in the Lower Jordan Valley and the Desert Fringes of Samaria during the Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age I. By Shay Bar. Culture and History of the Ancient Near East, vol. 72. Leiden: Brill Pp. vi + 607, 178 illus. $250.

Two recent studies by A. R. Giumlia-Mair and P. T. Craddock have been devoted to a form of bronze having a blackish tint.1, 2 The authors there describe examples ancient and modern, from as far apart as Mycenean Greece, Egypt, Rome, China and Japan. In Japan such bronze is prominently represented in decorative art and known as Shakudo.

This article argues that the purpose of ravaging in Greek warfare was not to goad the enemy into fighting or to cause systematic economic harm but to facilitate plundering. The cereal harvest was commonly chosen as a time for invasion, because it maximized the amount of plunder an invading force could expect to find in the enemy countryside. While ravagers were unlikely to cause permanent economic harm to a community as a whole, they could imperil the livelihoods of individual farmers, (...) both directly through theft and destruction and indirectly by preventing farmers from processing the harvest in a timely fashion. This explains the consistent fear of plundering and ravaging present in our sources. (shrink)

The Calm before the Storm: Selected Writings of Itamar Singer on the End of the Late Bronze Age in Anatolia and the Levant. By Itamar Singer. Writings from the Ancient World Supplements, vol. 1. Atlanta: Society of Biblical Literature, 2011. Pp. vii + 766, illus. $69.95. Pax Hethitica: Studies on the Hittites and Their Neighbours in Honour of Itamar Singer. Studien zu den Boğazköy-Texten, vol. 51. Edited by Yoram Cohen, Amir Golan, and Jared L. Miller. Wies baden: Harrasowitz Verlag, (...) 2010. Pp. xiv + 439, illus., portrait. (shrink)

In this paper, we view creativity through the lens of innovation, a concept familiar to archaeologists across a range of contexts and theoretical perspectives. Most attempts to understand ancient innovation thus far, we argue, have been limited by their lack of capacity to cope with the multiple scales of innovation: Those that track widespread changes, like the beginnings of metallurgy, fail to account for the changes experiences by individual craftspeople; those that do justice to the details of the micro-scale, (...) with ‘thick’ description, cannot well explain the regional adoption of new practices. Here we develop an intermediary position, at the meso-scale, which we hope can serve to integrate these different scales. It is based on the notions that all innovation entails learning (and hence cognitive transformations) and that learning is very often supported at this meso-scale, through ‘communities of practice’. Drawing on the ethno-archaeological literature in particular, we emphasise how learning is a process of embodied cognition. Our archaeological case study is then drawn from the Bronze Age east Mediterranean, where a striking innovation in pottery making — the use of rotative kinetic energy via the potter’s wheel — sees a very uneven uptake from region to region over the course of many centuries. We propose certain differences in community organization from one region to another that might account for such variation in the adoption of an innovation, with the island of Crete in particular seeing a much more stable trajectory of adoption than many of its neighbouring areas. (shrink)

How do ancient (or contemporary) portraits display power? Why is that man (or less often woman) a ruler, and how can viewers (or readers), alone or in a crowd, tell that he represents something more than himself? He stands for something, literally in the case of ancient bronze or marble portrait statuary, signifier of a powerful office, and its individual holder, a basileus (‘king’) or an emperor. His power over me and mine is expressed in physical or literary (...) form by the creation and circulation of his image(s), by their intrinsic attributes, materials or context. Images become powerful not just by their creation, but through contemporary social and political rules (or norms) of representation and by their reception. Mass media rely on specific associations in my (or our) culture, state and/or religion to convey not only a ruler's individual appearance and character, but also his office and its ideals, symbols and authority over me and us. (shrink)

ABSTRACTFree versus unfree was a fundamental axis of differentiation in ancient Near Eastern societies. Liberty was conceptualized as the power to govern oneself, free from another's domination, thus free to participate in constituting political authority. More concretely, the subject of the state was by definition free, this being the condition of obliging him for duty. Thus the relation between people and polity was predicated on liberty, not servitude as commonly supposed of an area still shackled to the Western ideology (...) of Oriental despotism. I argue that liberty was an operative principle in the organization of ancient Near Eastern polities, basing the case on sources from the Late Bronze Age. The first section sets forth general propositions, and the second puts them in ancient Near Eastern terms. The third and fourth sections examine documents from Ugarit and Emar, two polities under Hittite suzerainty, that illustrate how these principles operated in the lives of individuals. The fifth section examines how they were articulated at the scale of communities, through the lens of the poet who composed the Hurro-Hittite ‘Song of Liberation'. The conclusion draws together the ideas of liberty, bondage and liberation these sources disclose, ideas that remained productive in later ages. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Prostitutes and Courtesans in the Ancient WorldMadeleine M. HenryChristopher A. Faraone and Laura K. McClure, eds. Prostitutes and Courtesans in the Ancient World. Wisconsin Studies in Classics. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2006. x + 360 pp. Cloth, $65; paper, 24.95.This collection stems from a conference at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in April 2002. McClure's introduction situates the essays historically from nineteenth-century assemblages of textual (...) references to sexual practice to the present, when attention to prostitution has grown out of interest in women's history, the history of sexuality, and cultural studies. She notes important modern approaches and the vexed question of terminology and its relationship to behavior. As McClure states, "while prostitutes in the ancient world may have been socially marginal, they were symbolically and even socially central" (6). Most of the essays, organized into three categories, concentrate on written evidence; some may wish that illustrations had been included.Section A: "Prostitution and the Sacred"In "Marriage, Divorce, and the Prostitute in Ancient Mesopotamia," Martha Roth concentrates on the impact, especially on marriage, of unmarried women (harı\mtu in Babylono-Assyrian, kar.kid in Sumerian) who had sexual relations with men. She concludes that the documents assign responsibility to the unmarried woman who has sexual relations with a man and that the law codes attempted to prevent or minimize the economic repercussions of such unions on inheritance. Roth finds no evidence of "ritualized or institutionalized sexual intercourse" (23) in Old Babylonian evidence (nineteenth to seventeenth centuries B.C.E.).In "Prostitution in the Social World and Religious Rhetoric of Ancient Israel," Phyllis Bird mainly provides interpretations of references in the Hebrew Bible to prostitution (e.g., the quest for "oriental sacred prostitution") and surveys elite, male religious biases. The prostitute "type" of the Hebrew Bible resembles that of surrounding cultures (41). Bird disentangles the considerable metaphorical uses of prostitutional language from other more literal references in order to concentrate on the differences between one called a prostitute proper (zonah, one who engages in extramarital sexual relations) versus one called qedes=ah ("consecrated woman"). The verb zanah referred to all extramarital sexual relations except adultery, and Bird dissects the problems involved when no one English word can be used to cover the range of meanings that the Hebrew root ZNH carries: raped women are defined by the same word, as are women who lure men [End Page 419] into adultery. In each instance, "an unmarried woman is involved in a sexual act" (45). The city can be personified as a prostitute or bride, and prostitutes symbolize dishonor in narrative texts. ZNH and its derivatives describe illicit political activity and describe Israel herself as a fornicating woman. Bird finds no evidence that prostitution was illegal in ancient Israel; the abundant references to and metaphorical uses of terms derived from ZNH suggest strongly that prostitutes were a feature of life, without establishing that females might engage in prostitution in order to pay religious fines. Bird notes briefly that male prostitution in ancient Israel was homosexual and had its own terminology (49).In "Heavenly Bodies: Monuments to Prostitutes in Greek Sanctuaries," Catherine Keesling examines literary references to votive monuments erected by or commemorating female prostitutes in Greek sanctuaries in the archaic and classical periods. She concentrates on the degree to which Rhodopis' and Phryne's famous monuments were liminal or transgressive, but she incorporates findings about other votives. Keesling observes that Rhodopis' votive stands midway between those that Snodgrass terms "raw" (everyday objects, e.g., weapons) and "converted" (e.g., statues): Rhodopis dedicated a tithe of ox-spits ("raw") but constructed the offering so that the spits could not be removed (thus becoming "converted"). Keesling also discusses the monument, known only from literary sources, supposedly dedicated to Leaina, who was loyal to the tyrannicides. This tongueless statue, if originally dedicated to her, is the only canting-device animal statue found in a sanctuary (64–65). Phryne's portrait statue in the sanctuary of Apollo at Delphi is also singular as the only portrait before the Roman period that was not part of a family group, as one of three pre-Hellenistic gilded bronze portraits, and... (shrink)

Numerous recent discoveries in China of ancient tombs have greatly increased our knowledge of ritual and religious practices. These discoveries include excavated oracle bones, bronze, jade, stone and pottery objects, and bamboo manuscripts dating from the twelfth to fourth century BCE. Inscribed upon these artifacts are a large number of records of numerical sequences, for which no explanation has been found of how they were produced. Structural links to the Book of Changes, a divination manual that entered the Confucian (...) canon, are evident; yet, the algorithm described therein dates to the slightly later second to first century BCE. By combining archeological and statistical evidence, we propose a new methodology that enables us to reconstruct and test cleromantic techniques which can explain how these numerical sequences were generated. Dice and divination stalk use, either in combination or separately, appear in fact to have been underlying the rather stable numerical patterns in ancient China all the way back to the late Shang dynasty (1300–1046 BCE). Bringing to light such a long-standing technique, which awaits further confirmation from the ever-growing database of newly discovered numerical and textual records, can change drastically our understanding of early Chinese history and of the historical development of sophisticated arithmetical practices and the rationalization of chance. (shrink)

Résumé: La technologie métallurgique de la Chine ancienne est connue pour son ancienneté et sa délicatesse, mais pendant longtemps, le peuple chinois a toujours été sensible aux idées philosophiques qu’elles contiennent et le manque de compréhension rationnelle et généralisation théorique. La technologie métallurgique est une technique typique de l’ancien artisanat chinois. Cet article présente une analyse détaillée des idées philosophiques contenues dans la technologie métallurgique, notamment la technologie de la fabrication du fer (sidérurgie) et la technologie de la fonte et (...) du moulage de bronze. Nous estimons que les principales caractéristiques de l’ancienne culture chinoise de la technologie métallurgique sont l’accent mis sur l’importance de la philosophie, l’accent mis sur “le temporel, les avantages géographiques, et l’harmonie humaine”, et l’accent mis sur la pensée philosophique sur l’“harmonie”. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Bodily Arts: Rhetoric and Athletics in Ancient GreeceMindy FenskeBodily Arts: Rhetoric and Athletics in Ancient Greece by Debra Hawhee. Austin: University of Texas Press, 2004. Pp. xiv + 226. $40.00, hardcover.In Bodily Arts, Debra Hawhee constructs an often compelling, always interesting case for the conceptual and material linkages between the ancient arts of rhetoric and athletics. In so doing, Hawhee also highlights the integral role (...) of the musical arts to rhetorical and athletic training. Throughout the book, Hawhee weaves together close readings of multiple texts (poetry, oratory, sculpture, painting, architecture) in order to illuminate the intricate “network of overlapping practices” that connect the bodies of rhetoric, athletes, and musicians in Ancient Greece. To this reader, the central strengths of the study are methodological as well as conceptual. In terms of method, Hawhee carefully and with studied finesse integrates close readings of visual, spatial, and verbal texts and practices. In the wrong hands, this type of endeavor can easily appear as the worst kind of pastiche. Not so in this case where Hawhee manages the textual interpretation with deft expertise. Conceptually, the central premise that rhetoric was a practice that was fully embodied and, most importantly, that embodiment was not in a hierarchical relation to reason, rationality, and the mind is provocative. Hawhee argues that the relations of mind-body in Ancient Greek culture were understood as a complex interlocking system that, when trained through physical practices emphasizing rhythm, repetition, and response (to/with an encounter), resulted in the possible transformation of the very nature of the self. [End Page 197]In the process of constructing the argument for the connections between rhetorical and athletic training and performance, Bodily Arts moves through three phases. The Introduction and first three chapters lay the theoretical groundwork for the second phase: the introduction of the concept of phusiopoieses in Chapter 4. Chapters 5–7 then discuss the actual rhetorical and athletic spaces, practices, and bodies of and in phusiopoiesis.The introduction opens with description of a first-century BC bronze statue of an “Antikythera Youth” (3). Hawhee uses the mystery surrounding the identity of the figure (deciphered largely through interpretations of the actions implied by the stature of the statue) to articulate the connections between the body of the rhetor and the body of the athlete as well as to introduce the importance of the body to Greek values of hexis (comportment) and aretē (virtuosity). The Introduction also presents three critical relations that serve both as conceptual departure points as well as hail the multiple audiences of the book: relations of body and mind, learning and performing, and classical studies and rhetorical studies. Hawhee’s perspective is quite straightforwardly that rhetoric is an art that required physical training and physical performance.Chapter 1, “Contesting Virtuosity: Agonism and the Production of Aretē,” connects the values of agon and aretē and argues that the “very logic for linking rhetoric and athletics” lies at the heart of this relation (22). Hawhee argues that agon and aretē are less about ends (victory and virtue) and more centrally concerned with embodied processes. Agon, through Hawhee’s reading of Hesiod’s Work and Days, is articulated as a mode of encounter that produces a particular, and possibly transformative, response. Aretē is the bodily performance of virtuosity. Central to this performance, according to Hawhee’s interpretation of the Olympic ethos through Pindar’s poetry, is the activity of questing. Aretē is demonstrated rather than simply won or attained. Following these definitions of agon and aretē, the chapter moves to illustrating the shared language of rhetoric and athletics in terms of these values. Hawhee argues that this shared vocabulary confirms that sophistic rhetoric was understood and practiced as an embodied and agonistic art “fused and infused” with athletics (43).In Chapter 2, “Sophistic Mētis : An Intelligence of the Body,” Hawhee describes mētis as cunning and somatic becoming that “infuses the arts of rhetoric and athletics with a kind of bodily intelligence... not an explicit set of precepts but rather a tacit style of movement running through most kinds of actions, including thought” (47). Moreover, the movement of mētis [End Page 198] is corporeal. It... (shrink)

Although we experience many cultural artifacts by way of reproductions, there remains a particular thrill in experiencing genuine objects—‘real things’. I argue that genuineness is a property that possesses many dimensions of value, including aesthetic value. Typically, aesthetic qualities are perceptual, but genuineness is not a perceptual property. I investigate the aesthetic dimensions of genuineness by considering the role of touch in encounters with old things, using the example of an ancient bronze figurine whose reputation as genuine has waxed (...) and waned, along with its aesthetic assessment. (shrink)

The development of ancient civilizations and their achievements in sciences such as mathematics and astronomy are well researched for script-using civilizations. On the basis of oral tradition and mnemonic artifacts illiterate ancient civilizations were able to attain an adequate level of knowledge. The Neolithic and Bronze Age earthworks and circles are such mnemonic artifacts. Explanatory models are given for the shape of the stone formations and the ditch of Stonehenge reflecting the circular and specific non-circular shapes of these (...) structures. The basic mathematical concepts are Pythagorean triangles, thus adopting the construction procedures of the Neolithic circular ditches of Central Europe in the fifth Millennium bc and later earthworks and stone circles in Britain and Brittany. This knowledge was extended with new elliptical concepts. Approximations for the values of π and the square root of 2 are encoded in the henge. All constructions were performed using a standardized “Babylonian” metrology that shows a remarkable consistency and comprehensible development over some 14 centuries. (shrink)

Since the earliest Ancient Greek written records from the Mycenaean palaces (ca. 1450–1200 BC) contain no laws, contracts, or judicial decisions, some scholars have considered them unsuitable evidence for legal historical study. Yet this large body of administrative documents reveals much about the operation of the land regime and the interaction of property relations with the central power of the palaces. This article offers a treatment of the relationship between structures in language and normativity in the administrative records relating (...) to land from Late-Bronze-Age Pylos, in particular focussing on a family of textual formulae constructed with the preposition _pa-ro_, which represents a derivative proprietary relation. By focussing on how the records represent the land regime through the use of this formula, and what inconsistencies in its use may tell us, this article explores how we can analyse textual strategies towards an understanding of the system of order in documentary sources. While the tablets are not formally ‘legal’ or normative sources, a study of strategic patterns in the structure of the texts, as well as their inconsistencies and limitations, together shows that normative and legal relations are indeed represented in the records, but appear to be more complex than what is written down. The technical language used by the Mycenaean administrators does not construct a perfectly applied system of abstractions, which has consequences for our understanding of power in the period, perhaps indicating that the complicated sphere of land relations operated partly beyond the palatial system of order. Through this case study this article proposes a method for a more critical approach to normativity in documentary records more generally. The approach outlined here for critically analysing formulae which carry legal meanings may be applied in other contexts using the evidence of ‘practice’, which has often been sidelined by legal historians in favour of normative or formal legal texts. (shrink)

This paper is dedicated to the Εἰκόνες of the two Philostrati and to the Ἐκφράσεις of Callistratus, that is to say to three Greek works that bear important witness to the genre of art criticism in Antiquity and which concern both literary history and the history of art. The first series of Εἰκόνες is the work of Philostratus the Elder (2nd-3rd century AD) and comprises sixty-five descriptions of paintings with mythological subjects, which the author assures us he has seen in (...) a gallery in Naples. Another Philostratus, who claims to be the grandson of the former, and who is traditionally referred to as Philostratus the Younger, wrote a second, shorter series of Εἰκόνες, which describes seventeen paintings. Finally, a certain Callistratus, who probably dates from the 4th century AD, is the author of the Ἐκφράσεις, which group together fourteen descriptions of statues in marble and bronze.1 Ecphrasis is a subject that is often the focus of contemporary research. Perhaps its importance stems from the fact that we live in a civilization dominated by images, and we feel the need to control the visual imagery that surrounds us, to govern it and to make sense of it through language. The attention given to literary theory, rhetoric and sophistry today also helps to explain the success of this subject. The present book is situated in this field of research. The "La Licorne" series in which it is published specializes in the study of ancient and modern literature, a specialization to which this volume corresponds. This volume has two points of focus: (1) the literary form of description and the complex relationships between word and image, between the oral and the visual (hence the title Le défi de l'art, which signifies, among other things, that the art of the painter and of the sculptor challenges the sophist, who tries to describe works of art with words); (2) the Nachleben of ancient texts, because Philostratus and Callistratus were well-known to posterity, particularly during the Renaissance. (shrink)

The conventional history of the ancient Near East at large, including Egypt and the eastern Mediterranean basin, contains several “Dark Ages,” poorly documented transitional periods of uncertain length. James et al. 1991 have argued that the most significant of these Dark Ages—the transition from the Late Bronze to the Iron Age during the last two centuries of the second millennium BCE—is largely an artifact of an overly long reconstruction of the Egyptian Third Intermediate Period, and that this Dark Age (...) presents itself in every chronology linked to the Egyptian. A wide variety of often seemingly contradictory scientific, archaeological, art-historical, and philological evidence has been adduced to argue for the status quo, or to lengthen or to shorten by up to several centuries the relative chronology for this period. This review article comments on the papers presented at the Third BICANE Colloquium held at Sidney Sussex College, Cambridge, summarizing a variety of recent positions taken in the ongoing evaluation of James et al. 1991, testing the specific proposition that the tenth century BCE biblical Egyptian King Shishak is to be distinguished from the historical Egyptian King Shoshenq I, who is now to be situated about a century later in the latter half of the ninth century BCE. the wider historical implications of this proposed distinction are examined in new detail. (shrink)

Mark Twain, the great American writer of the South whose characters struggle with difficult choices, famously said: Always do what is right. It will gratify half of mankind and astound the other. Taking Twains phrase as a starting point, this book considers how literature and art explore different systems of values and principles of conduct, and how they can teach us to cope at times of trial. Morality remains one of the most contested areas of thought and ethics in the (...) modern world, due to numerous misapprehensions and the move away from solidarity, from what we share and hold in common, particularly our inherent pursuit of virtue and consideration of principles concerning the distinction between right and wrong, good and bad. Featuring essays by scholars from countries which have seen traditions of virtue and character formation perish in the course of tragic social experiments, this book highlights the role of literature and arts in educating about virtues and character, in both a regional and global context. The volume offers philosophical analysis of moral education and engages with the literary canon, discussing the ways in which virtue was taught and can still be taught with Aristotle as one of the regained tools of learning. The essays span countries from England, Spain, Italy and Belgium to the USA, Costa Rica, ancient China and Israel, with Poland, the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth and Central Europe receiving considerable coverage. They address themes of virtue and character formation from the Bronze Age to the present and serve as inspiring reading for educators, literary scholars, historians, ethicists, artists and active readers. (shrink)

Writing in the early third century AD, Julius Africanus claimed to have built a library “in the Pantheon” in Rome, the exact location of which remains elusive. In considering the competing possibilities for the site of the library, this paper argues that the building we commonly refer to as the Pantheon does not correspond to the ancient understanding of what the Pantheum was. The case is made that it was not a single building, but instead comprised a larger complex, (...) of which the still-standing structure was only one part. This interpretation allows for a number of details associated with the Pantheon to be rethought within a wider context and alternative proposals advanced regarding the forecourt in front of porch, the “arch” in the centre of this space, the location of the now lost caryatids and bronze columns, the little understood Severan restoration, and the meanings of the much-discussed inscriptions on the façade. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Hurricane Gloria LAWRENCE DUGAN A screaming northern gale flew past his wild words And slammed the sails, and pulled a wave toward heaven. —Aeneid, i.102–3 (Sarah Ruden, trans.) i. A phalanx of weather tools at the door, A shovel, an ice-pick, an umbrella, A new cane, leaning against each other, Plastic fabricated to resist storms, Reminds me of a storm I rode out years ago, The Nor’easter of 1985, (...) On the twenty-first floor of 5 Penn Center Across the street from where the Fox Theater Spread the bright wings of its marquee, folded Now forever, torn down, and then replaced With a glass-box not unlike the office I looked out of, watching the rain lashing Windows, tearing at the flags hung on poles On other buildings, solitary banners Left up as if to challenge the weather To do its worst, to refute the young storm Tearing northeast out of the Atlantic, Predicted only a few days before As a hurricane, that didn’t happen, But leaving the high-rise building nearly Deserted, with the ticker still running Across the wall; the market had opened Empty office or not, unoccupied Desks giving it that strange quietude Peculiar to such spaces, which the mind Expects to be filled, even while seeing Otherwise. arion 28.2 fall 2020 66 hurricane gloria I felt like a sailor for The only time in my life, stepping off The elevator at 21, and then Walking into the main hall and sensing The building swayed slighty, barely feeling It but knowing it distinctly, hearing It creak exactly as I had heard ships At sea in dozens of movies, and with The sound, the sway, the massive grid of pipes And beams giving and taking. jms Old timers hadn’t warned me about this Although some had ridden out several Storms as bad, real or metaphorical, Not even old Harris who remembered Moving down from Susquehanna county In ’29, to Wall Street and the Crash. ii. Future archaeologists of urban Storms will study pictures of umbrellas Taking flight, wrecked synthetic shapes blooming Against resistant hands, then abandoned, Stuffed into trash cans, twirling down alleys, Pastels, stripes or old-fashioned banker-black, The edge of the story, the windy street’s Last rebuke to those daring to stagger To lunch but caught in the nor’easterly Gale’s grey wall of wind and rain that rattled Doors and buckled windows. The building held Two dozen companies, and I still like To think one fronted for an anchorite, Some isolated individual Up on 24, alone at his desk In a skyscraper office for ten years Praying, sometimes looking down the cliff walls At the peregrine falcons sweeping home Lawrence Dugan 67 To their massive nest stuffed tight in the bronze Lap of a statue seated on City Hall, One of the allegories of Founders And Lenape chiefs placed high over Broad, The hawks diving downward athwart the storm Coming on in grey curtains wavering Over the city and the Delaware Valley. Across the river in Jersey The pines begin, in Camden the street dirt Is sand; halfway to the shore the forest Runs above the expressway, farms below, The pines flourishing in sandy barren Earth lacking nitrogen, incinerating Every dozen years, thousands of acres Blowing away in flames seen at the shore. After that rain those woods were safe for weeks. iii. Ten years and two jobs later I needed Census material and found it online On a rainy day in Center City In a high-rise office nearby, a halfDay ’s work done to my surprise in only Twenty minutes, then realizing as I Stood up from a computer that the view Was familiar. I was back on 21 In my old office; jms had moved But the grey sky cleared with a sweep of wind And the view north and south looked as before Wherever the market’s ticker-tape rolled now. The weather had surprised me again; The only full rainbow I ever saw, The ancient sign that spares the world from floods, A pure unblemished iridescent span, Appeared late in spring, in a sun shower.... (shrink)

This paper explores the archaeological finds at the site of Artemis Orthia in Sparta through a gender-based framework. It chronicles the history of the site from the 6th century BCE to modern excavations and critically evaluates the subtle biases of recent scholarship on the artefacts found there, including bronze dedications, the Orthia masks, and an architectural votive. This research aims to question established perceptions of Sparta as unique within Greece and scholarly biases against Laconian art as “backwards” by focusing on (...) the context of the site and looking beyond the infamous literary flogging ritual to ask how women in particular fit into the mythology and archaeology. Utilizing a gender-based lens opens new possibilities and exposes modern preconceptions about gender in the ancient world, uniting seemingly contradictory elements. (shrink)

It is generally assumed that a cult of El existed in Late Bronze Age Ugarit and that the alphabetic spelling IL must refer either to the generic “god” or to the divine name El. However, such an either-or question is too simplistic when we are dealing with the multifarious nature of polytheism. In the light of Ugaritic material, which includes the liturgical texts, several “pantheon” lists, a quadrilingual vocabulary, as well as theophoric personal names, it is obvious that IL also (...) can refer to the collective godhead Ilū. Furthermore, IL in the ritual-myth text KTU 1.23 is distinct from El in the Baal cycle. In light of several Greek and ancient Near Eastern myths of “divine engenderment,” KTU 1.23 most likely deals with the motif of the collective godhead IL (ˀIlū), who impregnated two human women in order to engender two sets of divinities. Hence, the deus otiosus theory that IL in 1.23 is a “younger” El should be rejected. (shrink)

What effects do archaeological discoveries, and in particular some of the new archaeological discoveries, have on research into ancient history and culture, and especially on the research into [ancient] intellectual culture that all of us present today are concerned about? This is a subject that very much deserves to be studied. Archaeological discoveries have a very substantial effect on research into history. I believe everyone recognizes this fact today. This is probably a matter of common knowledge. However, very (...) few people give any thought to its effect on research into intellectual culture. People do not attach sufficient importance to this. Very few people realize that it has such an effect. Why is that? I believe that one of the reasons is that the archaeology of earlier times did not emphasize research into intellectual culture. For a very long period of time we were, in particular, influenced by Britain's Gordon Childe. As we all know, Childe was, in a certain sense, a Marxist. For instance, we can see in his books, such as What Happened in History and others, that he was basically a Marxist. However, we also note that he brought with him the influence of the Danish school of thought in early archaeology. The Danish school of thought started out by operating museums, and its founder was the person who invented such terms as "Stone Age," "Bronze Age," and "Iron Age." They operated museums and displayed objects but did little explaining. Nor was it possible in those times to talk about ideology and culture. That is why Childe's books brought that kind of an influence. We all know that for a long time in the former Soviet Union, the archaeological research institutes were not called "archaeological institutes," nor did they use the term "archaeology." Their institutes were called "institutes of material culture." What is "material culture?" This term is unclear, because the things discovered by archaeology cannot be defined simply as "material culture." How can one call all the things dug up by archaeology "material culture?" I myself have never looked at the matter that way. That is why I wrote that pamphlet "Dong Zhou yu Qin dai wenming" , and especially put in that particular statement. Many people have since quoted that statement, and fortunately everyone seems to think it is all right. What I meant to say is that the things discovered by archaeology are, of course, material things, but many of them also reflect spiritual things. Actually, the reason is simple. A tomb, for example, always has to do with certain funerary ceremonies and certain rites, and all of these reflect things of the spirit. A bronze vessel, or a pottery vessel—such things reflect the society and the customs and habits of those times. If you are only looking at it from the material side, then the effects of this [other] sort of archaeology are worth considering. This is my view of the matter, and I hope everyone will comment on it. So, today I would like to talk about the influence of archaeological culture on things of the spirit. (shrink)

In a review in JHS lxxxix 127 Dr M. L. West gives as an example of ‘a certain innocence on matters of literary history’ the belief that seven-stringed lyres ‘came in’ in the seventh century B.C. Since the emphasis in the context is upon rigorous down-dating, what Dr West seems to be saying is that seven-stringed lyres were not in use amongst the Greeks before about 600 B.C. I hope that I do not misunderstand Dr West's contention: the purpose of (...) this short note is to suggest, with the greatest respect and deference, that another view of the matter may perhaps be permissible.Let us ignore the seven-stringed musical instrument shown on the Ayia Triadha sarcophagus, because evidence from the Late Bronze Age may be thought too remote to be relevant to early Hellenic musical practice. Let us also leave aside ancient opinions associating Terpander with the seven-stringed lyre and assigning him to the first half of the seventh century B.C.. Dr West may well regard the putting of trust in such testimonies as evidence of incorrigible amateurism. There remains, nevertheless, a contemporary witness to the existence of seven-stringed lyres amongst the Greeks of the seventh century B.C.In JHS lxxi 248, fig. 8, there is illustrated a fragment of a Subgeometric dinos of the first half of the seventh century B.C. from the excavations at Old Smyrna. On the piece is painted a seven-stringed lyre. The lines representing strings are carefully distinguished and spaced. It would be extravagant to assert that the artist could not count, or that he was suffering from hallucinations, or that he was imagining a type of instrument never seen by himself or his customers. In short, a tentative suggestion may be made—with due deference and hesitation: scholars, including those whom in this particular matter Dr West would, it seems, classify as innocents, ‘can seriously argue’ that seven-stringed lyres were reintroduced to Greece or ‘came in’ well within the first half of the seventh century B.C. (shrink)

This research explores the historical and cultural impact of Oracle Bone Inscriptions (OBIs) on the development of Chinese Calligraphy, employing a systematic literature review approach. Focusing on the period from the Shang Dynasty (1600 to 1050 BCE) to contemporary Chinese Script, the study uncovers the contributions of OBIs to the evolution of the Chinese writing system, character configurations, and linguistic structures during the Shang dynasty. Through an extensive review of primary sourced documents, specifically oracle-bone inscriptions from the late Shang dynasty, (...) and secondary scholarly literature, the research elucidates traditional practices and the origin of the Chinese writing system. The evolution of OBIs into various script forms, including Bronze Inscriptions, Seal Script, Official Script, and Regular Script, reflects linguistic transformation and cultural refinement. This study sheds light on the intricate relationship between OBIs and Chinese Calligraphy, providing insights into how these ancient markings influenced the evolution of calligraphic art. The research illuminates intriguing parallels between Oracle Bone Inscription words, exemplified by "Dingxi" for divination, and their evolved counterparts in Chinese calligraphy. Notably, the character "羊" for sheep in oracle bones undergoes a fascinating evolution in calligraphy, showcasing the dynamic transformation of visual symbols over millennia. By detailing the selection criteria and the systematic approach employed in the literature review, the research enhances transparency and replicability, contributing to a more comprehensive understanding of the enduring cultural and aesthetic influence of Oracle Bone Inscriptions on the calligraphy tradition. (shrink)

Writing, or calligraphy, in China is strongly influenced by ancient techniques of making art. Chinese characters have evolved from the patterns of bronze drawings, and China’s earliest hieroglyphs usually retain the traces of their origin in paintings. These paintings usually recorded daily life, and the related Chinese characters have evolved from these with general, simplified and abstract features. The composition that makes Chinese characters is a manifestation of ancient Chinese philosophy, of which Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism are the (...) three key strands. They have affected Chinese culture and aesthetics in all dynasties. Chinese philosophy emphasizes the integration of individuals in their surrounding environment. The art of ancient China consequently combines skills that relate to the artificial, or constructed, and to natural patterns. Chinese characters make a perfect example of this. The article/presentation will outline the research that I have so far undertaken on the relation between Chinese calligraphy and architectural space, between writing and constructing environments. It will also present some experimental design research that aims at developing from the above-mentioned basic research new architectural typologies that are contemporary, resonant and sensitive to the Chinese context. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:‘Reading’ Greek Death: To the End of the Classical PeriodJoseph W. Day and Leslie Preston DayChristiane Sourvinou-Inwood. ‘Reading’ Greek Death: To the End of the Classical Period. Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1995. xiv + 489 pp. 11 pls. Cloth, $79.This important book contributes much to the growing, though divided, scholarship on Greek mortuary practice as a system of behavior that reflected and constructed eschatological, religious, and socio-political attitudes and (...) ideologies. Distancing herself strongly from I. Morris’ historical analysis of mortuary data (Burial in Ancient Society [1987]; Death-Ritual and Social Structure in Classical Antiquity [1992]), with its rejection of what he sees as limiting text- and object-based approaches, S-I derives cultural attitudes from texts like Homer and artifacts like the archaic grave monument. Her approach to this conventional material is hardly conventional, however, nor are its results.Chapter 1, which most classicists could read with benefit, explains S-I’s reader-oriented method; but methodology is foregrounded throughout, especially the semiological principle that no element of a text or artifact, independent of its context, has a fixed meaning for readers. S-I recreates ancient readings of grave monuments, epitaphs, literary texts, and other artifacts accordingly, by reconstructing the cultural lenses through which contemporaries would have interpreted such an artifact (that is, their attitudes to death, expectations about relevant genres, and other aspects of their cultural repertoire). To alleviate the dangers of circularity inherent in such approaches, S-I constructs, and criticizes others for failing to construct, several independent arguments to support each point. Though “very idiosyncratic post-structuralist” (113), S-I’s method can be compared to recent semiological, cultural, and functional approaches to literary and artistic “texts” (e.g., C. Dougherty and L. Kurke, Cultural Poetics in Archaic Greece [1993]) and inscriptions (e.g., D. T. Steiner, The Tyrant’s Writ [1994]).Chapter 2 deals with views of the afterlife in the Homeric poems and with beliefs about the dead from the Late Bronze Age to the seventh century. For S-I, Homer represents the culture of eighth-century Ionia, and she uses the poems to show later eighth-century attitudes toward death. This is too facile a solution to complex Homeric problems, and while her analysis of the beliefs reflected in the poems is excellent, she does not apply archaeological evidence to demonstrate that this analysis is relevant to eighth-century Greece. She sees two attitudes in the poems: the predominant belief that “everyone must die,” a simple statement of the inevitability of death without any idea of reward and punishment, and the nascent idea that a few individuals can achieve happiness and even immortality after death. She debunks the theory that this latter concept of Elysion comes from Minoan Crete. What she does not do is use archaeological evidence to support her hypotheses. As she rightly points out, reconstructing “belief systems on the basis of archaeological data is a complex and problematic enterprise” (90); [End Page 645] but given the hundreds of burials excavated all over the Greek world from this period, it seems amazing that she refers to them so little. S-I is not unfamiliar with archaeological evidence and uses it to good account in discussing Minoan and Mycenaean burial practices, and she makes excellent use of sculpture and vase painting in chapters 3 and 5; but she chooses not to use actual burial data for Homeric beliefs, perhaps partly in response to Morris. Chapter 2 supplies a useful background for the study of archaic grave markers, but the unwary classicist should know that a methodologically rigorous archaeologist, in particular, will have trouble with it, as with Morris, although for different reasons.Morris and his methodology come under heavy attack in the lengthy Appendix. While some find Morris’ model-building methodology problematic, it is widely accepted by anthropologists looking for an objective method akin to scientific hypothesis testing. S-I opposes this methodology because of its a priori assumptions, yet no methodology is free of cultural bias. We need a variety of approaches, and archaeology must be allowed to give its evidence without either being forced into Morris’ a priori models or S-I’s (and the traditional... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Greek Athletics and the Olympics by Alan Beale, and: Thinking the Olympics: The Classical Tradition and the Modern Games ed. by Barbara Goff, Michael SimpsonJacques A. BrombergAlan Beale. Greek Athletics and the Olympics. Greece & Rome: Texts and Contexts. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2011. iv + 196 pp. Numerous color figs. Paper, $26.Barbara Goff and Michael Simpson, eds. Thinking the Olympics: The Classical Tradition and the Modern Games. (...) London: Bristol Classical Press, 2011. xi + 227 pp. 23 black-and-white figs. Paper, $40.The quadrennial cycle of modern Olympiads has always assured a steady interest in the history of ancient athletics, as participants of all kinds (athletes, officials, and spectators alike) are reminded of the Games’ debts to the ancient Greeks. With the proliferation of undergraduate courses in Classical athletics, sports, and festivals in recent years, however, a growing number of undergraduates are also getting their first glimpses of Greco-Roman antiquity through the stadium door and quickly discovering how different the modern Olympics are from the ancient. The persistent conservatism of the modern Olympics thus presents instructors of undergraduate surveys with the challenge of introducing the festival to an audience that has come to accept the modern as a continuation of the ancient. In two popular histories of the Olympics, for instance, both published in 2004, one may contrast Nigel Spivey’s (The Ancient Olympics [Oxford 2004]: xix) proposed “journey to the strangeness” of Olympia with David Young’s claim (A Brief History of the Olympic Games [Malden, Mass. 2004]: 140) that “our Olympic Games are not so much a revival of the ancient Greek games as a genuine continuation of them.” Although intended for different audiences, the titles under review share the goal of de-familiarizing the Olympics both by emphasizing differences between ancient and modern athletics and by illuminating how an idealized, ancient Greek model has been used to establish and perpetuate the modern Games.There is no shortage of sourcebooks and histories of ancient athletics: Steven G. Miller, Arete: Greek Sports from Ancient Sources (Berkeley, Calif. 2004); Rachel Sargent Robinson, Sources for the History of Greek Athletics (Chicago, Ill. 1955); Waldo E. Sweet, Sport and Recreation in Ancient Greece: A Sourcebook with Translations (Oxford 1987); and William Blake Tyrell, The Smell of Sweat: Greek Athletics, Olympics, and Culture (Wauconda, Ill. 2004), who includes on a companion CD a wider assortment of sources than any printed edition. In keeping with the goals of Cambridge’s Greece and Rome: Texts and Contexts series, Alan Beale’s Greek Athletics and the Olympics offers a combination of texts and illustrations. One need only consider the nature of the evidence to understand [End Page 703] why this approach is not simply valuable, but obligatory: the literary sources are often fragmentary, belated, or anecdotal (or all three), and the material evidence requires detailed and careful exegesis. The challenge of the evidence is compounded by the instinct to read into the modern Olympics continuity rather than innovation. Beale sets out to overcome the “superficial similarities” and re-mystify ancient athletics as something “substantially different from anything in the modern world” (1). In his brief introductions to each source or object, Beale provides the cultural framework into which students may situate texts and images, and he offers questions (many contrasting ancient with modern) aimed at stirring curiosity and facilitating discussion.The opening chapters treat athletics in the Bronze Age and the Homeric epics (chap. 1), outline the ritual origins and growth of competitive athletics at Olympia (chap. 2), and trace the development of the sanctuary and the festival site (chap. 3). Beale is cautious with the examples of Minoan and Mycenaean art (9–12) and quotes generously from both the Iliad (13–19) and Odyssey (19–22), allowing room to observe discrepancies with later athletic practice. Like Robinson (34–35), he supplements Pausanias and Strabo on the first competitions at Olympia with a sample from Pindar, Olympian 10.24–77 (25–26), and instructors who wish to discuss this early history will not find better treatments of these passages elsewhere. Chapter 3 presents the site at Olympia and the administration of the festival, and Beale is to be commended for his... (shrink)

This book explores the aesthetic consciousness of the Shang Dynasty and its influence on Chinese aesthetic development and contemporary aesthetic creation. The Shang Dynasty is the first era in China with authentic historical documentation. Its artifacts and inscriptions have great aesthetic value and serve as vivid and rich records of aesthetic concepts. By examining the production and use of pottery, jade, bronze, and oracle bone inscriptions, the book sheds light on the functions of these creations as media for conveying emotions (...) driven by human nature. By discussing how Shang script was invented and used, the author explores the significant role it played in the development of the aesthetic consciousness of the Chinese ancients. Based on surviving documents, including the hexagrams in the Book of Changes, the Pan Geng in the Book of Documents, and the Shang songs in the Book of Songs, he further examines the poetic characteristics of Shang literature, recognizing it as both historically and literarily significant. The title is essential reading for scholars, students, and general readers interested in Chinese aesthetics, ancient Chinese civilization, culture, and art. (shrink)