Archaeology of the Ancient Near East - (course II) lecture

The course is focused on the archaeology of the Middle East. The development of the Mesopotamian urban civilisations from Sumerians to the Macedonian conquest will be discussed in chronological order. So-called peripheral regions, such as Anatolia, Syro-Palestine (Levant) and Iran with their own archaeology and history will also be important subjects during the course. The lecture is planned to end with a presentation of the archaeology, political history and cultural situation in the Middle East during the Roman and Byzantine periods.

The course will introduce students to different aspects of the archaeology of the Ancient Near

East., which will be discussed in chronological order – from the formation of the first states in the Uruk period to the Classical period in the Near East. The following subjects will be discussed:

1. Geography, climate and natural recourses as a background for the development of ancient Middle Eastern cultures.

2. Beginnings of the civilisation – first state organisms in the Middle East (mainly the Uruk Period).

3. Great cultures of the 3rd Millennium. The Early Dynastic Period in Mesopotamia, the Akkad Empire, Anatolia, Syria and Susiana in the Early Bronze Age.

4. “The World is changing” – Amorites in Mesopotamia and Syria, the Hittite Old Kingdom.

5. Late Bronze Age world. The Hittite Empire, Hurrians, Syro-Palestine, Elam, Kassite Babylonia and the first Assyrian Empire.

6. Iron Age Empires: Assyria, Babylonia, Media, Achaemenid Persia.

7. Around the Great Empires. Levantine, Syro-Palestine, the Neo-Hittite state, Urartu.

8. Late Iron Age cultural and social changes – Achaemenid Persia’s universalism. Persian relations with the Mediterranean World. Relations with Greeks, the Macedonian invasion and the consequences of the conquest by Alexander the Great.

9. The Middle East under the Greeks, and under the Roman and Byzantine rule.

P.M.M.G. Akkermans, G. M. Schwartz, The Archaeology of Syria. From Complex Hunter-Gatherers to Early Urban Societies (ca.16,000-300 BC), Cambridge 2003.

J. Aruz (ed.), Art of the First Cities: The Third Millennium B.C. from the Mediterranean to the Indus, New York 2003.

J. Aruz, K. Benzel, and J. Evans (eds), Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C., New York 2008.

J. Black, A. Green, Gods, Demons and Symbols of Ancient Mesopotamia: An Illustrated Dictionary, London 2004.

H. Crawford, Dilmun and its Gulf Neighbours, Cambridge 1998.

H. Crawford, M. Rice, Traces of Paradise: The Archaeology of Bahrain 2500 BC-300 AD, Dilmun Committee, 2000.

A. Mazar, Archaeology of the Land of the Bible 10,000-586 B.C.E., New York-London-Toronto-Sydney-Auckland 1992.

G. McMahon, S. Steadman (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Anatolia: (10,000-323 BCE), Oxford 2012.

E.M. Meyers (ed.), The Oxford Encyclopedia of Archaeology in the Near East, vol. I-V, New York-Oxford 1997.

M. Van De Mieroop, A History of the Ancient Near East ca. 3000-323 BC, Oxford 2007.

J.N. Postgate, Early Mesopotamia, Society and Economy at the Dawn of History, London-New York 1992.

D.T. Potts, Mesopotamian Civilization. The Material Foundations, Ithaca, New York 1997.

D.T. Potts (ed.), A Companion to the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Oxford 2012.

M. Roaf, The Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East, Oxford 1996.

A. Sagona, P. Zimansky, Ancient Turkey, London-New York 2009.

J.M. Sasson (ed.), Civilizations of the Ancient Near East, vol. I-IV, New York 1995 (selected chapters).

A. Smogorzewska, F.M. Stępniowski (eds), Archeologia starożytnego Bliskiego Wschodu, Warszawa 2009 (for those, who know Polish)

M.L. Steiner, A. E. Killebrew (eds), The Oxford Handbook of the Archaeology of the Levant c. 8000-332 BCE, Oxford 2014.

Students have knowledge concerning main issues of the archaeology of the Ancient Near

East. They have a skill to identify and define main aspects of Near Eastern architecture, art

and cultures. Familiarity with main terms concerning the Near Eastern cultures, geography and chronology.

Several criteria are considered: an exam, which is the main benchmark and participation in lecture and class discussion.