This volume brings together essays that encompass the two principal approaches to the history of ancient Near Eastern studies. The first approach is descriptive, compiling data to reconstruct the way ancient Near Eastern studies was founded and how it progressed within a specific country or academic tradition. The essays in this volume focus especially on those countries often neglected in international research to date, such as Turkey, Portugal, Belgium, Iran, China, Spain, and the Czech-speaking regions. The second approach—often labeled “intellectual history” in the English-speaking academy—examines topics in ancient Near Eastern studies analytically and critically through a diachronic or transnational lens. These essays either synthesize the previous descriptive work within one academic tradition or develop that work from a transnational point of view. This collection treats the two approaches as complementary to one another. The result is a rich and wide-reaching collection of essays that share a reflective approach to the discipline and to research on the ancient Near East.
In addition to the editors, the contributors are Selim Ferru Adali, Isabel Almeida, Silvia Alura, 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.
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