Annotation
"Assyrian pottery of the XI-VI centuries BC is a very special topic in Near Eastern archaeology for several reasons: it is widely diffused, relates to the expansion of the first real 'empire' in Western Asia, and is well-characterized in terms of typology, manufacturing and deco…
Imperial peripheries in the Neo-Assyrian period
"Highlighting strategies that Neo-Assyrian Empire applied to manage its massive and diverse empire. Examining various ways those strategies were received by subjects close and far from the center. Studies illustrate how responses to aggression, economic policies, cultural influe…
The ancient Assyrian Empire at its greatest extent in the 7th century BCE, spanned almost one million square kilometers. As the world’s first regional-scale empire, it established control over many pre-existing settlements, drawing them into the fold of not only Assyrian politic…
In 1846, the British polymath Austen Henry Layard began archaeological excavations in the mounds of ancient Assyria, approximately twenty miles south of the modern day city of Mosul, Iraq. Uncovering artifacts almost immediately, Layard's discoveries were sent to the British Mus…
Those who study the cognitive development of Homo sapiens maintain that our specialized communication skills evolved from the desire to narrate. Societies define themselves through their histories and their traditional stories; the socio-political significance of narrative in an…
Recent work by world-systems theorists such as Chase-Dunn, Hall, Kohl, and Algaze have allowed scholars to apply Immanuel Wallerstein's model of the modern world-system to precapitalist settings. In doing so, they have challenged many of the basic assumptions made by Wallerstein…
This thesis is a study of the ways in which the Late (Neo-) Assyrian empire integrated agricultural practices into its imperial designs. The ancient kingdom of Late Assyria (ca. 900 - 600 BCE) was one of the world's first empires, and at its peak stretched across Iran, Syria, An…
The relationship between tectonic environment and human activity has a long history that intimately involves the Ancient Near East and Levant. Texts from the third millennium onward attest to earthquake imagery while records of actual earthquakes cluster in two periods in the Mi…
This study examines several texts from Assyria and from the Hebrew Bible that describe or refer to the exhibition of divine symbols that have been plundered as part of the spoils of war. The exhibition of divine symbols as trophies of war conveyed messages about power relations …
This dissertation investigates the political and economic relationships among Assyria, the Syro-Palestinian states, and Egypt from the reign of Sargon II to the reign of Ashurbanipal; it does so by examining relevant Assyrian and Babylonian writings in a comprehensive and system…
This dissertation builds on the insights of the “Italian school” (e.g., Liverani, Fales, Zaccagnini, Younger) concerning the ideological shaping of historical narratives. It engages in a literary-ideological analysis of nine West Semitic royal inscriptions from the ninth to the …
This study examines the early second millennium B.C. Habur Ware assemblage from Tell Leilan/Shubat Enlil in order to integrate a ceramic assemblage of which the painted pottery--Habur Ware--has traditionally been emphasized, divorced from the larger unpainted assemblage. These c…
This study is a historical comparison of the use of gendered metaphors in the recording of the Israelite/Assyrian encounter (9th –7th centuries BCE). Beginning with the assumption that gendered language is a tool of ideology expressed metaphorically, the study examines the manip…