Podcasts about neo assyrian

For centuries, magic and warfare have been deeply intertwined, shaping military strategy, morale, and even battlefield outcomes. From Mesopotamian divination and Greek war omens to medieval sacred warfare and modern occult operations, supernatural beliefs have influenced how wars are fought and won. In this episode, we explore the forgotten history of magical warfare, revealing how esoteric traditions have been used to protect warriors, disrupt enemies, and even alter the course of history.Did John Dee's Enochian magic help defeat the Spanish Armada? Were Nazi leaders using occult knowledge for strategic advantage? And did British Wiccans perform a ritual to psychically deter Hitler from invading Britain? We examine historical records, esoteric practices, and modern interpretations of war magic, shedding light on one of history's most mysterious intersections of the mystical and the military.

Die Themen in den Wissensnachrichten: +++ Wo im Körper man Gefühle fühlt, ist nicht nur eine Frage der Biologie +++ Wie der Geruch von Bäumen zur Wolkenbildung beiträgt +++ Schon die Gebrüder Grimm mochten Schokolade +++**********Weiterführende Quellen zu dieser Folge:Embodied emotions in ancient Neo-Assyrian texts revealed by bodily mapping of emotional semantics, iScience, 04.12.2024New particle formation from isoprene under upper-tropospheric conditions, Nature, 04.12.2024High sea surface temperatures were a prerequisite for the development and expansion of the Great Barrier Reef, Science Advances, 04.12.2024Inflation Surprises and Election Outcomes, Kieler Arbeitspapiere, 12/2024A twin-driven analysis on early aging biomarkers and associations with sitting-time and physical activity, Plos One, 11.09.2024Alle Quellen findet ihr hier.**********Ihr könnt uns auch auf diesen Kanälen folgen: TikTok auf&ab , TikTok wie_geht und Instagram .

The angry and impotent king Shamshi-Adad would accomplish quite little during his reign of the Neo-Assyrian empire, but he would manage to completely annihilate the resurgent Babylonians and set them back a full century, while also marrying Shammu-Ramat, the inspiration for the mythical Semiramis, and allowing the Assyrian Empire to descend fully into the Age of the Magnates, or Assyrian Feudal Period. If you like the show, consider sharing with your friends, leaving a like, subscribing, or even supporting financially: Buy the Oldest Stories books: https://a.co/d/7Wn4jhS Donate here: https://oldeststories.net/ or on patreon: https://patreon.com/JamesBleckley or on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCG2tPxnHNNvMd0VrInekaA/join Youtube and Patreon members get access to bonus content about Egyptian culture and myths.

 This is a special episode presenting the prize-winning research of three early career scholars: William McGrath, Alessia Pilloni, and Christopher Jones. What prizes did they win, and what was their research about? We hear about the latest news from Isin II period history, astrology in the Late Babylonian period, and a military coup in the Neo-Assyrian period. 1:24 William McGrath2:10 dissertation6:08 key conclusions9:10 publication plans10:48 what's next?13:45 Alessia Pilloni14:27 horoscopes20:03 star signs22:37 two technical terms identified26:51 wider context29:10 Christopher Jones30:45 whodunnit35:59 new evidence41:54 purge45:48 coup theoryMusic by Ruba HillawiWebsite: http://wedgepod.orgYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCSM7ZlAAgOXv4fbTDRyrWgwEmail: wedgepod@gmail.comPatreon: http://Patreon.com/WedgePod

It's Wednesday, September 4th, A.D. 2024. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard on 125 radio stations and at www.TheWorldview.com.  I'm Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com) By Jonathan Clark 55,000 Nigerians killed between 2019 and 2023 The Observatory for Religious Freedom in Africa released a report last month on Christian persecution in Nigeria.  Violence in the country has taken the lives of over 55,000 people between 2019 and 2023. Of those, over 30,000 were civilians, including 16,769 Christians. Radical Muslim Fulani herdsmen were responsible for over half of the Christian deaths. The observatory noted, “In states where attacks occur, proportional loss to Christian communities is exceptionally high. In terms of state populations, 6.5 times as many Christians are being murdered as Muslims.” Please pray for the persecuted church in Nigeria, ranked 6th on the Open Doors' World Watch List of nations where it is most dangerous to be a Christian.  Psalm 14:4, 7 asks, “Have all the workers of iniquity no knowledge, who eat up My people as they eat bread, and do not call on the LORD? … Oh, that the salvation of Israel would come out of Zion! When the LORD brings back the captivity of His people.” People looking for leaders who will champion religious freedom Pew Research released a survey finding people around the world want leaders who stand up for religious freedom. In the U.S., 64% of adults said it is important to have a leader who stands up for people who share the respondents' religious beliefs. A majority of people in most other countries surveyed said the same thing.  Countries with high levels of support for leaders sharing their religious beliefs included Indonesia, the Philippines, Malaysia, India, and Kenya. Countries with the lowest levels of support for this included France, South Korea, Japan, Spain, and Sweden.  7,500 pro-lifers attend India's March for Life Pro-lifers in India held their 2024 National March for Life last month.  The event took place in the southern city of Thrissur and drew over 7,500 people. It was the country's largest March for Life. India legalized abortion back in 1971. Now, mothers in the country kill 15 million of their pre-born children per year.  Bishop Gerald John Mathias attended the recent march and told Life Site News, “I'm grateful to the youth, particularly the youth taking interest. It's most encouraging for the future of the Church, future of the society, future of families.”  Donald Trump champions in vitro fertilization In the United States, former President Donald Trump said he would make in-vitro fertilization (IVF) free for Americans if he is elected. Last Thursday, Trump told NBC News' Dasha Burns “it's helping women [be] able to have a baby....We need great children, beautiful children in our country.”  Here's a soundbite from that interview. TRUMP: “So, we are paying for that treatment.” BURNS: “All Americans who want it?” TRUMP: “All Americans that get it; all Americans that need it. So, we're going to be paying for that treatment, or we're going to be mandating that the insurance company pays.” However, many oppose in vitro fertilization as undermining pro-life goals. CatholicVote noted, “We are opposed to any In Vitro Fertilization mandate and will work with [Trump] and his administration to make clear that IVF puts women at risk, and destroys countless innocent living human embryos.” Only 54% of Protestant Evangelical attend church in person Lifeway Research published analysis of a 2024 report by Grey Matter Research and Infinity Concepts entitled “Church After COVID.” The report found only 54 percent of Protestant Evangelicals attend church in-person every week. Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic nearly 90 percent of Evangelicals were attending semi-regularly.  Online viewing of services has increased; however, many of those engaging online are also attending in person. The study also found about a quarter of churchgoers started attending their current church since the pandemic, marking significant changes in the makeup of churches post-COVID. Hebrews 10:24-25 says, “And let us consider one another in order to stir up love and good works, not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together, as is the manner of some, but exhorting one another, and so much the more as you see the Day approaching.” Archeological find from Biblical Jerusalem affirms Scripture And finally, the Israeli Antiquities Authority announced the discovery of a stone seal at the City of David National Park in Jerusalem. Archaeologists believe it is from the First Temple period, around 2,700 years old.  The seal bears a name inscribed in Old Hebrew script and a winged figure associated with pagan Neo-Assyrian influences. Ze'ev Orenstein with the City of David Foundation told Fox News the seal “joins the list of countless archeological discoveries in the City of David — the historic site of Biblical Jerusalem — affirming Jerusalem's Biblical heritage.”  Close And that's The Worldview on this Wednesday, September 4th, in the year of our Lord 2024. Subscribe by Amazon Music or by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldview.com. Or get the Generations app through Google Play or The App Store. I'm Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldview.com). Seize the day for Jesus Christ.

The lead-up to and significance of the first great battle of the iron age. Qarqar changed the equation for the Assyrian empire, which has until now been expanding without serious resistance. We will learn about the geopolitical significance of Damascus and Israel, watch the Assyrians struggle and grow as a result, and reach the peak of early Neo-Assyrian military achievement. If you like the show, consider sharing with your friends, leaving a like, subscribing, or even supporting financially: Buy the Oldest Stories books: https://a.co/d/7Wn4jhS Donate here: https://oldeststories.net/ or on patreon: https://patreon.com/JamesBleckley or on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCG2tPxnHNNvMd0VrInekaA/join

The Library of Ashurbanipal, a vast collection of cuneiform tablets from ancient Mesopotamia, reflects the scholarly ambitions of Ashurbanipal, the last Neo-Assyrian king, showcasing diverse subjects from math to epics. Despite its partial destruction after the fall of Nineveh, the library's rediscovery in the 19th century provided valuable insights into Mesopotamian culture and history, illustrating humanity's enduring pursuit of knowledge and wisdom.

Welcome to Day 2386 of Wisdom-Trek, and thank you for joining me. This is Guthrie Chamberlain, Your Guide to Wisdom – Theology Thursday – The Abandoned Child and the Basket Case – I Dare You Not To Bore Me With The Bible Wisdom-Trek Podcast Script - Day 2386 Welcome to Wisdom-Trek with Gramps! I am Guthrie Chamberlain, and we are on Day 2386 of our Trek. The Purpose of Wisdom-Trek is to create a legacy of wisdom, to seek out discernment and insights, and to boldly grow where few have chosen to grow before. Today is the fourth lesson in our segment, Theology Thursday. Utilizing excerpts from a book titled: I Dare You Not To Bore Me With The Bible written by Hebrew Bible scholar and professor the late Dr. Michael S Heiser, we will invest a couple of years going through the entire Bible, exploring short Biblical lessons that you may not have received in Bible classes or Church. The Bible is a wonderful book. Its pages reveal the epic story of God's redemption of humankind and the long, bitter conflict against evil. Yet it's also a book that seems strange to us. While God's Word was written for us, it wasn't written to us. Today, our lesson is The Abandoned Child and the Basket Case. In modern stories, people destined for greatness rarely start as privileged. They are dropped off at the doorstep of an orphanage or abandoned in the rain. This literary motif goes back to ancient stories, where writers use the abandoned child theme to identify a character that rises from obscurity to privileged hero status. It's a motif found in the biblical account of Moses' birth. But is that really the whole story? Moses' story begins when Pharaoh feels threatened by the growing Hebrew population in Egypt and commands that all Hebrew male infants be killed (Exod 1:16-22). Moses' mother hides her newborn son for three months and then devises a risky but calculated plan: She sets him adrift on the Nile in a small basket made of bulrushes, waterproofed with bitumen and pitch (2:1- 3). Moses' older sister, Miriam, watches as the basket floats to where the daughter of Pharaoh bathes. God uses these circumstances to bring Moses under the protection of Egypt's ruler (2:4-10). Ancient literature outside the Bible attests to several stories in which a child, perceived as a threat by an enemy, is abandoned and later spared by divine intervention or otherworldly circumstances. Roughly 30 stories like this survive in ancient Mesopotamia, Canaan, Greece, Egypt, Rome, and India literature. The Mesopotamian work known as the Sargon Birth Legend offers the most striking parallels to the biblical story. It relates the birth story of Sargon the Great, an Akkadian emperor who ruled several Sumerian city-states around 2000 BC, centuries before the time of Moses. The infant boy is born into great peril: His mother is a high priestess, and he is illegitimate. Consequently, his mother sets him adrift in a reed basket on a river. The boy is rescued and raised by a gardener named Akki in the town of Kish. He becomes a humble gardener in Akki's service until the goddess Ishtar takes an interest in him, setting him on the path to kingship. Some assume that the biblical story of Moses' birth was based on the Sargon Birth Legend, but this is unlikely. Although ancient Sumerian accounts of Sargon the Great date back to his lifetime, the legendary account of his birth is known from only four fragmentary tablets—three from the Neo-Assyrian period (934-605 bc) and one from the Neo-Babylonian

Today we pause and look at the early Neo-Assyrian army itself, the arm of the empire that was doing all the conquering. It is an infantry focused force, but we also have some to say about the world's first cavalry forces, as well as the prestigious but declining chariot. Sprinkling in some of what we know about Assyrian military tactics, strategy and psychology, we can see that the success of the army in these early years is not due to any one greatest strength, but instead the overwhelming dominance of the Assyrian military is a wide variety of fields. If you like the show, consider sharing with your friends, leaving a like, subscribing, or even supporting financially: Buy the Oldest Stories books: https://a.co/d/7Wn4jhS Donate here: https://oldeststories.net/ or on patreon: https://patreon.com/JamesBleckley or on youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCCG2tPxnHNNvMd0VrInekaA/join --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/oldeststories/message

Cyrus finishes the conquest of Babylon and Babylonia, frees the Jews from captivity, and manages the largest empire in the world.LINK:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IuCZgfGNMRgListener sent map of Neo Assyrian and Neo Babylonian Empires year by yearThis is a podcast by Dan Hörning and Bernie Maopolski.If you like what we do you can support the Fan of History project on https://www.patreon.com/fanofhistoryContact information:E-mail: zimwaupodcast@gmail.comhttp://facebook.com/fanofhistoryhttps://twitter.com/danhorninghttps://www.instagram.com/dan_horning/Music: “Tudor Theme” by urmymuse.Used here under a commercial Creative Commons license. Find out more at http://ccmixter.org/files/urmymuse/40020 Support the show and listen ad-free to all of the episodes, including episode 1-87. Click here: https://plus.acast.com/s/history. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Abstract: T. J. Uriona has offered two new theories about the meaning of Nephi's term “skin of blackness” in 2 Nephi 5:21. He suggests that Nephi's term may indicate impending death and/or it may be a literal reference to diseased or deathly skin. Both theories are based on a motif in an ancient Neo-Assyrian treaty […] The post Review of Two New Theories about the Lamanite Mark Recently Presented in Two Different Forums first appeared on The Interpreter Foundation.

Abstract: T. J. Uriona has offered two new theories about the meaning of Nephi's term “skin of blackness” in 2 Nephi 5:21. He suggests that Nephi's term may indicate impending death and/or it may be a literal reference to diseased or deathly skin. Both theories are based on a motif in an ancient Neo-Assyrian treaty […] The post Review of Two New Theories about the Lamanite Mark Recently Presented in Two Different Forums first appeared on The Interpreter Foundation.

Abstract: T. J. Uriona has offered two new theories about the meaning of Nephi's term “skin of blackness” in 2 Nephi 5:21. He suggests that Nephi's term may indicate impending death and/or it may be a literal reference to diseased or deathly skin. Both theories are based on a motif in an ancient Neo-Assyrian treaty […] The post Review of Two New Theories about the Lamanite Mark Recently Presented in Two Different Forums first appeared on The Interpreter Foundation.

The king today is Adad-Nirari II, but we have a lot to discuss in the background as well. The Nairi get their spotlight right before they get destroyed, and we look at the dating system for the Neo-Assyrian period and why it is so reliable, compared to the earlier parts of ancient history. And we also ask what an Empire is and whether or not the Neo-Assyrian Empire counts as one, which it does. Adad-Nirari is a conquering king, and though we know little about the army at this point, we know it is doing quite well under his leadership. --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/oldeststories/message

During this episode of the Red-Haired Archaeologist® Podcast, learn about the collapse of the Northern Kingdom to the Neo-Assyrians. Understand why the conquerors are “neo,” where the “lost tribes of Israel” went, and how the Samaritans' culture developed. Episode links: “House of David“ inscribed on a victory stele, (now at the Israel Museum): https://www.imj.org.il/en/collections/371407-0 Black Obelisk of Shalmaneser III: https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/W_1848-1104-1 “Ashur (Qal'at Sherqat),” UNESCO World Heritage Convention, https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/1130/ Timeline of Nimrud Excavations: http://oracc.museum.upenn.edu/nimrud/index.html Marcia Biggs, “Reduced to rubble by ISIS, archaeologists see a new day for ancient city of Nimrud,” PBS News Hour (12 April 2017): https://www.pbs.org/newshour/show/reduced-rubble-isis-archaeologists-see-new-day-ancient-city-nimrud Relief of Tiglath-Pileser III from Nimrud's Central Palace (now at the British Museum): https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/W_1856-0909-61 “Sargon II - The Ashur Charter," from the Library of Ashurbanipal (now at the British Museum): https://www.britishmuseum.org/collection/object/W_K-1349 Red-Haired Archaeologist® links: https://redhairedarchaeologist.com/free https://www.facebook.com/AmandaHopeHaley/ https://www.instagram.com/redhairedarchaeologist/ https://amandahopehaley.square.site/ Learn more about my fabulous video editor, Tanya Yaremkiv, by visiting her website at ⁠https://tanyaremkiv.com⁠ and listening to her podcast, Through the Bible podcast with Tanya Yaremkiv. You can also follow her on Facebook and Instagram @tanyaremkiv

What you'll learn in this episode: Why ancient Nubian jewelry is still significant today How the Kingdom of Kush rose and fell How ancient jewelry motifs, techniques and materials were shared and adapted between cultures Why the Museum of Fine Arts Boston has a significant collection of ancient Nubian art, and why it's being exhibited at the Getty Villa Why jewelry is often one of the only pathways to understand ancient cultures About Dr. Sara E. Cole Sara E. Cole is Assistant Curator of Antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum (Villa). She holds a PhD in Ancient History from Yale University. At the Getty, she is part of the Classical World in Context initiative, which seeks to highlight cross-cultural interactions in antiquity and explore the diversity and interconnectedness of the ancient Mediterranean and Near East through a series of special exhibitions and related publications and public programs. She has curated or assisted with exhibitions of Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Neo-Assyrian, Persian, and Nubian art. About “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan” from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston October 12, 2022 - April 3, 2023 Getty Villa Museum For nearly 3,000 years a series of kingdoms - collectively known as the Kingdom of Kush - flourished in ancient Nubia (present-day southern Egypt and northern Sudan). The region was rich in sought-after resources such as gold and ivory and its trade networks reached Egypt, Greece, Rome, and central Africa. This exhibition presents highlights from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston's extensive collection of Nubian objects and features superbly crafted jewelry, metalwork, and sculpture exhibiting the wealth and splendor of Nubian society. Learn more about the exhibit at https://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/nubian_jewelry/ Photos available on TheJewelryJourney.com Transcript: Nubian jewelry is often overshadowed by Egyptian and Greco-Roman jewelry, but the ancient Nubians were the world's first jewelry pioneers. Their influential work is currently on display at “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan,” an exhibit at the Getty Villa featuring pieces from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Dr. Sara E. Cole, assistant curator of the exhibit, joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about how Nubians developed their own enameling techniques; why jewelry is the key to understanding ancient cultures; and how iconography was shared and adapted throughout the ancient world. Read the episode transcript here.   Sharon: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the second part of a two-part episode. If you haven't heard part one, please head to TheJewelryJourney.com. Today, my guest is Sara Cole, who's the Assistant Curator of Antiquities at the Getty Villa in Malibu, California. She's the curator of “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan,” an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston which showcases Nubian material. These finds were jointly executed early in the last century by Harvard and the Museum of Fine Arts. The exhibit is now open until April 3. Welcome back. Can you look at a piece of jewelry and say, maybe not exactly where it came from, but the period? It's late; it's early? Can you look at one and know? Sara: To put it in a bigger perspective, something about this collection of material that makes it so special is that it is all from documented archaeological excavations that were carried out in the early 20th century. Jewelry can be quite challenging if you have no context for a piece other than by comparing it stylistically to other known examples. It can be quite difficult sometimes to try to approximate when and where something was made, or to say with 100% certainty that it's even ancient if you have no context for it. A lot of the same materials and techniques that were used in antiquity are used or can be mimicked today. But with all of this material, it came from documented archaeological excavation, so we know exactly where it was found. Thanks to that context, we are able to say approximately the time period in which it must have been made and used and placed in the tomb. I suppose you could compare other surviving examples with what we now know from the archaeological record, but with this material, we are able to be absolutely certain of its authenticity and the time period in which it was being made and used because we have that archaeological context. Because Nubia had such a close relationship with Egypt and they engaged in so much exchange, there are some pieces that are found in Nubian contexts that might have been made in Egypt and imported to Nubia. It's often very difficult to say precisely where something was made because they were using very similar techniques and materials and iconography. So, there are a number of pieces in the exhibition that we think might have been manufactured in Egypt and then imported into Nubia. But even where that's the case, those objects clearly have value to the Nubians because they speak to their cultural and religious beliefs and priorities. Sharon: So, people would wear this jewelry in life, the pectorals or amulets. Did they have the same thing in their grave? Were they buried with what they wore, or did they have something special for it? Is it something made just to be buried with? Sara: It's both, actually. These royal tombs contained rich assemblages of jewelry. Some of the items do appear, based on signs of wear, to have actually been worn in life and then placed in the tomb with the deceased. There are also pieces that appear to have been made specifically to go in the burial, things that are very, very delicate and seem like they would not have been able to work in real life, or certain objects that are made specifically for funerary contexts. There's one piece in the exhibition from the Napatan Period that's really exquisite. It's this large, gold repoussé image of the goddess Isis, who is kneeling and stretching her wings out in a protective gesture, but at the tips of her wings and below her legs are these little tabs that each have a hole punched in them. The piece is too delicate, it seems, to have been something that someone would wear in life. And because of those little tabs with the punched holes, we believe it was probably manufactured specifically for this king's burial, and that it was meant to be sewn into the linen mummy wrappings that were used to mummify his body. Often there were amulets, protective icons, pieces of jewelry that were incorporated into the wrappings during the mummification process. So, it's both. Some of these pieces were probably worn in life and then taken to the tomb, and some of them were made specifically for the burial context. Sharon: I'm surprised you can even tell the difference between Egypt and Nubia with the cross-pollination. You talk about Isis. Being an expert, how does somebody know it was Egyptian? The only thing I've heard is that earrings were Egyptian. There weren't earrings before that. Sara: It's actually the other way around. This is one of the areas where the Nubians may have influenced the Egyptians. Earrings appear in Nubia before they appear in Egypt, so it's possible the Egyptians got the idea for earrings from the Nubians. As I mentioned, too, the fly pendant ornament originates in Nubia and gets adopted by the Egyptians. So, there is influence going in both directions, and where the Nubians incorporate Egyptian religious ideas, religious iconography, protective icons, they're still adapting it. They're not directly copying it necessarily. They're adapting it to their local traditions, to the types of materials they work with, to the types of objects and ornaments they make. It's not necessarily just a direct copy. In some instances, it is hard to tell whether a specific piece was made in Nubia versus Egypt. But with the burials themselves, we know these are Nubians and not Egyptians because we're looking not just at the jewelry, but at the overall burial itself, the whole object assemblage, the types of materials they're being buried with. In addition to the jewelry, there would be things like vessels, pottery, tools, weapons, things that give us a bigger picture. The cultural identity is not just the jewelry, but also the way in which they're buried and the place in which they're buried. In the Kerma Period, they used a very distinctive type of burial. They used tumulus burials, these big, beehive-shaped mounds, which was a distinctive type of burial. Over time those mounds get larger and larger, and we can tell that some of them must have belonged to Kerma rulers. Even though there are now written records during that period, we're going strictly by the archaeological record. In the Napatan Period, they actually used Egyptian hieroglyphs for monumental inscriptions. We do start to get some written records that we can read, and when these kings' and queens' tombs were excavated, there were often items within the tomb inscribed with their names. So, we know who these tombs belonged to, and they belonged to Nubian and Napatan kings and queens. It's really looking at the big picture and not just at the jewelry specifically to identify who these items belonged to and whose burials they come from. Sharon: First, I want to know how anybody even knew these tombs were there. Everything you're describing, at least from the description of what was in the tombs, is what Carter found when he opened the tomb just a few years later, maybe 10 years later. I'm just wondering how they knew these tombs were there. How did they know that? Was it just the beehives that were standing on a farm? Sara: The material that's in the MFA Boston was all excavated in the early 20th century, from 1913 to 1932, by a joint Harvard/MFA Boston expedition led by an American archaeologist named George Reisner, who worked in both Egypt and Sudan. He took a team to Sudan that ended up excavating at Kerma, Napata and Meroë. He was tremendously successful in what he discovered, and he essentially rediscovered the city of Kerma. There have been excavations within the city itself, but they also discovered this vast cemetery outside of the city containing tens of thousands of these tumulus burials. Then at Napata and Meroë, they're utilizing pyramid burials, which are still visible on the landscape. You can walk up to them. He was really the first to do these rigorously documented, professional archaeological excavations of these places, and he found a tremendous amount of material. I should also mention the way it ended up in Boston is that, at the time, Sudan practiced the partage system, so he finds would essentially be split 50-50. About half the materials remain in Sudan, where it is now in the national museum in Khartoum, and about half the material was allowed to be taken back to Boston by Reisner, where it became part of the MFA collection. So, the MFA is now home to the largest and most significant collection of Nubian archaeological material in the world outside of Khartoum. Sharon: Did they suspect that there were these kingdoms, but nobody ever found them? Is that what happened? How did he start digging? Sara: To be perfectly honest, I would have to go back and double check how he determined exactly where he wanted to begin. Sharon: Why should we care about the Nubians? Why should we care about these kingdoms? You describe how it kept moving further south. That's usually because of agriculture. What caused them to move, besides invasion? Sara: That's a broad question. I don't know that we necessarily know for certain what was motivating them to move from one city to the next. In terms of the question of why we should care, that's something we could ask about any ancient civilization. It does raise this broader question about relevance that a lot of audiences are asking. I would say for Nubia especially, this is the region in northeastern Africa where some of the earliest civilizations of ancient Africa are arising. This is an incredibly important region that was also a real crossroads for international trade, given their connections to the Red Sea, into central Africa, into sub-Saharan Africa, and eventually out into the broader Mediterranean world. This was a very interconnected place with rich natural resources where some of the earliest complex civilizations of ancient Africa arise, so I think we absolutely should care about it. Speaking in terms of jewelry specifically, this is the place where some of the most exquisitely crafted, sophisticated pieces of ancient jewelry in the world were produced. They were incredibly skilled artisans who developed techniques for working with these materials that in some cases, like I mentioned with the enameling, were believed to have been invented in the modern era until recently. Sharon: That's amazing. I always have to think about the fact that they didn't have electric lights and they had to work by candlelight. They had to deal with sunlight only. I don't know exactly how to phrase this, but most of the time, if I were to take a piece from the little room of jewelry at the Getty Villa, and I want to take it out and put it on my wrists, nobody would know the difference. Would you say that's the same with a lot of this? Sara: I think so. It always strikes people how contemporary some of these pieces look. They look like things that could have been made today. Sharon: Were they going back or was this the start of it? Were they going back and building on what had been done before? Sara: They were really pioneers. They were developing new techniques and new styles for working with this material. In the pre-Kerma phase, in the archaeological record, there are items of personal adornment that are made from things like shell or imported faience sometimes, simple strings of beads, that kind of thing. But then as they develop kiln technology to make pottery, they're also able to apply that to making faience and eventually glass. They develop, as I mentioned, these very sophisticated techniques for working with different semiprecious stones, for working with gold, for working with glass and enameling. They're really not looking back to any existing precedent. They are developing these techniques for the first time. Sharon: That's amazing. You wonder why each civilization or each culture seems to have certain things that are ubiquitous, like a ram's head. You wonder, where did it start? What keeps your attention about all of this? Is it the cross-pollination? Sara: I don't even know where to begin answering that. I find this material endlessly fascinating. Every time you look at it, you see or appreciate something new, the intricacy of it, or as I mentioned, the ways in which this jewelry for the ancient Nubians is not just a status item. It's not just something beautiful to look at and wear. It's imbued with all of these layers of meaning. It reflects so many aspects of Nubian society and Nubian beliefs and Nubian practices. Because of the relative lack of written records from ancient Nubia, we are reliant on the archaeological record. So much of this jewelry helps us more broadly understand ancient Nubian society. I think you can come back to it and look at it over and over again and find new levels of meaning in it every time, as well as being able to appreciate how beautiful it is. Sharon: But you must have seen a lot of ancient jewelry. You've seen Greek and Roman and Egyptian and Nubian. What keeps your attention? What's so fascinating that it would keep your attention for so long? Sara: I think everything I just mentioned. The jewelry across ancient societies is fascinating for those same reasons, that it typically is not just about beauty and personal adornment. It's also reflective of cultural and religious beliefs, but I think it's the fact that this material is some of the earliest of its kind as well. As I mentioned, they're pioneers in developing new techniques or adopting techniques from other places and reengineering them as they did with faience, which was being made in Egypt prior to Nubia. They reengineered it, figured out how to make it for themselves. They were developing these unique techniques like the glazed quartz, the enameling techniques. It's incredible to think that 3,000, 4,000 years ago, people were making these items and developing these technologies and with handmade tools and natural light, and it would be very difficult to control temperatures of a kiln. It's incredible. Sharon: It is incredible. I know the Getty Villa is different than the Getty Center. The Getty Villa is a replica of a Roman villa, and it has a little room that has just jewelry. It's very small. It's a jewel box of a room, really. Do they have Nubian jewelry in there? Sara: We do not. We do not own any ancient Nubian jewelry in our permanent collection at the Villa. The Villa is a separate site from the Getty Center. We are home to the Getty Museum's Antiquities Collection specifically. Our permanent collection of antiquities is predominantly Greek, Roman and Etruscan. This Nubian exhibition is part of a broader initiative we've been engaged in in recent years, where we're trying to bring in special exhibitions featuring material from other ancient cultures and civilizations so our visitors can get a bigger picture of the ancient world. It's also so we're not perpetuating this idea that in antiquity, Greek and Roman are all there is. There's so much more than that. What's reflected in our permanent collection is Greek and Roman. So, through this special exhibition program, we're able to highlight other cultures. We also recently had a big exhibition on ancient Persia that included some stunning items of Persian jewelry. Sharon: I missed that one. Sara: We don't have any Nubian or Egyptian jewelry in our antiquities collection, so this is a unique opportunity. As I mentioned, this material is housed at the MFA Boston, so it's a unique opportunity for people on the West Coast to see a major exhibition of ancient Nubian material, but it is quite different. You can see some stylistic similarities like I mentioned with the Meroitic Period, when they have those trade connections to the Greco-Roman world. You can see stylistic similarities between some of our Greco-Roman pieces and some of the pieces in the Meroitic section of the exhibition, but it is very distinctive. It's a nice counterpoint. We have at the Getty a pretty significant collection of ancient, engraved gemstones as well as some Hellenistic gold jewelry and finger rings. You can see similarities. Finger rings with carved bezzles became very popular during the Meroitic Period as well, so you can see some similarities there with the rings being made in the Greco-Roman world. Sharon: If you haven't seen the little room with jewelry there, you could take any piece from the Greco-Roman era—and it's probably true of the Nubian era, too—and put it on, and nobody would know the difference if you went to the market. Sara: Yeah. Sharon: Something I came across mentioned the role of women in Nubia, that there was a stronger role. Can you tell us something about that? Sara: Yes, it seems throughout ancient Nubian history, in the Kingdom of Kush, royal women held particularly high status. We can see that in a few different ways. We can see that in their burials. We can see it some of their individual items of jewelry, which I'll mention, and we also see it in some of the practices that were being implemented, the roles that royal women had. In the Napatan period, there were a group of royal women who became associated with the god Amun and were sent to Thebes in Egypt, which was the Egyptian center of the worship of Egyptian Amun. These women were made into high priestesses of the god at his temple there. So, they held these very high-ranking, powerful positions, and these were royal women who were relatives of the Napatan kings who were also ruling in Egypt. They had great religious significance in this very important role, where they were sent to Egypt as god's wives of Amun, what we call them, or high priestesses of Amun. During the same period, there are some items of jewelry in royal women's tombs at Napata that speak to their importance. For instance, there's a piece in the exhibition that is easy to overlook because it's very small, but it's definitely worth taking the time to look at. It's a little silver pendant that shows the goddess Hathor, who I mentioned previously is the goddess of love and fertility and motherhood who gets adopted and becomes very important in the Nubian culture. It's an image of Hathor, and she is nursing a Nubian queen named Nefrukakashta. The item was found in her tomb. So, she is receiving, essentially, divine lifeforce from Hathor through being nursed by her. This is important because this was also a composition we see in Egypt,  but there it's only the kings who appear being nursed by Hathor. The king is embodying a divine role as pharaoh, so he receives divine lifeforce from Hathor. You never see royal women in ancient Egypt in this pose being nursed by Hathor, but in Nubia, we see it. The status of royal woman is higher there. They're considered worthy of being show in this position of being nursed by the goddess herself. By the time we get to the Meroitic Period, the final phase of the kingdom, there's actually a series of queens who take the throne for themselves and they rule as sole rules. These were very powerful women ruling over the Kingdom of Kush in its final phase, one of whom even famously fought off attempts at invasion by the Roman emperor Augusts. She signed a peace treaty with him to protect the border between Nubia and Egypt, which at that time had become a Roman province. So, royal women in ancient Nubia achieved very high status. Sharon: I think that's very interesting. I could talk to you for hours about the history of women and what happened after that. Thank you so much, Sara, for being with us today. I just want to remind you about the exhibit. I listened to a webinar and looked at the press release. It looks like it will be a very interesting exhibit. I look forward to seeing it in person live. It's through April 13. Dr. Sara Cole is the assistant curator. Thank you very much for being here today. Sara: Thank you so much for having me. We will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out. Thank you again for listening. Please leave us a rating and review so we can help others start their own jewelry journey.

What you'll learn in this episode: Why ancient Nubian jewelry is still significant today How the Kingdom of Kush rose and fell How ancient jewelry motifs, techniques and materials were shared and adapted between cultures Why the Museum of Fine Arts Boston has a significant collection of ancient Nubian art, and why it's being exhibited at the Getty Villa Why jewelry is often one of the only pathways to understand ancient cultures About Dr. Sara E. Cole Sara E. Cole is Assistant Curator of Antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum (Villa). She holds a PhD in Ancient History from Yale University. At the Getty, she is part of the Classical World in Context initiative, which seeks to highlight cross-cultural interactions in antiquity and explore the diversity and interconnectedness of the ancient Mediterranean and Near East through a series of special exhibitions and related publications and public programs. She has curated or assisted with exhibitions of Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Neo-Assyrian, Persian, and Nubian art. About “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan” from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston October 12, 2022 - April 3, 2023 Getty Villa Museum For nearly 3,000 years a series of kingdoms - collectively known as the Kingdom of Kush - flourished in ancient Nubia (present-day southern Egypt and northern Sudan). The region was rich in sought-after resources such as gold and ivory and its trade networks reached Egypt, Greece, Rome, and central Africa. This exhibition presents highlights from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston's extensive collection of Nubian objects and features superbly crafted jewelry, metalwork, and sculpture exhibiting the wealth and splendor of Nubian society. Learn more about the exhibit at https://www.getty.edu/art/exhibitions/nubian_jewelry/ Photos available on TheJewelryJourney.com Transcript: Nubian jewelry is often overshadowed by Egyptian and Greco-Roman jewelry, but the ancient Nubians were the world's first jewelry pioneers. Their influential work is currently on display at “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan,” an exhibit at the Getty Villa featuring pieces from the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. Dr. Sara E. Cole, assistant curator of the exhibit, joined the Jewelry Journey Podcast to talk about how Nubians developed their own enameling techniques; why jewelry is the key to understanding ancient cultures; and how iconography was shared and adapted throughout the ancient world. Read the episode transcript here. Sharon: Hello, everyone. Welcome to the Jewelry Journey Podcast. This is the first part of a two-part episode. Please make sure you subscribe so you can hear part two as soon as it's released later this week. Today, my guest is Sara Cole, who's the Assistant Curator of Antiquities at the Getty Villa in Malibu, California. She's the curator of “Nubia: Jewels of Ancient Sudan,” an exhibit at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston which showcases Nubian material. These finds were jointly executed early in the last century by Harvard and the Museum of Fine Arts. The exhibit is now open until April 3. Sara received her Ph.D. from Yale, which is amazing. She's an expert in ancient history and a specialist in material culture of Greco-Roman Egypt. She has studied the cross-pollination of cultures, and we'll hear a lot more about it today. Sara, welcome to the program. Sara: Thank you for having me. Sharon: So glad to have you. Tell us about your own journey. Did you come to jewelry through antiquities or archaeology, or the other way around? Sara: Yes, through my study of archaeology and Egyptology as a graduate student. That was primarily my introduction to this material. I became familiar with Nubia primarily through the MFA Boston's tremendous archaeological collection of Nubian material. When I was a graduate student at Yale back in, I think, 2011, I took a graduate seminar on Nubian archaeology with a Nubian specialist named Maria Gatto. In one of our classes, we took the train to Boston and got to spend a day going through the storerooms of the MFA looking at Nubian material. We were primarily looking at pottery that day, but we did get to see some other objects as well. In 2014, MFA put on its own small exhibition featuring their Nubian jewelry collection, so that brought that material a little bit more into public view. Then in 2019, the MFA did a big exhibition bringing out highlights of their full Nubian collection that was called “Ancient Nubia Now.” Since 2019, they very generously sent parts of this collection to different museums for exhibitions around the world. We're very fortunate at the Getty Villa that we were able to borrow some of these stunning pieces of jewelry and personal adornment from that collection for this current exhibition. Sharon: I have to ask you. When you were younger, you say you were interested in Egypt and ancient periods, but very few people go into archaeology. How is it that you stuck with it? Sara: Museums were really my entry point to the ancient world as a child, which I think is true for a lot of us. I grew up in a small town in Virginia and wasn't exposed to major museum collections as kid, but we had a small, local museum. It featured mostly local contemporary artists, but one summer they put on view a small touring exhibition of Egyptian material from the Virginia Museum of Fine Arts in Richmond. I was probably 11 or 12 years old. That was my first exposure to ancient Egyptian material, and I just found it incredibly captivating and compelling, and I stuck with that interest. I ended up doing a bachelor's degree in classics and then my Ph.D. in ancient history, where I studied a combination of Egyptology, classics and art history. But I've always had a great passion for museums in particular because it was my personal entry point to the ancient world. We do have the opportunity, through putting on exhibitions like this, to reach such wide audiences and to bring this material to their attention, things they've maybe never seen or considered before. It's a really wonderful opportunity. Sharon: It really is. When you say Nubia, a lot of us haven't really thought about Nubia or Nubian jewels. That's the entry point or the foundation. What is Nubia? What do you mean by Nubian? Sara: That's a great question, because I think a lot of people have heard of Nubia but they're not quite sure what it is. Traditionally it has received a lot less attention than ancient Egypt, which is this huge, looming civilization. When we talk about ancient Nubia, we're really talking about a geographical region that was located immediately south of ancient Egypt. They were neighbors. In terms of modern-day geography, it reached essentially from Aswan in what is now southern Egypt down to about Khartoum in present-day Sudan. The contemporary political border between Egypt and Sudan cuts across part of what was ancient Nubia, when the border was located further north between Nubia and Egypt. So, it's essentially this geographical region going across part of what is today southern Egypt and northern Sudan. For parts of its ancient history, Nubia as a region was actually home to several different cultural groups. It wasn't always a single, unified culture. So, when we talk about Nubia, we're talking about the geographical area, and then there were different cultures that lived within Nubia. Around the third millennium B.C., a political institute called the Kingdom of Kush—because the region was known as Kush in antiquity—arose at the city of Karma in what is today Sudan. It eventually came to conquer essentially all of the region of Nubia. The Kingdom of Kush lasted on and off for a period of almost 3,000 years, and it moved to different capital cities in different phases. It first arose at Kerma in the third millennium B.C., then moved further south to a capital called Napata, which was also along the Nile River, around 750 B.C. Then in its final phase, starting around 350 B.C., it was centered at a city even further south on the Nile River called Meroë. So, when we talk about ancient Nubia, we're talking about that region, but for this exhibition, we're really focusing on items of jewelry that were worn by royalty and the elite of the Kingdom of Kush that were found at these three successive capital cities. Sharon: I was going to ask you if Napata and—is it Morocco? Sara: Meroë. Sharon: Meroë. I've heard so much about it, but did they all have jewelry? Did the royalty all have jewelry at all three of these sites? Sara: Yes, absolutely. Throughout human history, I think in all cultures we see personal adornment as a universal means of self-expression. It's a means of expressing status and power. But also in antiquity, much of this jewelry, either the materials themselves or the iconography incorporated into it, had symbolic religious significance. Items of jewelry were often amuletic and protective, or they could signify one's status in society, one's role. They reflect a lot about an ancient culture's social organization, religious beliefs, communities, etc. These items of jewelry speak to so much more than being aesthetically beautiful status items. So, yes, even very early in Kerma and even in pre-Kerma archaeology, we find items of jewelry in the archaeological record. Jewelry was very essential, especially for rulers and for individuals of high status, to express themselves in ancient Nubia. Sharon: Did both men and women have jewelry? Sara: Yes, they did. Men, women, children, and sometimes even very prized royal animals were adorned with jewelry. Sharon: Were these from tombs or graves? Sara: Yes, essentially all of the items in this exhibition were excavated from royal and wealthy burials. This was material that people valued in life but also chose to take with them to the grave. As a I mentioned, a lot of these pieces have iconography that is protective or amuletic, which would have particular significance in the context of the tomb. These are images that are going to protect you as you are making your transition to the afterlife. So, all of the material was excavated from burials. That is primarily where we find these high-status jewelry items still surviving. They survive because they were buried, and people didn't have the opportunity to reuse them or repurpose the materials. Sharon: First of all, I think I forgot to say that this exhibit is only on until April 3, which comes up quickly. I can't remember if I said that or not. Sara: Yes, two more months to go see it at the Villa. Sharon: When you say it's like a dynasty or the Kingdom of Kush lasted 3,000 years, I have this idea that it rose high and then it was—I don't want to say nothing, but they weren't reading. It was like the Dark Ages in a sense, really dark, and then it rose again in a different place. How did that work? Sara: The Kingdom of Kush went through fluctuations over that 3,000-year period. I wouldn't necessarily call it dark ages. The Nubians simply never developed the same tradition of extensive written records like we get from Egypt, so much of our knowledge of Nubia comes from the archaeological material. We just don't have extensive written historical documentation from this region. It wasn't part of the culture. They had a very complicated relationship with their neighbor to the north, Egypt, which is largely the reason for these periods of rise and fall. The Kingdom of Kush arose, like I mentioned, at Kerma in Sudan, during which time in northern Nubia, there were other cultural groups inhabiting that region who were in conflict with Egypt. The Kingdom of Kush eventually was able to take that region and unify Nubia under its rule. Kerma flourished for almost 1,000 years, from about 2,400 B.C. until roughly 1,550 B.C. But what happened around 1,550 was that Egypt entered into a very powerful period in its history, the New Kingdom, the rise of the Eighteenth Dynasty, and those kings invaded Nubia and took over. They occupied Nubia for about 500 years, during which time we don't have a tremendous amount of archaeological evidence for what was going on. But it seems like Nubians and Egyptians were essentially coexisting in Nubia during this period. As you can imagine, over 500 years, there's a huge amount of cross-cultural exchange as a result of the Egyptian presence in Nubia. Some Egyptian religious ideas get incorporated into local Nubian tradition, as does a lot of iconography. There are a lot of ways in which the Nubians start adapting some Egyptian concepts to their own local practices. Then the Egyptians get pushed out of Nubia around 1,000 B.C. approximately. The Kingdom of Kush starts to regroup and rebuild itself, and it reappears fully around 750 B.C., now at the capital city of Napata. What's interesting at the beginning of the Napatan phase is that the Nubians turn the tables on Egypt and invade them. They take over Egypt and rule for about 80 years. For that 80-year period, staring around 725 B.C., the Kingdom of Kush is at its greatest extent, going all the way from what is today Sudan up to the Mediterranean coast, ruling over both Nubia and Egypt. After that 80-year period, they get pushed out of Egypt but are still ruling the Kingdom of Kush from Napata. We see some really interesting ways in which the rulers of that 80-year period adapted an Egyptian mode of self-presentation. They're trying to present themselves as legitimate pharaohs in Egypt. They start presenting themselves in a way that is adapted from earlier pharaonic styles of self-presentation. Even though the Nubian kings are spending some time in Egypt, they choose to be sent back to Napata for their royal burials, and they start using pyramid tombs during this period. They start practicing mummification and incorporating some Egyptian-style object assemblages into their burials. We see some of those practices get adapted during this 80-year period, including the incorporation of a lot of Egyptian religious iconography into their jewelry. We see those trends continue later, even when they're no longer ruling in Egypt. Then during this Napatan phase, which lasts roughly 400 years, they start to gradually shift the capital further south to this third city of Meroë. By around 350 B.C., both the administrative capital and the royal cemetery have moved to Meroë, and this is the final phase of the Kingdom of Kush. This is a phase that lasts from roughly 350 B.C. to 350 A.D., when the Kingdom of Kush falls. It corresponds with the conquests of Alexander the Great throughout the eastern Mediterranean and ancient Near East, the rise of his successor kingdoms and then the rise of the Roman Empire. But throughout all of this, the Kingdom of Kush maintained its political independence. It never became part of Alexander's territories; it never became part of the Roman Empire, unlike Egypt, which did. They had a complex relationship with Rome, who at times tried to take Nubia unsuccessfully, but they were also connected to these vast trade networks that connected the Mediterranean and the Near East throughout the Roman Empire. It was a very cosmopolitan place, ancient Meroë. They were very closely connected through trade networks to the rest of the world. They were also producing some incredibly high-status pieces of jewelry with really exquisite craftsmanship. Then the Kingdom of Kush falls around 350 A.D. That's the big picture of what we're looking at here, with the history of the Kingdom of Kush and its different phases. Sharon: When you say Nubia, is that the same as the Kingdom of Kush? Do you mean the Kingdom of Kush or Nubia are one in the same, I guess? Sara: Nubia in antiquity was known as Kush, and then the Kingdom of Kush is the political entity ruling over that region. Sharon: Did the jewelry change over the years? Sara: It did, yes. We do see that even across these different phases, each one has a distinctive aesthetic. There is no single, unified Nubian look to the jewelry. Different fashions change over time. Different popular materials come in and out of fashion. In Kerma, in the earliest phases, we see jewelers making items out of locally available and imported organic materials. They're making use of things like hippo and elephant ivory to create cuff bracelets. They're making use of shells they imported from the Red Sea coast and fashioned into different items. They were also importing faience from Egypt. Ancient faience was a man-made, blue-green, glazed, quartz-based ceramic material that was very popular in Egypt. The Kermans were importing it initially, but then they developed their own faience-making technology and were able to produce their own. So, we start to see the use of this man-made material. They're using gold. Nubia in antiquity is known primarily as a land of gold because of their rich gold resources in the Eastern Desert. That was their main coveted natural resource. They had incredibly skillful techniques in working with gold. We see them using locally available semiprecious stones, things like carnelian and amethyst. They work with quartz in some really interesting ways. Quartz is found alongside gold, so it was probably symbolically associated with gold. Gold was valued not only because it was this very prized economic resource, but it was also an imperishable material. It was associated with immortality and the sun, and it was very highly symbolically valued. They would take quartz and do an interesting treatment that, as far as I am aware, is distinctive to ancient Kerma. They would take the quartz, either shaping it into spherical beads or taking chunks of it in its raw form to use as pendants, and they would put a blue-green glaze over it and fire it in a kiln to create a hard, shiny, translucent blue surface that creates this stunning, glass-like appearance when it's done successfully. It was a delicate technique. You had to be very careful, because if you raised the temperature in the kiln too quickly, the quartz would fracture and burst, and you would lose your item of jewelry you were making. They had to be very careful in this process, but again, as far as I know, this is a distinctive Kerman technique, a distinctive way of working with quartz. Those were the types of materials they were utilizing to make items of jewelry. There's also a particular ornament we start to see in Kerma that is really interesting and later gets adopted by the Egyptians, which is the fly pendant. They are these large pendants that were often worn in pairs strung around the neck, and they represent flies. We have an example in the exhibition where the head is made of gilded bronze and the wings are carved out of ivory. These are found in soldiers' tombs. They appear to have been given as a medal of honor to high-status members of the Nubian military. We can ask why they would choose a fly of all things to honor a member of the military, and we believe it's because if you go to Egypt, if you go to the Nile Valley, you will experience that the flies are very big and mean and aggressive. So, we think these fly pendants are a way of associating the aggression and the tenacity of the Nilotic flies with the aggression and the tenacity of Nubian warriors. Later these fly pendants actually get adopted in Egypt as well as a military medal of honor. So, those were the kinds of things we find at Kerma. As I mentioned, that period comes to an end with this big invasion of the Egyptians around 1,500 B.C. Then when the Kingdom of Kush rearises at Napata around 750 B.C., they invade Egypt. They take over, and we start to see how this 500-year period of intense cross-cultural interaction has resulted in the introduction of a lot of Egyptian iconography into the royal jewelry. We start to see a lot of images of goddesses like Hathor and Isis, who became very important in the Nubian pantheon. There is an Egyptian god called Amun who becomes introduced as the supreme god of ancient Nubia, but in his Nubian form specifically, he takes the form of a ram or a man with a ram's head. We believe that before this period, there was probably an indigenous ram god who Amun became assimilated with. So, we see a lot of ram iconography in the jewelry. There's a lot of iconography associated with the goddess Hathor, who was this Egyptian goddess of love, fertility, beauty and motherhood with whom Nubian queens and royal women became particularly associated. We see a lot of that kind of iconography. We see protective icons that have been introduced from Egypt, things like the Eye of Floridus, the scarab beetle, that kind of thing. They're working a lot in faience still. There are some queens' tombs from this period where these large faience plaques are very popular, again in the shapes of religious protective imagery, amuletic icons, gods and goddesses. They were big plaques that were strung on strings of beads and worn around the neck, essentially meant to sit over the chest to protect the pectorals. We see a lot of that kind of thing, this incorporation of new iconography, new religious ideas, sometimes a very Egyptian mode of self-presentation that they've adopted from the Egyptians. They're working in faience; they're working in gold. We do see some silver during this period. Silver was not locally available; it was an imported material, but we do see a lot of skilled gold work during this phase. They are developing some very sophisticated techniques for how to fashion items of jewelry, but also things like golden vessels. This is a phase where we start to see that Egyptian influence and some increasing sophistication in the techniques with which they're working, with both these man-made and locally available resources. In the Meroitic Period, we see those gold working techniques really hit their stride. There is some tremendously sophisticated gold work made during the Meroitic Period, where they're using techniques like granulation and filigree and very delicate wirework. At Meroë, they also start producing glass. Glass beads start to appear in the jewelry. Something that Meroë distinctively is also known for is the use of a wide range of enameling techniques. They would take powdered glass and apply it to the surface of items of jewelry, and then heat it to fuse it and create it a hard, shiny, colorful surface. There were multiple enameling techniques they developed at Meroë, some of which, prior to their discovery at Meroë, were thought to have not been invented until the modern era. There were techniques they developed at Meroë, and the knowledge of that technology was lost and rediscovered in modern times. This is also a phase during which we see, as I mentioned, a kind of cosmopolitan international style developing. We do see some Greco-Roman influences coming into play in the form of large, dangly pendant earrings and the development of new color schemes, for instance. There was a color scheme at Meroë that was especially popular, which was red, white and black. They would use cornelian, which was a popular material, to achieve the red and then import obsidian for black and travertine for white. Each phase has its own distinctive repertoire of objects and iconography and manufacturing techniques that were being used. Sharon: We will have photos posted on the website. Please head to TheJewelryJourney.com to check them out. END OF PART ONE

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/new-books-network

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/history

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/middle-eastern-studies

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Eight women appear in Neo-Assyrian sources from the 7th and 8th centuries BCE with the ambiguous but intriguing title 'queen of the Arabs.' Despite providing a rare glimpse of power wielded by women in this period, these rulers remain under-studied and often misunderstood in Assyriology. Aiming to correct these misconceptions, 'the queens of the Arabs' formed the basis of Dr. Ellie Bennett's doctoral dissertation (University of Helsinki, 2021). In this episode Dr. Bennett joins me to talk about gender, language, king- and queenship, the "Arabs" and life in the Arabian Peninsula, and depictions and understandings of nomadism in the Neo-Assyrian Period. Follow Dr. Bennett on Twitter: @sharratu_EllieB . Read the dissertation "The 'Queens of the Arabs' during the Neo-Assyrian Period." *Content warning for descriptions of violence against women in this episode* Music in this episode: Desert City by Kevin MacLeod. License. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Episode: In part 2 of this series, Kyle and Chris discuss additional historical and archaeological aspects associated with the origin stories of Jesus as seen in Matthew and Luke. They discuss the archaeological background and traditions associated with the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. They also explain a number of other historical background elements connected with Matthew's use of the Old Testament focusing – in particular – on the impact of the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian conquests of Israel and Judah in prophetic literature and how that context still matters for how one reads the origin narrative of Jesus in Matthew. (This is a re-broadcast of a previously published episode) Relevant Articles The Accommodations of Joseph and Mary in Bethlehem: Κατάλυμα in Luke 2.7* STEPHEN C. CARLSON Hosts: Chris McKinny and Kyle Keimer. Give: Help support OnScript's Biblical World HERE. Thanks to all of you who have supported us! Image by Jeff Jacobs from Pixabay

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: The Black Bouquet Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in March, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Settle in for a HEFTY episode, folks! This week, Amber and Anna examine the world of the Neo-Assyrian empire. This means some substantial time spent context-setting, thanks to the complex nature of early Mesopotamian politics, religion, warfare, and state propaganda. Then we look further at that carefully crafted state propaganda and its influence on Assyriology. THEN we get into a bit of archaeology, and finally, discuss the Neo-Assyrian legacy and descendant communities. What a ride! Interested in learning about how to use X-Rays and similar technology in archaeology? Check out the linked PaleoImaging course from James Elliot! Connect with James on Twitter: @paleoimaging Interested in sponsoring this show or podcast ads for your business? Zencastr makes it really easy! Click this message for more info. *LISTENER NOTE* We discuss some pretty graphically violent art in this episode, starting around time stamp 35:00. Content warning for war crimes and sexual assault--skip ahead about 25 minutes. Links Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East (via WorldCat) Ideology and Propaganda in Assyrian Art (Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires) The Assyrians — The Appalling Lords of Torture (Medium, cn illustrations of graphic violence) Assurnasirpal II, king of Assyria (r. 883-859 BC) (Nimrud: Materialities of Assyrian Knowledge Production) Object: The Banquet Scene (The British Museum) Assyria: Lion hunts, Siege of Lachish and Khorsabad (The British Museum) Ancient salmu and the (Post-) Modern Scholar (JAGNES, via Academia.edu) Early Excavations in Assyria (Metropolitan Museum of Art) A History of the Ancient Near East (via WorldCat) Cuneiform Texts and the Writing of History (via WorldCat) Marxist Historiography and the Ancient Near East (What's Left of Marxism: Historiography and the Possibilities of Thinking with Marxian Themes and Concepts, via Google Books) Ancient near Eastern History from eurocentrism to an Open World (ISIMU: Revista sobre Oriente Próximo y Egipto en la antigüedad 2) Approaching ancient Assyria through archaeology leads to new insights (Universiteit Leiden) Archaeologists Find 2,700-Year-Old Assyrian-Style Leather Armor in China (Sci-News) (Re)Animating The Oikos: Tell Billa's Domestic Space In 3D (UPenn) Excavations at Nineveh: The Halzi Gate (IRAQ) The sack of Nineveh in 612 (Nineveh. The Great City. Symbol of Beauty and Power, via Academia.edu) Assyrians (UNPO) Assyrian Aramaic Dialects | Similarities & Differences (via YouTube) Assyrians Celebrate Akitu In Northern Syria (North Press Agency Syria) Contact Email the Dirt Podcast: thedirtpodcast@gmail.com ArchPodNet APN Website: https://www.archpodnet.com APN on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/archpodnet APN on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/archpodnet APN on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/archpodnet Tee Public Store Affiliates Wildnote TeePublic Timeular Motion

In this week's episode of Unruly Figures, we're diving deep into ancient history to cover the Neo-Assyrian queen Shammurammat, better known as the legendary divine queen and conqueror Semiramis. As always, you can get ad-free versions of the episode, and much much more on the Unruly Figures Substack: http://unrulyfigures.substack.com That's always where you can find transcripts of each episode, photos of each episode's subject, and behind-the-scenes goodies. So come join us! --- Send in a voice message: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/unruly-figures/message Support this podcast: https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/unruly-figures/support

Settle in for a HEFTY episode, folks! This week, Amber and Anna examine the world of the Neo-Assyrian empire. This means some substantial time spent context-setting, thanks to the complex nature of early Mesopotamian politics, religion, warfare, and state propaganda. Then we look further at that carefully crafted state propaganda and its influence on Assyriology. THEN we get into a bit of archaeology, and finally, discuss the Neo-Assyrian legacy and descendant communities. What a ride! Interested in learning about how to use X-Rays and similar technology in archaeology? Check out the linked PaleoImaging course from James Elliot! Connect with James on Twitter: @paleoimaging Interested in sponsoring this show or podcast ads for your business? Zencastr makes it really easy! Click this message for more info. *LISTENER NOTE* We discuss some pretty graphically violent art in this episode, starting around time stamp 35:00. Content warning for war crimes and sexual assault--skip ahead about 25 minutes. Links Cultural Atlas of Mesopotamia and the Ancient Near East (via WorldCat) Ideology and Propaganda in Assyrian Art (Power and Propaganda: A Symposium on Ancient Empires) The Assyrians — The Appalling Lords of Torture (Medium, cn illustrations of graphic violence) Assurnasirpal II, king of Assyria (r. 883-859 BC) (Nimrud: Materialities of Assyrian Knowledge Production) Object: The Banquet Scene (The British Museum) Assyria: Lion hunts, Siege of Lachish and Khorsabad (The British Museum) Ancient salmu and the (Post-) Modern Scholar (JAGNES, via Academia.edu) Early Excavations in Assyria (Metropolitan Museum of Art) A History of the Ancient Near East (via WorldCat) Cuneiform Texts and the Writing of History (via WorldCat) Marxist Historiography and the Ancient Near East (What's Left of Marxism: Historiography and the Possibilities of Thinking with Marxian Themes and Concepts, via Google Books) Ancient near Eastern History from eurocentrism to an Open World (ISIMU: Revista sobre Oriente Próximo y Egipto en la antigüedad 2) Approaching ancient Assyria through archaeology leads to new insights (Universiteit Leiden) Archaeologists Find 2,700-Year-Old Assyrian-Style Leather Armor in China (Sci-News) (Re)Animating The Oikos: Tell Billa's Domestic Space In 3D (UPenn) Excavations at Nineveh: The Halzi Gate (IRAQ) The sack of Nineveh in 612 (Nineveh. The Great City. Symbol of Beauty and Power, via Academia.edu) Assyrians (UNPO) Assyrian Aramaic Dialects | Similarities & Differences (via YouTube) Assyrians Celebrate Akitu In Northern Syria (North Press Agency Syria) Contact Email the Dirt Podcast: thedirtpodcast@gmail.com ArchPodNet APN Website: https://www.archpodnet.com APN on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/archpodnet APN on Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/archpodnet APN on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/archpodnet Tee Public Store Affiliates Wildnote TeePublic Timeular Motion

Schedule: Sunday: D&D 3.5e / World of Darkness-Mage the Awakening Monday: D&D 3.5e-Weapons of Legacy Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in February, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Guests: Kirra, Jojo First, Ensuhkeshdanna, the haughty lord of faraway Aratta, demands the submission of our hero Enmerkar, the wise king of noble Unug. When Enmerkar refuses to so debase himself, the lord of Aratta plots a campaign of economic sabotage by means of dark sorcery. Then, an introduction to the Uruk expansion (or the Uruk phenomenon), a process of intensive trade, migration, and cultural interaction spanning most of the Near East for most of the 4th millennium BCE. This episode focuses on the Middle Uruk period (3800-3400 BCE). Then, we return to Susiana, in southwestern Iran, to pick up right after the end of the Susa 1 period (in episode 16). A population explosion accompanies the introduction of Uruk-style material culture (that is, similar to the culture of southern Mesopotamia). We tour the small rural village of Shafarabad and the revitalized city of Susa. What can we know about Susiana's relationship to the Mesopotamian alluvium during this period? Then, we return to Tell Brak in northeastern Syria as it, too, is incorporated into the Middle Uruk economy. The climate is drying and the city is shrinking, but they do manage to build a pretty cool temple! Then, a handful of other sites incorporated into the Uruk world: Tell Hamoukar (near Brak), Tepe Gawra (from episode 15), and Nineveh (more famous as the capital of the Neo-Assyrian empire). Then, we visit Hacınebi in southeastern Anatolia, one of several pre-existing large towns with their own history of administrative record-keeping subsumed within the Uruk trade network. Finally: wizard fights are the continuation of diplomacy by other means! Questions? Feedback? Email us at drumbeatforeverafter@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter and Instagram @drumbeatforever Works cited

Schedule: Sunday: Demeter's Testimony (Foxy) Monday: Roleplaying Games (D&D 3.5e Weapons of Legacy) Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in January, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Neo-Assyrian leather armor? In a Western Chinese tomb? It's a classic, what's up with that situation. Is it really Neo-Assyrian? How do we know? If so, how did it get there? What can we make of a sample of one? Why are we talking about Ricardo Montalban? It's an episode so filled with questions that we're literally bubbling over.

Schedule: Sunday: Demeter's Testimony (Foxy) Monday: Roleplaying Games (D&D 3.5e Weapons of Legacy) Tuesday: Scottish Folklore For Children Wednesday: Ancient Civilizations Thursday: Metro 2033 Friday: Strange Stories Saturday: Into the Abyss This schedule will take effect in January, 2022, for my third season. --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/message Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/roger-hanson/support

Episode: In part 2 of this series, Kyle and Chris discuss additional historical and archaeological aspects associated with the origin stories of Jesus as seen in Matthew and Luke. They discuss the archaeological background and traditions associated with the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem. They also explain a number of other historical background elements connected with Matthew's use of the Old Testament focusing – in particular – on the impact of the Neo-Assyrian and Neo-Babylonian conquests of Israel and Judah in prophetic literature and how that context still matters for how one reads the origin narrative of Jesus in Matthew.  Relevant Articles The Accommodations of Joseph and Mary in Bethlehem: Κατάλυμα in Luke 2.7* STEPHEN C. CARLSON Hosts: Chris McKinny and Kyle Keimer. Give: Help support OnScript's Biblical World HERE. Thanks to all of you who have supported us! Image by Jeff Jacobs from Pixabay   

This episode takes us back to the juggernaut of the iron age, Assyria and to the last great conqueror of the Neo-Assyrian empire, Esarhaddon, who  accomplished what was perhaps the greatest conquest in the empire history, the conquest of Egypt !! 

Aramaic is a language that for some three thousand years facilitated the exchange of ideas across large tracts of the Middle East and Asia. In its heyday it was the main official and written language across the Neo-Assyrian and Achaemenid empires. It was the language in which several sections of the Old Testament Bible were written. A Galilean dialect of Aramaic was probably the language Jesus spoke. Different dialects of Aramaic still exist today but numbers of speakers are dwindling and there are fears that it could die out. So what is the story of Aramaic? Why did it become so influential and then go into decline? And how much has it changed over its long history? Bridget Kendall is joined by three distinguished scholars of Aramaic: Professor Holger Gzella from Ludwig-Maximilians University in Munich is the author of numerous publications on Aramaic as well as being an expert on other Old Testament languages. Professor Alison Salvesen from Oxford University works on ancient interpretations of the Hebrew Bible including its Aramaic versions. She is also an authority on Jacob of Edessa, a leading religious scholar who wrote in one of the many variants of Aramaic. Dr. Alinda Damsma teaches Biblical Hebrew at University College London and Aramaic at the Ecole Rabbinique in Paris. She studies medieval Aramaic dialects, especially in Jewish mystical literature, and has also done field research on the current use of the language. [Image: Aramaic script on a stone slab from Palmyra, Syria. Credit: mtcurado/Getty Images]

Probably the oldest transmitted hero myth we know is from the period of the foundation of Babylonia (circa 2800 BC). It concerns the birth history of its founder, Sargon of Akkad. He was best known for his conquests of the Sumerian city-states in the 24th to 23rd centuries BC. The Sumerian king list makes him the cup-bearer to king Ur- Zababa of Kish. Sargon appears as a legendary figure in Neo-Assyrian literature of the 8th to 7th centuries BC. Tablets with fragments of a Sargon Birth Legend were found in the Library of Ashurbanipal. This episode is also available as a blog post: http://martinifisher.com/2018/12/07/sargon-karna-and-ion-hidden-sons-of-virgin-mothers/

Conservation is one of the most important and often most misunderstood roles within a museum. In this episode of Object Matters Dr Craig Barker is joined by the Chau Chak Wing Museum's former Conservator Alayne Alvis to discuss the function of conservation and the role of a conservator in the process of collection management and exhibitions. The object the pair discuss dates to c. 730-720 BC and is a Neo Assyrian carved ivory plaque of a female figure that Alayne has worked very closely with. Excavated by Sir Max Mallowan from Fort Shalmaneser at Nimrud in Iraq in the 1950s, the discussion leads from the difference between field conservation and museum conservation, the ethics of working with ivory and the crime writer Agatha Christie's role in the excavation of Assyrian ivories. What can we learn from objects as a result of the close analysis and detailed observations afforded by conservation treatment? Object record: NM59.12. Muse article: Bollen, E. and Alvis, A. (2013) The Mystery of the Nimrud Ivory, MUSE, 5, pp. 15-17 Guest: Alayne Alvis was Conservator for the collections of the University of Sydney for over a decade, and the inaugural Conservator for the Chau Chak Wing Museum.   Host: Dr Craig Barker, Head, Public Engagement, Chau Chak Wing Museumand Director, Paphos Theatre Archaeological Excavations. Follow @DrCraig_B on Twitter and Instagram.  __ Subscribe to Muse Extra, our monthly newsletter and follow @ccwm_sydney on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook. Learn more about the Chau Chak Wing Museum at sydney.edu.au/museum

In this episode, we continue the story of Tiglath-Pileser III, covering the major reforms the great Neo-Assyrian king enacted, and of course, his great conquests. Combined, these two transformed Assyria into the world's first true empire, as well as the greatest and largest the world had ever seen !!

Science in antiquity was at times devised to be useful and at other times to prove to the people that the gods looked favorably on the ruling class. Greek philosophers tell us a lot about how the ancient world developed. Or at least, they tell us a Western history of antiquity. Humanity began working with bronze some 7,000 years ago and the Bronze Age came in force in the centuries leading up to 3,000 BCE. By then there were city-states and empires. The Mesopotamians brought us the wheel in around 3500 BCE, and the chariot by 3200 BCE. Writing formed in Sumeria, a city state of Mesopotamia, in 3000 BCE. Urbanization required larger cities and walls to keep out invaders. King Gilgamesh built huge walls. They used a base 60 system to track time, giving us the 60 seconds and 60 minutes to get to an hour. That sexagesimal system also gave us the 360 degrees in a circle. They plowed fields and sailed. And sailing led to maps, which they had by 2300 BCE. And they gave us the Epic, with the Epic of Gilgamesh which could be old as 2100 BCE. At this point, the Egyptian empire had grown to 150,000 square kilometers and the Sumerians controlled around 20,000 square kilometers. Throughout, they grew a great trading empire. They traded with China, India and Egypt with some routes dating back to the fourth millennia BCE. And commerce and trade means the spread of not only goods but also ideas and knowledge. The earliest known writing of complete sentences in Egypt came to Egypt a few hundred years after it did in Mesopotamia, as the Early Dynastic period ended and the Old Kingdom, or the Age of the Pyramids. Perhaps over a trade route.  The ancient Egyptians used numerals, multiplications, fractions, geometry, architecture, algebra, and even quadratic equations. Even having a documented base 10 numbering system on a tomb from 3200 BCE. We also have the Moscow Mathematical Papyrus, which includes geometry problems, the Egyptian Mathematical Leather Roll, which covers how to add fractions, the Berlin Papyrus with geometry, the Lahun Papyri with arithmetical progressions to calculate the volume of granaries, the Akhmim tablets, the Reisner Papyrus, and the Rhind Mathematical Papyrus, which covers algebra and geometry. And there's the Cairo Calendar, an ancient Egyptian papyrus from around 1200 BCE with detailed astronomical observations. Because the Nile flooded, bringing critical crops to Egypt. The Mesopotamians traded with China as well. As the Shang dynasty from the 16th to 11th centuries BCE gave way to the Zhou Dynasty, which went from the 11th to 3rd centuries BCE and the Bronze Age gave way to the Iron Age, science was spreading throughout the world. The I Ching is one of the oldest Chinese works showing math, dating back to the Zhou Dynasty, possibly as old as 1000 BCE. This was also when the Hundred Schools of Thought began, which Conscious inherited around the 5th century BCE. Along the way the Chinese gave us the sundial, abacus, and crossbow. And again, the Bronze Age signaled trade empires that were spreading ideas and texts from the Near East to Asia to Europe and Africa and back again. For a couple thousand years the transfer of spices, textiles and precious metals fueled the Bronze Age empires.  Along the way the Minoan civilization in modern Greece had been slowly rising out of the Cycladic culture. Minoan artifacts have been found in Canaanite palaces and as they grew they colonized and traded. They began a decline around 1500 BCE, likely due to a combination of raiders and volcanic eruptions. The crash of the Minoan civilization gave way to the Myceneaen civilization of early Greece.  Competition for resources and land in these growing empires helped to trigger wars.  Those in turn caused violence over those resources. Around 1250 BCE, Thebes burned and attacks against city states cities increased, sometimes by emerging empires of previously disassociated tribes (as would happen later with the Vikings) and sometimes by other city-states.  This triggered the collapse of Mycenaen Greece, the splintering of the Hittites, the fall of Troy, the absorption of the Sumerian culture into Babylon, and attacks that weakened the Egyptian New Kingdom. Weakened and disintegrating empires leave room for new players. The Iranian tribes emerged to form the Median empire in today's Iran. The Assyrians and Scythians rose to power and the world moved into the Iron age. And the Greeks fell into the Greek Dark Ages until they slowly clawed their way out of it in the 8th century BCE. Around this time Babylonian astronomers, in the capital of Mesopomania, were making astronomical diaries, some of which are now stored in the British Museum.  Greek and Mesopotamian societies weren't the only ones flourishing. The Indus Valley Civilization had blossomed from 2500 to 1800 BCE only to go into a dark age of its own. Boasting 5 million people across 1,500 cities, with some of the larger cities reaching 40,000 people - about the same size as Mesopotamian cities. About two thirds are in modern day India and a third in modern Pakistan, an empire that stretched across 120,000 square kilometers. As the Babylonian control of the Mesopotamian city states broke up, the Assyrians began their own campaigns and conquered Persia, parts of Ancient Greece, down to Ethiopia, Israel, the Ethiopia, and Babylon. As their empire grew, they followed into the Indus Valley, which Mesopotamians had been trading with for centuries.  What we think of as modern Pakistan and India is where Medhatithi Gautama founded the anviksiki school of logic in the 6th century BCE. And so the modern sciences of philosophy and logic were born. As mentioned, we'd had math in the Bronze Age. The Egyptians couldn't have built pyramids and mapped the stars without it. Hammurabi and Nebuchadnezzar couldn't have built the Mesopotamian cities and walls and laws without it. But something new was coming as the Bronze Age began to give way to the Iron Age. The Indians brought us the first origin of logic, which would morph into an almost Boolean logic as Pāṇini codified Sanskrit grammar linguistics and syntax. Almost like a nearly 4,000 verse manual on programming languages. Panini even mentions Greeks in his writings. Because they apparently had contact going back to the sixth century BCE, when Greek philosophy was about to get started. The Neo-Assyrian empire grew to 1.4 million square kilometers of control and the Achaeminid empire grew to control nearly 5 million square miles.  The Phoenicians arose out of the crash of the Late Bronze Age, becoming important traders between the former Mesopotamian city states and Egyptians. As her people settled lands and Greek city states colonized lands, one became the Greek philosopher Thales, who documented the use of loadstones going back to 600 BCE when they were able to use magnetite which gets its name from the Magnesia region of Thessaly, Greece. He is known as the first philosopher and in the time of Socrates even had become one of the Seven Sages which included according to Socrates. “Thales of Miletus, and Pittacus of Mytilene, and Bias of Priene, and our own Solon, and Cleobulus of Lindus, and Myson of Chenae, and the seventh of them was said to be Chilon of Sparta.”  Many of the fifth and sixth century Greek philosophers were actually born in colonies on the western coast of what is now Turkey. Thales's theorum is said to have originated in India or Babylon. But as we see a lot in the times that followed, it is credited to Thales. Given the trading empires they were all a part of though, they certainly could have brought these ideas back from previous generations of unnamed thinkers. I like to think of him as the synthesizers that Daniel Pink refers to so often in his book A Whole New Mind.  Thales studied in Babylon and Egypt, bringing thoughts, ideas, and perhaps intermingled them with those coming in from other areas as the Greeks settled colonies in other lands. Given how critical astrology was to the agricultural societies, this meant bringing astronomy, math to help with the architecture of the Pharoes, new ways to use calendars, likely adopted through the Sumerians, coinage through trade with the Lydians and then Persians when they conquered the Lydians, Babylon, and the Median. So Thales taught Anaximander who taught Pythagoras of Samos, born a few decades later in 570 BCE. He studied in Egypt as well. Most of us would know the Pythagorean theorem which he's credited for, although there is evidence that predated him from Egypt. Whether new to the emerging Greek world or new to the world writ large, his contributions were far beyond that, though. They included a new student oriented way of life, numerology, the idea that the world is round, numerology, applying math to music and applying music to lifestyle, and an entire school of philosophers emerged from his teachings to spread Pythagoreanism. And the generations of philosophers that followed devised both important philosophical contributions and practical applications of new ideas in engineering. The ensuing schools of philosophy that rose out of those early Greeks spread. By 508 BCE, the Greeks gave us Democracy. And oligarchy, defined as a government where a small group of people have control over a country. Many of these words, in fact, come from Greek forms. As does the month of May, names for symbols and theories in much of the math we use, and many a constellation. That tradition began with the sages but grew, being spread by trade, by need, and by religious houses seeking to use engineering as a form of subjugation.  Philosophy wasn't exclusive to the Greeks or Indians, or to Assyria and then Persia through conquering the lands and establishing trade. Buddha came out of modern India in the 5th to 4th century BCE around the same time Confucianism was born from Confucious in China. And Mohism from Mo Di. Again, trade and the spread of ideas. However, there's no indication that they knew of each other or that Confucious could have competed with the other 100 schools of thought alive and thriving in China. Nor that Buddhism would begin spreading out of the region for awhile. But some cultures were spreading rapidly. The spread of Greek philosophy reached a zenith in Athens. Thales' pupil Anaximander also taught Anaximenes, the third philosopher of the Milesian school which is often included with the Ionians. The thing I love about those three, beginning with Thales is that they were able to evolve the school of thought without rejecting the philosophies before them. Because ultimately they knew they were simply devising theories as yet to be proven. Another Ionian was Anaxagoras, who after serving in the Persian army, which ultimately conquered Ionia in 547 BCE. As a Greek citizen living in what was then Persia, Anaxagoras moved to Athens in 480 BCE, teaching Archelaus and either directly or indirectly through him Socrates. This provides a link, albeit not a direct link, from the philosophy and science of the Phoenicians, Babylonians, and Egyptians through Thales and others, to Socrates.   Socrates was born in 470 BCE and mentions several influences including Anaxagoras. Socrates spawned a level of intellectualism that would go on to have as large an impact on what we now call Western philosophy as anyone in the world ever has. And given that we have no writings from him, we have to take the word of his students to know his works. He gave us the Socratic method and his own spin on satire, which ultimately got him executed for effectively being critical of the ruling elite in Athens and for calling democracy into question, corrupting young Athenian students in the process.  You see, in his life, the Athenians lost the Peloponnesian War to Sparta - and as societies often do when they hit a speed bump, they started to listen to those who call intellectuals or scientists into question. That would be Socrates for questioning Democracy, and many an Athenian for using Socrates as a scape goat.  One student of Socrates, Critias, would go on to lead a group called the Thirty Tyrants, who would terrorize Athenians and take over the government for awhile. They would establish an oligarchy and appoint their own ruling class. As with many coups against democracy over the millennia they were ultimately found corrupt and removed from power. But the end of that democratic experiment in Greece was coming. Socrates also taught other great philosophers, including Xenophon, Antisthenes, Aristippus, and Alcibiades. But the greatest of his pupils was Plato. Plato was as much a scientist as a philosopher. He had works of Pythagoras, studied the Libyan Theodorus. He codified a theory of Ideas, in Forms. He used as examples, the Pythagorean theorem and geometry. He wrote a lot of the dialogues with Socrates and codified ethics, and wrote of a working, protective, and governing class, looking to produce philosopher kings. He wrote about the dialectic, using questions, reasoning and intuition. He wrote of art and poetry and epistemology. His impact was vast. He would teach mathemetics to Eudoxus, who in turn taught Euclid. But one of his greatest contributions the evolution of philosophy, science, and technology was in teaching Aristotle.  Aristotle was born in 384 BCE and founded a school of philosophy called the Lyceum. He wrote about rhetoric, music, poetry, and theater - as one would expect given the connection to Socrates, but also expanded far past Plato, getting into physics, biology, and metaphysics. But he had a direct impact on the world at the time with his writings on economics politics,  He inherited a confluence of great achievements, describing motion, defining the five elements, writing about a camera obscure and researching optics. He wrote about astronomy and geology, observing both theory and fact, such as ways to predict volcanic eruptions. He made observations that would be proven (or sometimes disproven) such as with modern genomics. He began a classification of living things. His work “On the Soul” is one of the earliest looks at psychology. His study of ethics wasn't as theoretical as Socrates' but practical, teaching virtue and how that leads to wisdom to become a greater thinker.  He wrote of economics. He writes of taxes, managing cities, and property. And this is where he's speaking almost directly to one of his most impressive students, Alexander the Great. Philip the second of Macedon hired Plato to tutor Alexander starting in 343. Nine years later, when Alexander inherited his throne, he was armed with arguably the best education in the world combined with one of the best trained armies in history. This allowed him to defeat Darius in 334 BCE, the first of 10 years worth of campaigns that finally gave him control in 323 BCE. In that time, he conquered Egypt, which had been under Persian rule on and off and founded Alexandria. And so what the Egyptians had given to Greece had come home. Alexander died in 323 BCE. He followed the path set out by philosophers before him. Like Thales, he visited Babylon and Egypt. But he went a step further and conquered them. This gave the Greeks more ancient texts to learn from but also more people who could become philosophers and more people with time to think through problems.  By the time he was done, the Greeks controlled nearly 5 million square miles of territory. This would be the largest empire until after the Romans. But Alexander never truly ruled. He conquered. Some of his generals and other Greek aristocrats, now referred to as the Diadochi, split up the young, new empire. You see, while teaching Alexander, Aristotle had taught two other future kings : Ptolemy I Soter and Cassander.  Cassander would rule Macedonia and Ptolemy ruled Egypt from Alexandria, who with other Greek philosophers founded the Library of Alexandria. Ptolemy and his son amassed 100s of thousands of scrolls in the Library from 331 BC and on. The Library was part of a great campus of the Musaeum where they also supported great minds starting with Ptolemy I's patronage of Euclid, the father of geometry, and later including Archimedes, the father of engineering, Hipparchus, the founder of trigonometry, Her, the father of math, and Herophilus, who codified the scientific method and countless other great hellenistic thinkers.  The Roman Empire had begin in the 6th century BCE. By the third century BCE they were expanding out of the Italian peninsula. This was the end of Greek expansion and as Rome conquered the Greek colonies signified the waning of Greek philosophy. Philosophy that helped build Rome both from a period of colonization and then spreading Democracy to the young republic with the kings, or rex, being elected by the senate and by 509 BCE the rise of the consuls.  After studying at the Library of Alexandria, Archimedes returned home to start his great works, full of ideas having been exposed to so many works. He did rudimentary calculus, proved geometrical theories, approximated pi, explained levers, founded statics and hydrostatics. And his work extended into the practical. He built machines, pulleys, the infamous Archimedes' screw pump, and supposedly even a deathly heat ray of lenses that could burn ships in seconds. He was sadly killed by Roman soldiers when Syracuse was taken. But, and this is indicative of how Romans pulled in Greek know-how, the Roman general Marcus Claudius Marcellus was angry that he lost an asset, who could have benefited his war campaigns. In fact, Cicero, who was born in the first century BCE mentioned Archimedes built mechanical devices that could show the motions of the planetary bodies. He claimed Thales had designed these and that Marcellus had taken one as his only personal loot from Syracuse and donated it to the Temple of Virtue in Rome.  The math, astronomy, and physics that go into building a machine like that was the culmination of hundreds, if not thousands of years of building knowledge of the Cosmos, machinery, mathematics, and philosophy. Machines like that would have been the first known computers. Machines like the first or second century Antikythera mechanism, discovered in 1902 in a shipwreck in Greece. Initially thought to be a one-off, the device is more likely to represent the culmination of generations of great thinkers and doers. Generations that came to look to the Library of Alexandria as almost a Mecca. Until they didn't.  The splintering of the lands Alexander conquered, the cost of the campaigns, the attacks from other empires, and the rise of the Roman Empire ended the age of Greek Enlightenment. As is often the case when there is political turmoil and those seeking power hate being challenged by the intellectuals, as had happened with Socrates and philosophers in Athens at the time, Ptolemy VIII caused The Library of Alexandria to enter into a slow decline that began with the expulsion of intellectuals from Alexandria in 145BC. This began a slow decline of the library until it burned, first with a small fire accidentally set by Caesar in 48 BCE and then for good in the 270s.  But before the great library was gone for good, it would produce even more great engineers. Heron of Alexandria is one of the greatest. He created vending machines that would dispense holy water when you dropped a coin in it. He made small mechanical archers, models of dancers, and even a statue of a horse that could supposedly drink water. He gave us early steam engines two thousand years before the industrial revolution and ran experiments in optics. He gave us Heron's forumula and an entire book on mechanics, codifying the known works on automation at the time. In fact, he designed a programmable cart using strings wrapped around an axle, powered by falling weights.  Claudius Ptolemy came to the empire from their holdings in Egypt, living in the first century. He wrote about harmonics, math, astronomy, computed the distance of the sun to the earth and also computed positions of the planets and eclipses, summarizing them into more simplistic tables. He revolutionized map making and the properties of light. By then, Romans had emerged as the first true world power and so the Classical Age. To research this section, I read and took copious notes from the following and apologize that each passage is not credited specifically but it would just look like a regular expressions if I tried: The Evolution of Technology by George Basalla. Civilizations by Filipe Fernández-Armesto, A Short History of Technology: From The Earliest Times to AD 1900 from TK Derry and Trevor I Williams, Communication in History Technology, Culture, Leonardo da vinci by Walter Isaacson, Society from David Crowley and Paul Heyer, Timelines in Science, by the Smithsonian, Wheels, Clocks, and Rockets: A History of Technology by Donald Cardwell, a few PhD dissertations and post-doctoral studies from journals, and then I got to the point where I wanted the information from as close to the sources as I could get so I went through Dialogues Concerning Two New Sciences from Galileo Galilei, Mediations from Marcus Aurelius, Pneumatics from Philo of Byzantium, The Laws of Thought by George Boole, Natural History from Pliny The Elder, Cassius Dio's Roman History, Annals from Tacitus, Orations by Cicero, Ethics, Rhetoric, Metaphysics, and Politics by Aristotle, Plato's Symposium and The Trial & Execution of Socrates.

When Shalmaneser III died, the Neo-Assyrian empire was facing one of the greatest threats it had ever faced in the form of the great rebellion. In this episode, we will cover this period of civil strife that weakened the empire and the decline it resulted in before reaching the reign of perhaps the greatest king and conqueror in Assyrian history, Tiglath-Pileser III. He will also be the first conqueror whose story will span more than one episode !!For maps of the locations and the campaigns of Tiglath-Pileser III discussed in the episode, you can checkout the following link: https://www.facebook.com/TheConquerorsPodcast/posts/192096352445487

In this  episode, we cover the reign of Ashurnasirpal II, who through a series of ruthless and brutal conquests, in which he boasted about flaying hundreds if not thousands of people alive, completed the transformation of Assyria from a regional power to an empire, the Neo-Assyrian empire, and left it perhaps stronger that it was ever before. Also, don't forget to check out Trevor Culley's History of Persia podcast:Website | Apple | Spotify | RSS

This episode covers the history of the city, region and people of Aššur or Assyria, from its early days as a small town of Akkadian speakers to the early days of the Neo-Assyrian empire, an empire that would rise to become the largest the world had ever seen and is considered the first true empire in history.

We (Lee Kyle and the nation's sweetheart Sammy Dobson) are delighted that you have chosen us for your podcast needs. We've earned it though, this is episode 133 mate. You can't put a price on that amount of content. Well, you can and t's free. This week, Lee is having a slight Edinburgh Fringe tiredness breakdown and they decide Which is the Best (For that is the name of the podcast) between: Synonyms (Synonym list in cuneiform on a clay tablet, Neo-Assyrian period[1] A synonym is a word or phrase that means exactly or nearly the same as another lexeme (word or phrase) in the same language. Words that are synonyms are said to be synonymous, and the state of being a synonym is called synonymy. For example, the words begin, start, commence, and initiate are all synonyms of one another. Words are typically synonymous in one particular sense: for example, long and extended in the context long time or extended time are synonymous, but long cannot be used in the phrase extended family. Synonyms with the exact same meaning share a seme or denotational sememe, whereas those with inexactly similar meanings share a broader denotational or connotational sememe and thus overlap within a semantic field. The former are sometimes called cognitive synonyms and the latter, near-synonyms[2], plesionyms[3] or poecilonyms[4]. Contents 1 Lexicography 2 Etymology 3 Examples 4 See also 5 References 6 External links Lexicography Some lexicographers claim that no synonyms have exactly the same meaning (in all contexts or social levels of language) because etymology, orthography, phonic qualities, ambiguous meanings, usage, and so on make them unique. Different words that are similar in meaning usually differ for a reason: feline is more formal than cat; long and extended are only synonyms in one usage and not in others (for example, a long arm is not the same as an extended arm). Synonyms are also a source of euphemisms. Metonymy can sometimes be a form of synonymy: the White House is used as a synonym of the administration in referring to the U.S. executive branch under a specific president. Thus a metonym is a type of synonym, and the word metonym is a hyponym of the word synonym. The analysis of synonymy, polysemy, hyponymy, and hypernymy is inherent to taxonomy and ontology in the information-science senses of those terms. It has applications in pedagogy and machine learning, because they rely on word-sense disambiguation. Etymology The word comes from Ancient Greek sýn (σύν; "with") and ónoma (ὄνομα; "name"). Examples Synonyms can be any part of speech, as long as both words belong to the same part of speech. Examples: verb buy and purchase adjective big and large adverb quickly and speedily preposition on and upon Synonyms are defined with respect to certain senses of words: pupil as the aperture in the iris of the eye is not synonymous with student. Such like, he expired means the same as he died, yet my passport has expired cannot be replaced by my passport has died. In English, many synonyms emerged in the Middle Ages, after the Norman conquest of England. While England's new ruling class spoke Norman French, the lower classes continued to speak Old English (Anglo-Saxon). Thus, today we have synonyms like the Norman-derived people, liberty and archer, and the Saxon-derived folk, freedom and bowman. For more examples, see the list of Germanic and Latinate equivalents in English. and Cinnamon (A spice)

Karl Sharro spoke about Karl ReMarks’ new book, And then God Created the Middle East and Said ‘Let There Be Breaking News’ (and Analysis). The book is forthcoming July 9.Boyd Tonkin’s The 100 Best Novels in Translation was released June 21. The two Arabic novels that made the list were Tayeb Salih’s Season of Migration to the North, translated by Denys Johnson-Davies, and Naguib Mahfouz’s Cairo Trilogy, translated by William Maynard Hutchins, Olive E. Kenny, Lorne M. Kenny, and Angele Botros Samaan. The translation was overseen by Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis, along with Martha Levin, and their notes on the manuscript can be found at the Lilly Library Manuscript Collections.You can read the Amazon press release online about how the mega-corporation has (finally) launched some 12,000 Arabic ebooks into the Kindle system. You can find and purchase them on Amazon.com.

Explore symbolic prophetic acts in the Old Testament. Consider 1 Kings 11:30-32. Consider the sign and the thing signified. Martin Luther stated, "The gospel gives the righteousness that the law demands." In Jeremiah we see the symbolic acts in the loincloth (13:1-11), the shattering of the jug (19:1-5), the yoke (28), the field (32:1-15), the burying of stones in clay pavement (43: 8-13), and the scroll in the Euphrates (51:59-64). [cf. Shead, 121] We read that Isaiah was naked for 3 years (20) and Ezekiel lies on his side for over a year and eats barley cakes cooked over human dung fire (4:1-13), he shaves; (5:1-4), digs (12:1-16), and writes on sticks (37:15-28). Hosea marries a prostitute (1-3) and Zechariah makes a crown (6:9-15). Consider the Flood Tablet from the 7th Century BC King Ashurbanipal of Northern Iraq and the Neo-Assyrian Archives 680-679 BC. Consider that prophets were present around the royal courts and it was common to bless the king which was called shulmu oracles. Explore 1 Kings 22 with Ahab (Israel) as seen in 1 Kings 22: 7-9, 11-14, 17-18. Consider the examples of Esarhaddon (680-669), Ashurbanipal (668-627) and 30 oracles of well-being. In Assyrian, the terms used are ragintu and ragimu or “one who shouts or proclaims.” The Assyrian terms zabbu and zabbatu are also used and mean “frenzied one”. Another term used is mahhu meaning ”crazy person". The majority was female as 8 out of 9 of the 13 named are female. This might be due to the practice of gender-bending and/or castration. The Neo-Assyrian prophets were supported by the state. Consider similarities include they are God’s or gods’ words, speak comfort, and are to the King, but intended for a larger audience. Differences include that Isaiah’s message mixes judgment and well-being, the tone is different, “winners write the history books”, and there is relative scarcity of well-being oracles in the Old Testament. Also, the Neo-Assyrian prophecies were written or collected prior to their downfall in late 7th Century to Babylon as in the Ziyaret Tepe (ancient Tushan) dated 611BC in the post-fall of Nineveh and final days of Neo- Assyrian empire.

The Neo-Assyrian empire is on its deathbed. Its the years 750-746 BC See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

Brennon and Dan discuss the armies of Shalmaneser III and Ashurnasirpal II. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

this is a history between the years of 877 bc to 500 bc and its the groovy historian and the fan of history doing another Collaboration , a history through the journeys of cyprus , empires and more ! support the groovy and subscribe i hope you all have enjoyed stay groovy. my channel : https://www.youtube.com/user/SuperTarihci/videos follow me : https://twitter.com/GroovyHistorian check out my groovy historical blog : http://officalgroovyhistorian.com/ FAN OF HISTORY youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCuIXoVRYAX2KyMBtqq7JGxQ  (Fan of History) facebook.com/fanofhistory twitter.com/thefanofhistory web: thefanofhistory.wordpress.com itunes: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/fan-of-history/id958058555?mt=2 patreon: http://www.patreon.com/fanofhistory Direct message: Just comment on any video on the Fan of History YouTube channel A music video tribute to Ashurnasirpal II, king of Assyria: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dof6PuYsNr0 The beginning of the Neo-Assyrian Empire in 911 BC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jh6zyYssjn8 The early Neo-Assyrian army (to 745 BC): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kGVV-DDYbKQ World Politics overview 1000 BC: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GpOAqqdogXs

A modern clay impression of a Neo-Assyrian cylinder seal, circa 7th century BCE. One of only five with this motif that have survived. Height: 3.9 cm. Diameter: 1.6 cm. Enkidu, on the left, wears a short kilt decorated with rosettes, hair and beard in curls, an axe in one hand, holding the tail of the Bull of Heaven in the other. The winged human-headed bull crouches down on its foreleg, in front Gilgamesh, wearing long fringed robe with rosettes, a double horned headdress, long curled hair and beard, holding one of the bull's horns while plunging his sword into its neck.The cylinder is in the Schøyen Collection of London and Oslo. The Schøyen Collection was started around 1920 by Engineer M.O. Schøyen (1896-1962), father of Martin Schøyen, who collected some 1000 volumes of early and later editions of Norwegian and international literature, history, travel, science, as well as antiquities.***Music excerpt is Vocalise, Op. 34/14 by Rachmaninov from the album The Swan (Le Cygne) 
Han-Na Chang (Cello) & Leonard Slatkin with the Philharmonia Orchestra