AMME seminar 27.3.: 'Ancient Archives'
”The Centre of Excellence in Ancient Near Eastern Empires (ANEE) is pleased to invite you to participate in the next instalment in the Ancient and Medieval Middle East (AMME) seminar’s spring programme on Thursday 27 March 16:15-18:00 EET (UTC+2h). The session will be organized as a hybrid event, and we invite you all to join us.
AMME seminars comprise of two papers followed by a shared round of questions and discussion on the session specific theme. The theme of March is ‘‘Ancient Archives” – please find the speakers and their topics below.
Prof. Michael Jursa
‘A new look at the Eanna temple archive’
The talk presents the agenda of a recently launched project based at the Universities of Jena, Vienna and Warsaw that aims at revisiting what is known about the archive(s) of the Eanna temple in Uruk in the long sixth century. (Re-)cataloging the entire published evidence plus a substantial part of the unpublished material, we reconstruct the administrative structure of the temple household and its bureaucratic system by identifying the various bureaus and scribal offices that produced the distinct files and dossiers into which the texts can be sorted. Particular attention will be given to the major ruptures in the documentation around the mid-point of Nebuchadnezzar’s reign and in the second year of Darius.
Dr. Rotem Avneri Meir
‘Archival Perspectives on Persian-Period Judea’
In this talk, I examine the role documents played in shaping local historiographical traditions by placing biblical letters in dialogue with provincial archives. Specifically, it reassesses the Persian imperial documents in Ezra 4 alongside the Elephantine and Wadi Daliyeh papyri and the archaeological remains from the archives of Kedesh and Maresha—bridging the gap between texts without context and material contexts without texts. Through this analysis, I argue that the universal claims of empires—expressed through rulers’ ability to communicate with specific communities via letters and decrees—enabled forms of local distinction under elite leadership. This dynamic, evident both in textual sources and material culture, illustrates how these letters and their surrounding narratives simultaneously validated imperial systems and reinforced the authority of Judean elites who mediated them, sustaining regimes of distinction and local power brokerage.
Time: Thursday 27 March at 16:15-18:00 EET (UTC+2h).
Live venue: Professori, (Fabianinkatu 33, room F1055). Directions: entering from the main entrance, go straight ahead, through the hall between the two stairs and to the right. ‘Professori’ (F1055) is the first room after the WC.
Zoom room: https://helsinki.zoom.us/j/67889792118 (Meeting ID: 678 8979 2118).
The spring programme: https://www.helsinki.fi/en/researchgroups/ancient-near-eastern-empires/news/amme-program-announcement-spring-2025-0
Everyone is welcome to join, so please share and join us in person or online! ”
Lähde: The organizers of the AMME seminar
