Phoenician Literature

2019 ◽  
pp. 255-269
Author(s):  
Carolina López-Ruiz
Keyword(s):  
Historical Records ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Great Loss ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Manuscript Tradition ◽  
Travel Accounts

There was, without a doubt, a Phoenician and Punic literature. Very little of it is extant, but we have enough of it to gauge the great loss. Lacking the advantage of its own manuscript tradition and later cultures devoted to it, Phoenician literature was not systematically preserved, unlike that of the Greeks, Romans, and Israelites. What we have are small pieces that surface among the Classical literary corpus. Despite these unfavorable conditions, an impressive range of literary genres is attested, concentrated in particular genres. Some of this literature aligned with broader ancient Near Eastern tradition: cosmogony, foundation stories, historical records, and other areas that correspond with Phoenician expertise (travel accounts or itineraries, agricultural treatises). Other genres were likely adopted through Greek influence (narrative histories, philosophy). Moreover, from Hellenistic times onward, works by Phoenician authors had to be written and transmitted in Greek in order to survive. Nonetheless, the chapter cautions that we should not lightly categorize them as merely “Greek” literature, at least in the cases in which we know the authors are Phoenicians (including Carthaginians) writing about Phoenician matters.

Psalms

2010 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Breck Reid ◽  
Rebecca Poe Hays
Keyword(s):  
20Th Century ◽  
Religious Tradition ◽  
Second Temple ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Second Temple Period ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
The Bible ◽  
The Social ◽  
Literary Composition ◽  
Form Criticism

The location of a book in the canon gives the reader clues to the genre and interpretation of the book. The Jewish canon places the poetry of the book of Psalms as the introduction to the division of the bible known as the Ketubim (writings). The Christian canon(s) place the Psalter between Job and Proverbs, accenting the Psalms’ place among the wisdom texts. Scholarly consensus understands the Psalter as a collection of collections of sung poetic prayers that range over a wide period of authorship, provenance, and redaction. Associated with ongoing worship in Israel, most psalms were continually reapplied to new situations. The earliest psalms antedate the period when Israel and Judah were ruled by an indigenous king, the monarchy (1030–583 bce), and the latest are from the period defined by the cultural and political hegemony of Greece, the Hellenistic period (323–63 bce). The book of Psalms functioned as the prayer book of the second temple period (521 bce–66 ce) and the repository of poetic instruction. The first audience of the completed book is the emerging population of what was then the Persian province of Yehud during this period. Prior to the rise of form criticism in the early 20th century, scholarship focused on the Psalms as expressions of individual religious poets, much as Keats, Dickinson, or Countee Cullen. Form criticism, shaped by the work of Herman Gunkel, focused on the social location of the various literary genres in the cult, but this approach still viewed the Psalter as assemblage or medley without structure or order. During the mid-20th century a focus emerged with an interest in the “shape and shaping” of the Psalter. The rise of postmodernity has led some to pursue post-Gunkel approaches to the book of Psalms that attend to matters such as the poetic language and the relationship to other ancient Near Eastern poetry and imagery. While many scholars still utilize form-critical language to discuss the Psalter, they tend to examine each psalm as a distinct literary composition and product of Israel’s religious tradition rather than forcing them into specific genres and corresponding life settings.

Offenses Against Human Beings in Private and Public Law

2019 ◽  
pp. 34-44
Author(s):  
Eckart Otto
Keyword(s):  
Historical Development ◽  
Legal History ◽  
Public Law ◽  
Comparative Approach ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Biblical Law ◽  
Literary Genres ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
History Of

This chapter deals with the legal functions of law of different literary genres in the Hebrew Bible and their legal historical development within their societal “settings in life. It concentrates on laws of bodily injuries and homicide in a comparative approach with ancient Near Eastern law and asks for the influence of religion on the legal history of the biblical law of offenses against human beings and for trends of correlating law and narrative in the Pentateuch. Special attention is given to the origins of talionic retaliation in cuneiform law and to the efforts in biblical law already in the Covenant Code to check and repeal the talio.

MEDEA: TRANSFORMATIONS OF A GREEK FIGURE IN LATIN LITERATURE

2013 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 114-135 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gesine Manuwald
Keyword(s):  
Ancient World ◽  
Latin Literature ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Literary Genres

Latin writers in the ancient world are well known to have been familiar with earlier Greek writings, as well as with the first commentaries on those, and to have taken over literary genres as well as topics and motifs from Greece for their own works. But, as has been recognized in modern scholarship, this engagement with Greek material does not mean that Roman writers typically produced Latin copies of pieces by their Greek predecessors. In the terms of contemporary literary terminology, the connection between Latin and Greek literature is rather to be described as an intertextual relationship, which became increasingly complex, since later Latin authors were also influenced by their Roman predecessors.

Orphic Traditions and the Birth of the Gods

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dwayne A. Meisner
Keyword(s):  
Literary History ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Individual Product ◽  
Manuscript Tradition ◽  
As If

Orphic Tradition and the Birth of the Gods is a literary history that attempts to reconstruct the fragments of four theogonies that were attributed to the legendary singer Orpheus: the Derveni, Eudemian, Hieronyman, and Rhapsodic Theogonies. Most modern scholars have described these poems as if they were similar to Hesiod’s Theogony—lengthy chronological accounts of the births of the gods from the beginning of time to the present—but this book suggests that a better model for understanding how these poems were composed is to see each of them as an individual product of bricolage (as explained by Claude Lévi-Strauss), rather than as items in the stemma of a static manuscript tradition (as reconstructed by Martin West). The Orphic tradition was more fluid and fragmented than modern reconstructions would lead one to believe, but in these four Orphic theogonies certain features stand out, such as points of comparison with Near Eastern myths, the continuous discourse between Orphic poetry and philosophy, and speculations on the nature of the gods in ways that generated unique deities and new narratives. A study of Orphic theogonies reveals that the Orphic myths of Phanes and Zeus were no less important than the Orphic myth of Dionysus.

The poor's curse: Exodus xxii 20-26 and curse literature in the ancient world

2006 ◽  
Vol 56 (4) ◽  
pp. 431-451
Author(s):  
Jonathan Ben-Dov
Keyword(s):  
Ancient World ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Book Of Job ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
The Poor ◽  
Violent Acts ◽  
Ancient Greek Literature

AbstractIn the passage Exod. xxii 20-26 the poor man cries to God after he had been mal-treated by a powerful creditor. In response God acts as an avenger against that evil individual. The article first clarifies the background to such violent acts by proprietors in Ancient Near Eastern Laws, and the response to it in the laws of Deuteronomy xxiv. The curse and revenge are then explained in the light of parallel practices from ancient Greek literature, mainly from the Oddesey. Curse practices meant to restore justice are explored on the basis of Greek binding spells and of the corpus of Greek literary curses. The image of the Mesopotamian god "ama" as an avenging god is analyzed according to the famous Babylonian "ama" hymn and to that god's epitheta. Finally, examples of Hebrew curse literature are highlighted in the Book of Job and in Psalm cix.

The Role of the Lukka People in Late Bronze Age Anatolia

Antichthon ◽  
1979 ◽  
Vol 13 ◽  
pp. 1-11 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. R. Bryce
Keyword(s):  
Bronze Age ◽  
Clear Picture ◽  
General Character ◽  
The Political ◽  
Western Anatolia ◽  
Late Bronze Age ◽  
Historical Records ◽  
Population Groups ◽  
Near Eastern

In a number of Near Eastern texts dating to the period of the Hittite New Kingdom, the term Lukka appears as a geographical and/or ethnic designation for one of the Late Bronze Age population groups of western Anatolia. Unfortunately we have no documents which deal primarily or specifically with the Lukka people; what we know of them rests essentially on incidental references in Hittite treaties, letters, prayers and historical records, along with several references in non-Hittite sources. Yet although the evidence is meagre, it still provides a relatively clear picture of the general character of the Lukka people and the role they played in the political and military affairs of Hittite Anatolia.

Greek Literature

2017 ◽  
Vol 64 (2) ◽  
pp. 182-187
Author(s):  
Malcolm Heath
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Short Life ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Alternative Version ◽  
The Status

I began my last set of reviews by expressing doubts about the speculative literary prehistory in Mary Bachvarova'sFrom Hittite to Homer(G&R64 [2017], 65). Near Eastern antecedents also feature in Bruno Currie'sHomer's Allusive Art. Currie displays more methodological awareness and more intellectual suppleness: he recognizes the possibility of parallels arising independently (213–15), but denies that his examples can be coincidental, while acknowledging that this confronts us with a ‘glaring paradox’ (217). To be fair, he has a point in this instance, and in many of his other case studies; and his overarching argument is beautifully conceived. On the debit side of the account, there are methodological tautologies: that we should accept conclusions if there is ‘sufficient warrant’ (29) or the evidence is ‘sufficiently compelling’ (174), and not bring charges ‘too quickly’ (32), follows from the meaning of ‘sufficient’ and ‘too’. Adverbial IOUs of indeterminate creditworthiness like ‘arguably’ (×45) are not an adequate substitute for arguments (cf.G&R63 [2016], 235). ‘Of course’ (×50) is superfluous if it refers to what is genuinely a matter of course, and misleading if not. And, of course, Currie's use of scare quotes is arguably too extravagant. Some weaknesses are more substantive. For example, when trying to determine theIliad’s relation to a hypothetical antecedent (designated ‘*Memnonis(Aethiops)’), Currie maintains that ‘the short life of Achilleus arguably [!] has the status of “fact” [!] because the audience knows – through familiarity with an earlier version – which way Achilleus is ultimately going to make up his mind’ (62). Regardless of their familiarity with any hypothetical earlier version, the audience of theIliadknows that Achilles' life will be short because theextantversion establishes it as a fact when it makes this a presupposition of the exchange between Achilles and Thetis (Il.1.352, cf. 416–18, 505–6). From 9.410–5 we might infer that what is presupposed in Book 1 results from Achilles' prior choice: if so, the change of mind implied in his answer to Odysseus is implicitly retracted in his response to Ajax (650–5). ‘The choice that Achilleus is actually going to make only after the death of Patroklos' (62) had therefore already been made. It is disappointingly reductive to say that ‘Diomedes plays out the part of Gilgamesh in this episode ofIliadV, but for this part of theIliadDiomedes serves as a “stand-in” [!] for Achilleus, and Achilleus in theIliadmore widely plays out the part of Gilgamesh’ (197): Homer's characters are not tokens, and Diomedes is always, and distinctively, himself. The point of puttingOd. 19.96–604 alongside an alternative version manufactured to be parallel but different (47–55) eluded me entirely. ‘I do not see’, says Currie, ‘what is gained by refusing to speak of allusion to a particular poem’ (102). Nor do I; and some of his parallels seemed compelling, however hard I tried to resist. Nevertheless, we must balance the loss in refusing to speak of allusion against the risks of building on foundations that may have too high a proportion of sand. Currie has written a brilliant and subtle book. Its contents will need careful sifting.

After Auerbach: Ancient Greek Literature as a Test Case of European Literary Historiography

2014 ◽  
Vol 22 (1) ◽  
pp. 116-128
Author(s):  
Irene J.F. de Jong
Keyword(s):  
Literary History ◽  
Test Case ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
European Literature ◽  
Literary Historiography ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
History Of ◽  
Ancient Greek Literature

In the first chapter of his celebratedMimesis(1946) Auerbach discussed a specimen of Ancient Greek literature (Homer) both as the starting point of a European literary history of realism and as a comparandum to biblical storytelling. Both lines of approach have recently been given new impetuses. On the one hand there is Martin West'sThe East Face of Helicon,1which does not merely compare early Greek literature and Near Eastern literature but describes the former as largely a product of the latter. On the other hand there is the series Studies in ancient Greek narrative, edited by Irene J.F. de Jong, which describes the early development of – what will become quintessential – European storytelling devices in Ancient Greek literature. Both scholarly projects, independently, have put the same urgent question on the agenda: how exactly are we to evaluate resemblances between ancient Greek literature and contemporary Near Eastern literature and later European literature. Can we speak of some form of historical connection, i.e. one literature taking over devices and motifs from another literature, or should we rather think in terms of typological resemblances, i.e. of the same narrative universals being employed at different places and at different times? Or is there some middle way to be found in the recent cognitive turn of comparative literature? Despite the methodological problems involved, investigating the history of European literature is an extremely rewarding task. The project of Europe as an economical and political unity has at the moment reached a critical phase. Literary scholars can contribute to this issue by showing the cultural unity of Europe, a mission that is just as urgent as it was in 1946, when Auerbach published hisMimesis.

Epic Poetry

2009 ◽  
pp. 441-453
Author(s):  
Johannes Haubold
Keyword(s):  
Historical Context ◽  
Epic Poetry ◽  
Oral Traditions ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Ancient Greek ◽  
Narrative Poetry ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Greek Epic ◽  
Ancient Greek Literature

The term ‘epic’, when applied to ancient Greek literature, refers to a set of texts that may be loosely defined as narrative poetry about the deeds of gods and heroes. To a very large extent, this is a reflection of Homer's authority as the most famous epic poet. This article argues that recent comparisons between early Greek epic and modern oral traditions, as well as the discovery and investigation of ancient Hittite and Near Eastern texts, place Greek epic in a much wider literary and historical context.

Oriental Motifs in the Alexander Romance

Antichthon ◽  
1992 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 95-113 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Stoneman
Keyword(s):  
Direct Influence ◽  
Greek Literature ◽  
Alexander The Great ◽  
Near Eastern ◽  
Art And Literature ◽  
Greek Tradition ◽  
Alexander Romance

Over the centuries, the fabulous adventures of Alexander the Great have become as prominent in art and literature as his historical achievements. Medieval artists in particular are frequent sources of depictions of the hero in such adventures as the search for the water of life, the flight into the air in a basket borne by eagles, the descent into the sea in a diving bell, the interview with the talking trees of India and the visit to the dwellings of the gods. Familiar as these episodes are—or were—it is easy for us to forget how completely new a thing they represent in the tradition of Greek prose writing. With the decipherments of cuneiform some one hundred years ago, a number of scholars concluded that they could not have been developed entirely within the Greek tradition, and posited direct influence from one or more Babylonian or other near eastern sources or traditions to explain the occurrence in Greek literature of these curious tales. Despite the antiquity of these arguments, they have been accepted without examination by many more recent writers on the Alexander Romance.

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