Judeans in Sippar and Susa during the First Century of the Babylonian Exile: Assimilation and Perseverance under Neo-Babylonian and Achaemenid Rule

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 119-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yigal Bloch

AbstractThe present study discusses the attestations of persons of Judean origin in Neo-Babylonian cuneiform tablets (of the period between 550 and 490 bce) as possible evidence of some aspects of the social history of the community of Judeans exiled to Babylonia by Nebuchadnezzar II. Although the number of such attestations is very small, it is nonetheless possible to single out two groups which display different patterns of personal name giving across generations. In one instance, a group of merchants in the city of Sippar (belonging mostly to a single family) uses, in part, distinctly Judean personal names in the first generation of the exile, but abandons them completely in favor of Babylonian theophoric names in the next generation. In another instance, a group of individuals active mostly in Susa and probably belonging to the families of royal officials (as suggested by names and patronymics of the type of Beamtennamen – names expressing a pious wish for the well-being of the king) displays the use of Yahwistic personal names even though the fathers of those individuals bore Babylonian theophoric names. It is suggested that the persistence of Yahwistic – hence distinctly Judean – names among royal officials or their direct offspring, even after the previous generation bore Babylonian names, reflects a considerable measure of tolerance toward ethnically foreign elements in the royal administration (the relevant examples date from the period after the establishment of the Achaemenid empire). In contrast, the progressing adoption of Babylonian names among the Judean merchants in Sippar in the first half of the sixth century bce seems likely to reflect assimilation into the native Babylonian society, fostered by the necessity to pursue commercial dealings with the Ebabbar temple of Šamaš and the social circles centered around the temple, which consisted of conservatively minded upper strata of the native Babylonian society. Editions of the cuneiform tablets discussed in the present study are provided in the Appendix.

1966 ◽  
Vol 34 ◽  
pp. 82-130 ◽  
Author(s):  
D. A. Bullough

Prefatory Note.—My interest in Pavia goes back at least to 1951 when I was elected Rome Scholar in Medieval Studies. I began seriously to collect material for the history of the city in the early Middle Ages in the winter and spring of 1953 when I enjoyed the warm hospitality of the Collegio Ghislieri, thanks to the efforts made on my behalf by the late Hugh Last, to whose memory this article is dedicated. The published proceedings of the Reichenau and Spoleto congresses on ‘The early medieval town’ in the 1950s clearly underlined the need for detailed studies of particular towns; but the lack of adequate archaeological evidence discouraged me from attempting such a study of early medieval Pavia. In 1964, however, Dr. A. Peroni, Director of the Museo Civico invited me to read a supplementary paper on this topic to the Convegno di Studio sul Centro Storico di Pavia held in the Università degli Studi at Pavia on July 4th and 5th of that year. The present article is an amplified and corrected version of that paper: I have made no substantial alterations to my account of the ‘urbanistica’ of early medieval Pavia—written for an audience of architects and art-historians as well as of historians—but have dealt more fully with the social history of the city in this period. Professor Richard Krautheimer read a draft of the revised version and made some pointed and helpful comments. I am greatly indebted to Dr. Peroni, not merely for the invitation to present the original paper but also for supplying illustrations and answering queries at a time when he and his staff were engaged in helping to repair the ravages of the Florence floods.


2015 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 89-108 ◽  
Author(s):  
Afshin Marashi

AbstractThis article investigates the evolution of print culture and commerce in Tehran during the first half of the 20th century. The first section examines technological changes that facilitated the commercialization of texts and then details the history of early print entrepreneurs in the Tehran bazaar. The second section examines the expansion of the book trade between the 1920s and 1940s, tracing the emergence of modern bookstores in a rapidly changing Tehran. I argue that patterns of change in print commerce between 1900 and 1950 contributed to the emergence of mass culture by midcentury. This new mass culture involved the social and political empowerment of a diversity of new reading publics in the city, and enabled the emergence of new forms of popular politics.


2011 ◽  
Vol 8 (2) ◽  
pp. 609-642 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karina Kuschnir

Drawing the city is a proposal for an ethnographic research project in Rio de Janeiro. I begin by mapping the production of an international group calling themselves ‘urban sketchers,' whose collective project extols drawing as a form of looking, knowing and registering the experience of living in cities. Next I show the connections between art and anthropology, as well as their relation to cities and to Rio de Janeiro in particular. The sources and bibliography on the themes of the social history of art, drawing, visual anthropology and urban anthropology are also discussed. Setting out from the latter area, I present the possibilities for undertaking an ethnography that contributes to our comprehension of the graphic and symbolic narratives of urban life.


Author(s):  
Frances R. Aparicio

This chapter examines the stories of the first-generation, immigrant parents of the Intralatino/as interviewed for the book. I analyze their personal stories of migration from their home countries, the romantic encounters with their partners as National Others, and the emerging conflicts and resistance on the part of their relatives and family members that they faced as they decided to start a family with a partner who was not of their own national community. That Chicago was the site for these inter-latino encounters speaks to the rich history of immigrant arrivals to the city. Historicizing the social meanings and tensions produced by interlatino/a desire and romance in Chicago, I highlight the courage and resilience of these interlatino couples given the challenges most of them faced for marrying outside their national community.


Author(s):  
Roger Ling ◽  
Paul Arthur ◽  
Georgia Clarke ◽  
Estelle Lazer ◽  
Lesley A. Ling ◽  
...  

The present volume is the first of three which will together provide an in-depth analysis of one city block at Pompeii: the so-called Insula del Menandro (Insula of the Menander) (Pompeii I 10). It will concentrate on the architecture and structural history of the insula, while the second and third volumes will deal respectively with interior decoration and with loose finds. Each will be used, in its different way, to shed light on the social history of the insula and of Pompeii in general. Behind this publication lies a long-term programme of recording and documentation going back to the 1970s, the primary objective of which has been the production of an archive, consisting primarily of drawings at 1:5 of the surviving wall-paintings, and plans, sections, and elevations at 1:50 of the visible architecture. These are supplemented by photographs in black and white and in colour, and by drawings of selected pavements and certain architectural details at 1:10. In addition there are pro forma sheets providing a detailed record, room by room, of all architectural and decorative features. Copies of this archive will ultimately be deposited in the Archaeological Superintendency at Pompeii, in the British School at Rome, and in the University of Manchester. This project, carried out by a team from Britain, fits in with the general policy of the Pompeian authorities since the late 1970s to improve the documentation of the site. There have been a number of programmes of recording during this period, most importantly a series of photographic campaigns mounted by the Istituto Centrale per il Catalogo e la Documentazione to record the surviving paintings and pavements and, more recently, a massive computerization project called Neapolis which has Involved specialists in various disciplines (archaeology, cartography, architecture, art history, and anthropology) and has aimed to produce an electronic archive permitting access to almost any piece of information, visual or written, about the city. The Importance of recording, in whatever form, is all too apparent. Despite the best efforts of the local authorities, the fabric of the city is steadily deteriorating: weathering, plant infestation, vandalism, and theft all take their toll.


Author(s):  
Alysa Levene

Childhood and youth have undergone a period of much more intensive scrutiny within the social history of medicine in the past few decades. This article discusses the significance of health and well-being of the younger generation as it reflects a variety of wider societal concerns about national efficiency, confidence in medical practice, a healthy and well-balanced population, and the quality of social relations. It discusses more insightful discoveries about the nature of child patients and disease by studying how they are treated compared with others experiencing similar impairment. It also deals with the second theme to emerge in recent medical histories of childhood and youth focusing on the boundaries of normal life experiences. The history of child health is moving from the margins of welfare and employment into its own field, and it is hoped that future work will continue to build up a more convincing set of theoretical reference points.


Focaal ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 2018 (82) ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Patrick Neveling ◽  
Luisa Steur

This introduction, coming out during the two hundredth anniversary of Karl Marx’s birth, discusses the distinctiveness of Marxian anthropology and what it has to offer to our efforts at understanding, and confronting, the complexities of the social contradictions constituted by—and constitutive of—twenty-first century capitalism. The article points out common denominators of Marxian anthropology going back to Marx’s insights, but also offers a cursory social history of the diverse lineages of enquiry within Marxian anthropology, shaped by the relations and inequalities of the context in which they emerged. Finally, we discuss certain crucial fields of engagement in contemporary Marxian anthropology as reflected in this theme section’s contributions.


Africa ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 88 (3) ◽  
pp. 518-538 ◽  
Author(s):  
Martin Mourre

AbstractThis article is an attempt to reconsider the representations that, in Senegal in the 2000s, linked the social history of thetirailleurs(African colonial soldiers) with the practical and symbolic processes at the heart of a number of migratory projects, especially among young people. The history of this social military body was rooted in almost a century of colonial domination, from 1857 to 1962. Thetirailleursplayed a part in all the battles of the French army and generated different kinds of social imaginaries that were woven between France and Africa. In the late 1950s, another figure, another ideal type, became established in the Senegalese public space: the migrant. After tracing the history of the way in which these two figures were constructed, I trace how, more recently, the younger generation has been able to mobilize the dominant memory of thetirailleurin its own aspirations of exile. Some preliminary methodological proposals will be needed to account for these migratory imaginaries.


2006 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 311-337 ◽  
Author(s):  
Kate Cooper ◽  
Julia Hillner ◽  
Conrad Leyser

This paper represents a report on work in progress at the University of Manchester’s Centre for Late Antiquity. The goal of our research is to open a new chapter in research on late ancient and Early Medieval Rome, through the systematic collation and diffusion of relatively neglected sources, in particular the Roman gesta martyrum. They are not usually considered as a source for the social history of the city, because of their transparently tendentious character. Yet the gesta are our best witness to the ebullient of the Roman laity, on whose patronage the ecclesiastical hierarchy continued to depend. We hope to make the gesta more widely accessible, and to facilitate their cross-referencing with other kinds of source; our method is to combine the tools of traditional scholarship with contemporary digital technologies, the operation of which we briefly describe here.


2000 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 171-172
Author(s):  
James E. Lindsay

An Ayyubid Notable and His World delivers on its title. David Morray's careful study of Ibn al-⊂Adim's (d. 1262) Bughyat al-talab fi ta⊃rikh Halab (Everything Desirable about the History of Aleppo) exemplifies how this important local history can be used to shed light on the social history of medieval northern Syria, especially under the Ayyubids.1


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