ASSYRIOLOGY

The course is part of the ancillary disciplines that make up the curriculum on Ancient and Medieval Mediterranean History of the BA Programme in History; it also offered for students of the BA in the Humanities and Cultural Heritage (select it as part of 'exams of your choice'). It aims at providing students with an intermediate knowledge of the discipline and its methodology, of the writing system, language and grammar of Akkadian, reading from the original and understanding from an historical and linguistic point of view texts of intermediate difficulty. Depending on their personal engagement, students will acquire an intermediate knowledge of the phonology, morphology and sintax of the Akkadian language, and will be able to read and translate texts of a certain difficulty, directly from cuneiform. In addition they will have gained the ability to decode and contextualize the sources from an historical, ideological and literary perspective and will be able to use the main bibliographic tools for the discipline.
Students will prepare the texts to be discusse sin class beforehand: this will allow them to assess step by step the degree of their learning process and actively participate in building their own knowledge of the discipline.

At the end of the course students:
- will have gained an intermediate knowledge of the cuneiform writing system and its principles
- will have gained an intermediate knowledge of the grammar of OB Akkadian (phonology, morphology and syntax)
- and will be able to apply such knowledge to the translation and analysis of different kind of texts in cuneiform on their own and in a group, using the right tools and resources as learnt and applied in class and preparing the texts for the class discussion, that are a necessary part of the final evaluation and of the discipline's knowledge building process.

Consider taking Assyriology I beforehand. Students are invited to attend the classes: in case they do not they are invited to ctc the teacher before accessing the exam.

FLOOD STORIES. THE FLOOD IN MESOPOTAMIAN LITERATURE

1) Introduction to Mesopotamian literature
2) Atrahasīs and Gilgamesh: medium, manuscripts, versions and context
3) The flood in Mesopotamia
4) Reading and commentary of Ah III and Gilg. XI

1) Flood in Gilgamesh
A. George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts, Oxford 2003 (selected parts)
S. Parpola, The Standard Babylonian Epic of Gilgamesh, Helsinki 1997 (cuneiform)
2) Flood in Atrahasis
S. Ermidoro, Quando gli dèi erano uomini, Torino, 2017 (Intro+ Tablet III)
W.J. Lambert - A.R. Millard, Atra-hasīs. The Babylonian Story of the Flood, Winona Lake 1999 (only Tablet III)
3) notes and materials from the classes

Working tools:
a) W. Von Soden, Grundriss der Akkadischen Grammatik, Roma 1995 (terza edizione)
b) J. Huehnergard, A Grammar of Akkadian, Winona Lake 2011 (terza edizione)
c) Fl. Malbran Labat, Manuel de langue akkadienne, Louvain-La Neuve 2001
d) The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary (on-line)
e) Fl.Malbran Labat, Manuel d'epigraphie akkadienne: signes, syllabaire, ideogrammes, 6 ed. o succ., Paris 1988 oppure:
f) R. Borger, Assyrisch-Babylonische Zeichenliste, Neukirchen-Vluyn 1978

STUDENTS WHO DO NOT ATTEND CLASSES
1) text and grammar: ctc teacher
2) S. Ermidoro, Quando gli dèi erano uomini, Torino, 2017
3) A. George, The Babylonian Gilgamesh Epic: Introduction, Critical Edition and Cuneiform Texts, Oxford 2003 (selected parts; ctc teacher)
4) One, of your choice, among:
a) D. Charpin, Reading and Writing in Babylon, Paris 2011
b) K. Radner - E. Robson, The Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Studies, Oxford 2011 (selected parts; ctc teacher)
c) M. Liverani, Paradiso e dintorni, Bari-Roma 2018

Students who are planning to access the exam without attending classes (or e-learning activities) are kindly requested to contact the teacher during office hours well in advance to the examination date, in order to build an individual program (Please note: program requests by e-mail are not accepted).

Learning abilities will be assessed by means of:
- homework discussion and assessment
- discussions & activities in class
- a final exam that will consist of an oral test including:
a) questions on the assigned readings
b) reading, tranliteration, transcription, translation and ommentary of selected texts among those discussed in class.

More details will be offered to the students in class.

oral

A mixture of lectures and seminars (homework+ discussion in class)

Students will be required to do their own homework on a regular basis. Homework will be corrected and discussed in class.

Italian

Other courses in the same area, beside Assyriology, include: History of the Ancient Near East; Phoenician-Punic Archaeology, Egyptology, Archaeology of the Ancient Near East, Islamic Archaeology and Muslim art History, Art and Visual Culture of the Islamic World.

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Human capital, health, education" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development