ANCIENT NEAR EASTERN LITERATURE

The course is part of the ancillary activities of the curriculum in Archaeology and Philology, Literatures and History of the MA in Ancient Civilisations: Literature, History and Archaeology; its goal is to help students developing their abilities, knowledge and methodology of the philology and literatures of the Ancient Near eastern world.
It aims at helping students to further develop their knowledge and mastery of the cuneiform sources written in Akkadian (reading, translation and contestualisation), and of the appropriate tools and methods necessary to produce a sample of an autonomous piece of research.

At the end of the course the student will have an in-depht knowledge of the tools and methods for the philological, grammatical, and historical analyis of the cuneiform text and will be able to apply it to the production of an original piece of research.

Elementary Akkadian (Assyriology) suggested, intermediate Akkadian (Sumero-Akkadian epigraphy) preferred.
Students with no previous knowledge of Akkadian are more than welcome to the course and will be able to take advantage of it anyway, with an ad hoc programme.

"Peeping into the Library of Ashurbanipal"
1) Archives and libraries in the Ancient Near East
2) The Library of Ashurbanipal, between history, myth and archaeology
3) Structure, formation and make-up
4) Peeping into the Library of Ashurbanibal: reading from the original of sections of selected manuscripts from the Library
5) The king's librarians at work': digital projects and the Library of Ashurbanipal

Students are required to prepare the cuneiform texts at home on a regular basis and prepare selected readings for the classes; they will also produce an original piece of research on a course-related topic that will be presented in class.

K. Veenhof, "Cuneiform Archives: An Introduction" in id, Cuneiform Archives and Libraries: Papers Read at the 30e Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale, Leiden, 4-8 July 1983. Leiden, 1986: 1-36
E. Robson, "Reading the Libraries of Assyria and Babylonia", in J. König, K. Oikonomopolou, G. Woolf. Ancient Libraries. Cambridge, 2013: 38-56.
E. Frahm, "Keeping company with men of learning: the king as scholar", in K. Radner, E. Robson (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Cuneiform Culture. Oxford, 2011: 508-532.
I. Finkel, "Ashurbanipal's Library: contents and significance" in G. Brereton (ed.), I am Ashurbanipal king of the world, king of Assyria. London 2018: 80-87
J. Fincke, "he British Museum's Ashurbanipal Library Project", Iraq 66, 2004: 55-60.

Tools and grammars
W. Von Soden, Grundriss der Akkadischen Grammatik, Roma 1995 (terza edizione)
J. Huehnergard, A Grammar of Akkadian, Winona Lake 2011 (terza edizione)
Fl. Malbran Labat, Manuel de langue akkadienne, Louvain-La Neuve 2001
The Chicago Assyrian Dictionary

More readings will be suggested in class.

Students who are not willing to attend classes please contact teacher in due time before the exam.

The evaluation process will take into account:
- students' proficiency in doing their homework and class participation
- the results obtained in producing a sample of autonomous research and presentino it to the public
- f2f exam on the main course topics.

classes will consist in seminars where the main topics and texts of the course will be discussed jointly by teacher and students.
Active participation is required at all times. Students will prepare and present a sample of their own research, on a topic to be agreed upon with the teacher.

Italian

oral