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Title Sensing the past : detecting the use of the five senses in ancient Near Eastern contexts : proceedings of the conference held in Rome, Sapienza University, June 4th, 2018 / edited by Davide Nadali and Frances Pinnock
Published Wiesbaden : Harrassowitz Verlag, 2020
©2020

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Description 1 online resource (viii, 254 pages) : illustrations, charts, maps, plans
Contents Editorial / Davide Nadali And Frances Pinnock -- To see and/or to be seen / Frances Pinnock -- From up above I see : sight and ceremonial landscapes in the southern Levant during Early Bronze I and IV / Marta D'Andrea -- A soft step and a little drop : on the acoustic experience of the Early Bronze Age temple of the rock at Ebla / Davide Nadali -- Noisy city, silent steppe, tweeting marsh : soundscapes in Sumerian literature / Lorenzo Verderame -- Sound as an expression of social interactions in Akkadian literature / Anne-Caroline Rendu Loisel -- The sound of water : the role of water in constructing forms of religiosity in the Ancient Near East / Nicola Laneri -- What did it taste like? Consuming liquids in 3rd millennium BC Syria and Mesopotamia / Agnese Vacca -- Personhood, senses and artefacts : tactile and visual experience in perceiving the immaterial materially / Silvana Di Paolo -- Touch me! Do not touch me! Sensing Mesopotamia through touch in museums / Paul Collins -- Smelling the city / Federico Buccellati -- "I am walking about shining and radiant with joy" : linking the senses and emotions in Mesopotamia / Elisabeth Wagner-Durand -- Considérations conclusives / Paolo Matthiae
Summary The Archaeology of Senses and the Archaeology of Emotions are two most interesting recent trends in the modern studies about the past, aiming at enlightening the human experience of the archaeological remains and artefacts, which are usually studied per se or in their (inter)connections. Scholars of the ancient Near East from different disciplines - archaeology, history and philology - try to understand how people were presumed to react, or how they reacted in reality, using spaces, and looking at or using artefacts. The volume presents the proceedings of a congress focusing mainly on the use of the five traditional senses, and trying to analyze how each of them might have played a role in specific ancient contexts: The use of sight was common in the rituals of kingship at Ebla and in the choice of specific places for settlements in the southern Levant. The use of hearing was an important aspect in the rites taking place in one of the main 3rd millennium BC temples of Ebla or in the open air sanctuaries of Anatolia, whereas specific words for the definition of sounds are detectable in Sumerian and Akkadian texts. Special foods and beverages were used during ceremonies involving taste and smell - at the same time smell affects both private and public spaces - and archaeological evidence (e.g. sewage systems) shows how this issue has been managed and controlled. Small every-day use objects might have had also tactile properties; senses convey emotions and this aspect can be reconstructed from Mesopotamian texts. A peculiar perspective is provided by the analysis of the relation between public and artefacts in museums
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references
Subject Senses and sensation -- History -- Congresses
HISTORY -- Ancient -- General.
Antiquities
Senses and sensation
SUBJECT Middle East -- Antiquities -- Congresses
Subject Middle East
Middle East -- Antiquities -- Congresses.
Genre/Form proceedings (reports)
Conference papers and proceedings
History
Conference papers and proceedings.
Actes de congrès.
Form Electronic book
Author Nadali, Davide, editor.
Pinnock, Frances, editor.
ISBN 9783447199841
3447199849