Vorderasiatische Museen: Gestern, Heute, Morgen; Berlin, Paris, London, New York, Eine Standortsbestimmung: Kolloquium aus Anla des Einhundertjhrigen Bestehens des Vorderasiatischen Museums Berlin am 7. Mai 1999 by Beate Salje Review by: Gary Beckman Journal of the American Oriental Society, Vol. 123, No. 1 (Jan. - Mar., 2003), p. 254 Published by: American Oriental Society Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/3217891 . Accessed: 14/06/2014 18:33 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact
[email protected]. . American Oriental Society is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Journal of the American Oriental Society. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 91.229.229.212 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 18:33:28 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions http://www.jstor.org/action/showPublisher?publisherCode=aos http://www.jstor.org/stable/3217891?origin=JSTOR-pdf http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp Journal of the American Oriental Society 123.1 (2003) Journal of the American Oriental Society 123.1 (2003) Vorderasiatische Museen: Gestern, Heute, Morgen; Berlin, Paris, London, New York, Eine Standorts- bestimmung: Kolloquium aus Anlajf des Einhundert- jdhrigen Bestehens des Vorderasiatischen Museums Berlin am 7. Mai 1999. Edited by BEATE SALJE. Mainz: PHILIPP VON ZABERN, 2001. Pp. 137, illus. ?34.80. This handsome volume presents the texts of lectures (in German and English) delivered at a conference held in Berlin in May 1999 to celebrate the centenary of the appointment of Friedrich Delitzsch as director of the ancient Near Eastern section of the Prussian royal mu- seums, an event considered the founding of today's Vorderasiatisches Museum. In these contributions, rep- resentatives of the most important European and Ameri- can museums with significant holdings from the lands of cuneiform culture (Berlin, Louvre, British Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art) outline the history of their collections. In addition, Berlin archaeologists review the major German excavations that have yielded objects for the Vorderasiatisches Museum (Assur, Babylon, Uruk, Habuba Kabira, Tall Knedig) and Joachim Marzahn sketches the development of the Museum's collection of cuneiform tablets and inscribed objects. The book concludes with the transcript of a panel discussion among the museum professionals in attendance con- cerning the future direction of their institutions' exhibi- tion and public outreach programs. This well-illustrated publication is a diverting intro- duction to a neglected aspect of the history of Assyrio- logy. Those interested in a more thorough consideration of the early history of the Vorderasiatisches Museum, however, should consult Nicola Criisemann, Vom Zwei- stromland zum Kupfergraben. Vorgeschichte und Ent- stehungsjahre (1899-1918) der Vorderasiatischen Abteilung der Berliner Museen vor fach- und kultur- politischen Hintergrinden (Berlin, 2001). G. B. Mythology and Mythologies: Methodological Approaches to Intercultural Influences. Edited by R. M. WHITING. Melammu Symposia, vol. 2. Hel- sinki: THE NEO-ASSYRIAN TEXT CORPUS PROJECT, 2001. Pp. xxv + 280. $75 (paper). The Melammu Project, a sister to the University of Helsinki's Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, seeks to investigate the intellectual influence of Mesopotamian civilization upon later cultures. It is pursuing this goal by compiling a database of ancient textual sources ex- emplifying direct borrowing and interaction between the cuneiform and classical worlds. This volume begins with a concise description of the planned database and Vorderasiatische Museen: Gestern, Heute, Morgen; Berlin, Paris, London, New York, Eine Standorts- bestimmung: Kolloquium aus Anlajf des Einhundert- jdhrigen Bestehens des Vorderasiatischen Museums Berlin am 7. Mai 1999. Edited by BEATE SALJE. Mainz: PHILIPP VON ZABERN, 2001. Pp. 137, illus. ?34.80. This handsome volume presents the texts of lectures (in German and English) delivered at a conference held in Berlin in May 1999 to celebrate the centenary of the appointment of Friedrich Delitzsch as director of the ancient Near Eastern section of the Prussian royal mu- seums, an event considered the founding of today's Vorderasiatisches Museum. In these contributions, rep- resentatives of the most important European and Ameri- can museums with significant holdings from the lands of cuneiform culture (Berlin, Louvre, British Museum, Metropolitan Museum of Art) outline the history of their collections. In addition, Berlin archaeologists review the major German excavations that have yielded objects for the Vorderasiatisches Museum (Assur, Babylon, Uruk, Habuba Kabira, Tall Knedig) and Joachim Marzahn sketches the development of the Museum's collection of cuneiform tablets and inscribed objects. The book concludes with the transcript of a panel discussion among the museum professionals in attendance con- cerning the future direction of their institutions' exhibi- tion and public outreach programs. This well-illustrated publication is a diverting intro- duction to a neglected aspect of the history of Assyrio- logy. Those interested in a more thorough consideration of the early history of the Vorderasiatisches Museum, however, should consult Nicola Criisemann, Vom Zwei- stromland zum Kupfergraben. Vorgeschichte und Ent- stehungsjahre (1899-1918) der Vorderasiatischen Abteilung der Berliner Museen vor fach- und kultur- politischen Hintergrinden (Berlin, 2001). G. B. Mythology and Mythologies: Methodological Approaches to Intercultural Influences. Edited by R. M. WHITING. Melammu Symposia, vol. 2. Hel- sinki: THE NEO-ASSYRIAN TEXT CORPUS PROJECT, 2001. Pp. xxv + 280. $75 (paper). The Melammu Project, a sister to the University of Helsinki's Neo-Assyrian Text Corpus Project, seeks to investigate the intellectual influence of Mesopotamian civilization upon later cultures. It is pursuing this goal by compiling a database of ancient textual sources ex- emplifying direct borrowing and interaction between the cuneiform and classical worlds. This volume begins with a concise description of the planned database and the format of its entries. The Melammu Project has also sponsored scholarly symposia in Tviirminne, Finland (1998), Paris (1999), Chicago (2000), and Ravenna (2001). The publication under review presents the pro- ceedings of the Paris meeting. As indicated by the title of this collection, the sec- ond Melammu conference focused on the question of myth. The subtitle, however, is misleading. Although the editor's introduction does briefly set forth some sys- tematic thoughts on the comparative study of religious narrative, little is said explicitly about methodology in the fourteen contributions here. Most of the authors simply demonstrate their approaches through consid- eration of the survival of some feature of Assyrian or Babylonian religion in a more recent period. An excep- tion is the essay of I. Gruenwald ("Ritual, Economy, and the Religion of Ancient Israel"), who revives the myth-and-ritual school (p. 37: "Myths are stories with ritual consequences." p. 40: "Every ritual, or ritual pro- cess, presupposes the existence of a sustaining narra- tive.") in an unconvincing exegesis of ancient Israelite culture as based on a "nomadic ethos." In rebuttal to one of Gruenwald's main points, it may be observed that the metaphor of the king as the shepherd of his people is not necessarily the product of a nomadic en- vironment, for it also arose in the distinctly urban civi- lization of early Sumer. Another dubious contribution is that of C. Grotta- nelli ("The Story of Combabos and the Gilgamesh Tra- dition"), who compares the Mesopotamian epic to a tale contained in De Dea Syria, as well as to the story of Absalom in 2 Samuel. In the narrative attributed to Lu- cian, Combabos is a companion of Seleucus I who cas- trates himself to assure his chastity. He bears practically no resemblance to any character in the Gilgamesh epic, yet Grottanelli equates him not only with the quasi- homophonous Humbaba, but also with Enkidu and Gil- gamesh himself. This multiplicity of correspondences is explained with the observation that since the narra- tive has been compressed in its translation into Greek, the characters had necessarily been condensed! As the editor observes, "[e]ach observer will decide independently whether coincidence has been falsified [as an explanation for similarities]" (p. xv). This reader sometimes had difficulty in accepting even the validity of the comparisons adduced. As a further such example, I might mention the essay of Amar Annus ("Ninurta and the Son of Man"), whose alleged parallels between the Sumerian myth Lugal-e and Judeo-Christian apoca- lyptic strike me as totally fanciful. Other papers are more useful. I particularly com- mend J. N. Lawson's exploration of the creative power of words in Babylonian and Greek thought ("Mesopo- tamian Precursors to the Stoic Concept of Logos"), and R. Rollinger's careful examination of evidence for the presence of Greeks ("Ionians") on the territory of the Assyrian empire ("The Ancient Greeks and the Impact of the Ancient Near East: Textual Evidence and His- the format of its entries. The Melammu Project has also sponsored scholarly symposia in Tviirminne, Finland (1998), Paris (1999), Chicago (2000), and Ravenna (2001). The publication under review presents the pro- ceedings of the Paris meeting. As indicated by the title of this collection, the sec- ond Melammu conference focused on the question of myth. The subtitle, however, is misleading. Although the editor's introduction does briefly set forth some sys- tematic thoughts on the comparative study of religious narrative, little is said explicitly about methodology in the fourteen contributions here. Most of the authors simply demonstrate their approaches through consid- eration of the survival of some feature of Assyrian or Babylonian religion in a more recent period. An excep- tion is the essay of I. Gruenwald ("Ritual, Economy, and the Religion of Ancient Israel"), who revives the myth-and-ritual school (p. 37: "Myths are stories with ritual consequences." p. 40: "Every ritual, or ritual pro- cess, presupposes the existence of a sustaining narra- tive.") in an unconvincing exegesis of ancient Israelite culture as based on a "nomadic ethos." In rebuttal to one of Gruenwald's main points, it may be observed that the metaphor of the king as the shepherd of his people is not necessarily the product of a nomadic en- vironment, for it also arose in the distinctly urban civi- lization of early Sumer. Another dubious contribution is that of C. Grotta- nelli ("The Story of Combabos and the Gilgamesh Tra- dition"), who compares the Mesopotamian epic to a tale contained in De Dea Syria, as well as to the story of Absalom in 2 Samuel. In the narrative attributed to Lu- cian, Combabos is a companion of Seleucus I who cas- trates himself to assure his chastity. He bears practically no resemblance to any character in the Gilgamesh epic, yet Grottanelli equates him not only with the quasi- homophonous Humbaba, but also with Enkidu and Gil- gamesh himself. This multiplicity of correspondences is explained with the observation that since the narra- tive has been compressed in its translation into Greek, the characters had necessarily been condensed! As the editor observes, "[e]ach observer will decide independently whether coincidence has been falsified [as an explanation for similarities]" (p. xv). This reader sometimes had difficulty in accepting even the validity of the comparisons adduced. As a further such example, I might mention the essay of Amar Annus ("Ninurta and the Son of Man"), whose alleged parallels between the Sumerian myth Lugal-e and Judeo-Christian apoca- lyptic strike me as totally fanciful. Other papers are more useful. I particularly com- mend J. N. Lawson's exploration of the creative power of words in Babylonian and Greek thought ("Mesopo- tamian Precursors to the Stoic Concept of Logos"), and R. Rollinger's careful examination of evidence for the presence of Greeks ("Ionians") on the territory of the Assyrian empire ("The Ancient Greeks and the Impact of the Ancient Near East: Textual Evidence and His- 254 254 This content downloaded from 91.229.229.212 on Sat, 14 Jun 2014 18:33:28 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp