The history of the region now known as Iraq is rarely told as one long and continuous story. It is instead split into periods between which little or no continuity is assumed to exist. A deep scholarly divide separates those who study the cuneiform cultures of ancient Mesopotamia from those who study the following periods, including the Islamic cultures of the Middle Ages. But this split among scholars masks deeper continuities in the historical evidence. Traditions, cultural practices, and religious beliefs that had their roots in Babylonian culture survived in various forms long after the cuneiform script had disappeared. As late as the eleventh century CE, small groups of worshippers still gathered on the banks of the Tigris to mark the death of Dumuzi, a mythical event that had been mourned for more than three millennia.

This workshop examines the Middle Eastern legacies of cuneiform cultures during and after their decline in the late first millennium BCE. The aim of the workshop is to encourage scholars to think of the history of Iraq as not a mosaic of separate episodes, but as a long tapestry of interwoven trends, gradual changes, and surprising echoes.

keynotes
Céline Debourse (Harvard University)
Hanaa Malallah (Iraqi Artist)

featuring…
Supratik Baralay (Princeton University)
Kevin Blankinship (Brigham Young University)
Johannes Haubold (Princeton University)
Sophus Helle (Princeton University)
Bret Langendorfer (Princeton University)