Category Archives: Antiquity

Reading Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics Is Still Rewarding

Ancient Greece, Antiquity, Aristotle, Philosophy

A while ago, I told some people about the fascinating experience that reading Aristotle’s Nichomachean Ethics entailed for me. A few queries about the Ethics followed. Not because I am an expert on this book or anything, but because I read more of it – and about it! – than the others present. And I can very much not help myself, sharing my enthusiasm for anything slightly related to the humanities… During that conversation I got an interesting question that fit the ethos of the Nicomachean Ethics: Why? Why read a philosophical treatise from more than two millennia ago? Philosophy has moved on since then, after all. Nobody has the spare time – and neither do their friends – to live the good life as proposed by Aristotle in the company he envisioned. The author of the Nichomachean Ethics was also famously misogynist and harbored many other views that do not fit our modern societies, with their human rights and the like. His stance on slavery was at best ambiguous and at worst tacit resignation, for crying out loud!1 So let us today discuss that monosyllabic question – why? Because I wish for others that very same experience that I had with the Nichomachean Ethics. But there are also more practical reasons to dust off this tome.

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Where Was Ancient Mesopotamia? The Case for Microecologies

Ancient Mesopotamia, Antiquity, Environmental Humanities, Methodology

That most people do not spend every waking hour contemplating the ultimate origins and regularly shifting meaning of everyday words – especially those of us who are not writing blogs for other’s infotainment – does not mean that this isn’t a very rewarding activity.1 Especially when it comes to area designations which are so ingrained that we hardly think about them, like the ancient Mediterranean or ancient Mesopotamia. Because it can be interesting to work out under which circumstances such large regions during such long eras can fruitfully be denoted with a single label and when this would obscure important subdivisions or local developments. For instance. if one studies people’s relationship to their immediate environment – be it ideologically, economically, or in any other conceivable way – it may be rewarding to break up familiar areas into what is called microecologies.2 And it is this useful methodological tool that I want to discuss with you today. Through this discussion we will also discover the ultimate origins of the label ‘Mesopotamia’ and encounter some of the conspicuous environmental differences within this region in ancient times.

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The Themes of My Favorite Video Games of 2024

Ancient Mesopotamia, Antiquity, Environmental Humanities, Methodology, Philosophy, Video Games

After we discussed my twenty favorite albums of the previous calendar year last week, today I want to introduce you to three games that came out in 2024 and which may be of interest to the readers of this blog. Because the themes present in these products of digital entertainment harken back to subjects that we discussed on Bildungblocks in the past and provide, I hope, a new perspective on them. These are, in my opinion, also the best games of last year. As such, the following discussion doubles as a list with my favorite video games of 2024.

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The Caring Queen: Puduḫepa of Hatti

Ancient Anatolia, Antiquity

A few weeks ago we discussed how history regularly does not give equal attention to all those who lived in the ancient past. In part, this is because of the limitations of our sources. Not only were the persons who could write back then often part of merely certain societal groups, but it also matters for whom and about whom they could chose to write within the constraints of their profession and world view. In addition there are the vicissitudes of fortune when it comes to which texts were accidently preserved and subsequently discovered, as well as to which texts kept getting copied and circulated throughout the ages.1 Due to such factors it is difficult to ascertain the lived experience of most women in many eras and areas, for example.2 Especially their inner world has often not survived through the written word. Though scholars did make progress in this regard for several different time periods and societies, including the monumental Women of Babylon by the Assyriologist Zainab Bahrani.3 And there is one prominent woman from ancient Anatolia who we may come to know reasonably well. A queen whose caring attitude shines through both the public and private documents pertaining to her: Puduḫepa of Hatti.

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Warlords of Hatti: The Greatest Television Series Never Made

Ancient Anatolia, Antiquity

Some might say that we live in an age of reboots and remakes.1 The adjacent need for already known or otherwise established material often leads those working in media-production to the past. As a result, many historical figures have a section about their appearances in popular culture tacked onto their Wikipedia-page, for example.2 But there is a lot of potential here, be it pertaining to relatively less famous periods and persons, that still remains untapped. Such is the case with the reigns and other adventures of the Hittite king Šuppiluliuma I and his royal prodigy, who ruled the Kingdom of the Hittites – roughly ancient Anatolia and sometimes parts of Syria – during the fourteenth and thirteenth century BCE.3 These men presided over a period of war, diplomacy, and intrigue that would put the average season of HBO’s famous serial Game of Thrones to shame – and which included court shenanigans in Ancient Egypt, for crying out loud!4 So, consider this my unofficial application for Hollywood and join me in summarizing the outline of the greatest television series never made: Warlords of Hatti.

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The Epic of Anzû: One of Ancient Mesopotamia’s Coolest Action Scenes

Ancient Mesopotamia, Antiquity

It is probably safe to say that every human being – perhaps even any and all hominid! – appreciates a good story.1 We all like to be entertained, to be moved, to shudder with fear, and, when the mood is right, to take away points of view that are presented in the narrative which we can ponder with regard to our own life and the lives of those around us. And sometimes we see, read, or otherwise experience a story that is so good, that one cannot be anything else than in awe of the narrative excellence on display. The clever resolution to an intriguing battle of weapons, magic, and wits between one of the Mesopotamian gods and the fearsome Anzû bird, makes the ancient tale now known as the Epic of Anzû undoubtedly one such story.2

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A.I. and Assyriology

Ancient Mesopotamia, Antiquity, Methodology, Translation Studies

To study Assyriology is both an intellectual joy and an exercise in sadness. The latter may come as a surprise to those who have read my breezy blogs about the fascinating world of the ancient Near East. Because, while it is true that we possess many useful sources from which we have learned a lot over the decades, we still lack a lot of essential information.1 For example, to use the story-based methodologies that can be found within the environmental humanities, with which we aim to establish how the people back then used to think about and deal with nature, we do need some stories.2 When these specific sources have been lost to time, such as with respect to ancient Elam – roughly the southwest and east of modern Iran – applying such methodologies is quite impossible.3 But we should not abandon all hope! Not only are there probably still clay tablets and other documents preserved in undiscovered archeological find spots across the Near East, but there are also thousands of unread fragments of clay tablets, papyri, and the other media just waiting to be studied, which sometimes haven’t been read since they were taken out of the ground. Extensively celebrating the latter reassurance would be premature, though. Because, there are at the moment simply not enough experts to study all these documents – even if they can be read.4 Luckily, we came into some good news recently: A.I., an abbreviation of the term ‘artificial intelligence,’ can be of service! Or can it?

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Byblos: At the Crossroads of the Ancient World

Ancient Levant, Antiquity

Say you were a time traveler with a time machine that was very expensive to operate – as most of them are, in my experience – and therefore your goal was to experience as much aspects of the ancient world as is possible in one go. Then Byblos would definitely be one of the places to be! Because this city in the eastern Mediterranean was a veritable metropolis of antiquity, where the gates and docks welcomed a varied and marvelous array of political, cultural, and artistic influences. Here you could observe hieroglyphs next to cuneiform writing, read the names of Pharaohs which adorned votive vessels, and find precious ingredients that would eventually end up in mummies.1

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The Death of Plato

Ancient Greece, Antiquity, Philosophy, Plato

Some famous people are perhaps as much known for the manner and time of their deaths as for the things that made them a household name in the first place. The infamous moniker ‘the club of 27’, which denotes legendary musicians like Kurt Cobain and Amy Winehouse who died tragically at a mere 27 years old, comes to mind.1 But also philosophers can acquire such moribund recognition.2 Socrates’ death, for example, has been portrayed throughout nearly all artforms.3 And the story of this ancient Greek philosopher’s forced suicide, on account of not saving his skin by changing a way of life which he deemed too important, still resonates today.4 But if you are a morbid mortal like myself, you have probably sometimes wondered about the demise of those towering figures of history whose end has not (yet) become part of popular culture. Like Socrates’ most famous student, that other widely acclaimed ancient Greek philosopher – and Dutch cd-store – Plato.

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‘Succession’ in the Bronze Age

Ancient Mesopotamia, Antiquity

It is easy to see why HBO’s darkly sardonic ‘Succession’ was one of the most popular tv-series of the last decade.1 We got to experience trappings of wealth that are otherwise unattainable to us – or at least to me – while being invested in a web of intrigue, betrayals, and parental issues that would even impress William Shakespeare. The heart of the show – so to speak, that is – is the relationship between Logan Roy, founder and CEO of a veritable business empire, and three of his four children. Through profanity laden rants and other varieties of abuse, Logan tries to prepare one of his children for the top role, though none of them ever lives up to his expectations.2 But what if I told you that there are not only recent historical parallels to this entwinement of fierce power struggles and dysfunctional family dynamics?3 Indeed, the Roys might feel right at home in the Bronze Age. As the relationships within the royal family in the Bronze Age kingdom of Upper-Mesopotamia were perhaps as volatile as those between the Roys, be it less profanity laden – but only marginally so.

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