meetings
TUESDAY, Noveber 14
4:00 pm, 254 Barrows
The Archaeology of Extispicy: Modeling Divination in Bronze Age Mesopotamia
Prof. Matthew Rutz, Brown University
Extispicy, the examination of a sacrificial animal’s entrails for divine signs, enjoyed both prestige and longevity as a cultural practice in the Near East during the Bronze Age. Evidence from cuneiform tablets as well as models of the organs themselves has been found in present-day Iraq, Iran, Syria, Palestine, and Anatolia, raising questions about the origins, diffusion, and adaptation of what is commonly construed as a ‘Mesopotamian’ or ‘Babylonian’ system of knowledge. In this paper Matthew Rutz will examine both the regional distribution and specific archaeological contexts of the source material with an emphasis on the early second millennium BCE. His goal is to illustrate how certain archaeological, historical, and philological methods and assumptions have permeated the discussion of this formative period in the history of Mesopotamian divination.