Matthews: Near Eastern Archaeology, 4-vol. set

by Roger Matthews (Editor)

The world we live in today has been fundamentally shaped by the ancient Near East. Farming and settled village life first developed in the Fertile Crescent after the end of the Ice Age around 10,000 BC and spread from there into Europe, Central Asia, and beyond. Around 3,000 BC, the world’s first cities and writing originated in Mesopotamia (the region in south-west Asia between the Tigris and Euphrates, now part of Iraq). They were soon followed by the world’s first empires, precursors of the great states and empires of the classical world. Our discovery and understanding of these episodes is due to the fieldwork and research of generations of archaeologists and ancient historians who have painstakingly reconstructed many aspects of the ancient Near East through its surviving physical remains and its written documents. Over the past two hundred years or so, entire ancient civilizations, including the Sumerians, the Hittites, Assyria and Elam, previously known, if at all, solely through oblique and biased sources such as the Bible and Herodotus, have been brought back to life through the archaeologist’s trowel and the historian’s eye. At the same time, our understanding of the modern Middle East has been enormously enriched by our deepening knowledge of the ancient Near East. This new collection of major works from Routledge, assembled and introduced by a leading scholar, provides a stimulating and authoritative reference resource. It showcases the dynamism and scope of Near Eastern Archaeology as a modern scientific discipline which employs a wide range of theories and approaches adopted and adapted from the natural and social sciences. The volumes encapsulate the diachronic strengths of Near Eastern Archaeology in its ability to interrogate material and written evidence from many millennia. They also illustrate the theoretical and methodological innovativeness of Near Eastern Archaeology as its practitioners grapple with the special attributes of the complex and fragmentary evidence recovered from archaeological sites across the region. Volume I is devoted to texts defining the scope and nature of the ancient Near East, and to the exploration of recurrent themes and issues through its study. The history of the discipline of Near Eastern Archaeology and its intimate connection with modern political discourses―as well as with scientific developments―is fully explored here. The landscapes and resources of the ancient Near East also feature in this volume, as well as its societal components, including household, village, town, and city. Volume II brings together the best scholarship relating to élite life, human burial, and the cult and religion of the ancient Near East. Volume III, meanwhile, assembles key texts on the technologies of production, consumption, and control. The final volume in the collection situates the ancient Near East within its wider context, examining connectivity amongst Near Eastern communities, as well as with their neighbours in all directions. The volume concludes with a reflective section reviewing the end of the ancient Near East and long-term change and continuity.

1736 pages, Hardcover

First published August 26, 2016