Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C.

by Joan Aruz (Editor), Kim Benzel (Editor), Jean M. Evans (Editor)

This important volume describes the extraordinary art created in the second millennium B.C. for royal palaces, temples, and tombs from Mesopotamia, Syria, and Anatolia to Cyprus, Egypt, and the Aegean.  Objects of the highest artistry reflect the development of a sophisticated trade network throughout the eastern Mediterranean region and the resulting fusion of Near Eastern, Aegean, and Egyptian cultural styles. The impact of these far-flung connections is documented in the precious materials sent to royal and temple treasuries and, most dramatically, in objects discovered on merchant shipwrecks off the shores of southern Anatolia. The history of the period and the artistic creativity fostered by interaction among the powers of the ancient Near East, both great and small, are discussed by an international group of scholars in essays and entries on the more than 350 objects included in the exhibition, continuing the fascinating story begun in the landmark catalogue Art of the First Cities (2003).

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Art

548 pages, Hardcover

First published November 25, 2008

About the author

Joan Aruz is curator emerita, Department of Ancient Near Eastern Art, at The Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Reviews

[Marc Lamot · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rather specialized survey of the relations between different regions in the Middle East, in the 2nd millennium BCE. Of course, Mesopotamia and the Nile Valley are the main focus, but the book also goes very deeply into the neighboring and more periphal areas. And the focus is mainly on trade, but also the exchange of art and craft, and of diplomatic relations are discussed. Extensively illustrated, as this actually is a book companying an exhibition at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, in New York, in 2008. A little more in my History account on Goodreads: https://www.goodreads.com/review/show....

[Sense of History]

Trade and exchange between human communities, of course, existed before written or urban civilizations. For example, in Neolithic graves, objects can be found that come from tens, sometimes hundreds of kilometers away. In most cases it is indistinguishable whether real commercial exchanges were involved (money as such did not exist yet, of course, but barter and exchange of gifts did), or whether it involved transactions through itinerant merchants or exchanges between neighbors along a network. Only very gradually, between 12,000 and 5,000 years ago, the fog lifts somewhat, and we see that contacts and exchanges between communities went hand in hand with the formation of specific professional groups: the merchants already mentioned, but also craftsmen and envoys/diplomats.

This book focuses on the 2nd millennium BCE, in what we might call the broad Middle East, and what archaeologists consider as the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. Just prior to that point, there was already a very intense interaction between the Sumerian-Akkadian cultures in Mesopotamia, with spurs in the Levant, northern Syria, and southwestern Iran, and a little more limited in the Nile Valley, with spurs to the south. Over the course of the second millennium, that interaction area would expand in several waves: eastwards (up to the Indus Valley), westwards (Anatolia and the Eastern Mediterranean), and northwards (up to the Caucasus), and it would also become intertwined, with the Nile Valley-Aegean axis being integrated at last in the 2nd half of the 2nd Millennium.

This book provides a good picture of this more intense exchange, both geographically and thematically, in sometimes highly specialized contributions. For a good synthesis of the Late Bronze Age I can especially recommend the article by Mario Liverani. And the icing on the cake is, of course, the very extensive discussion of the discovery of the shipwreck at Uluburun, near Cyprus, which more than anything else illustrates the cross-connections of the diverse human communities in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East, more than 3300 years ago.

[Svetlana]

Hard to give this one a rating - it's very dry and technical material about very specific subject matter. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone without some rough background knowledge on the topic, but it's well written and very interesting!

[Ihor Kolesnyk · Rating 5 out of 5]

Гарна нагода познайомитися із різними археологічними артефактами, локаціями, короткими історіями про них. Звісно це нагода посумувати за часами, коли був порядок, всі жили в достатку і богам можна було написати смс із зіккурату. Жартую звісно.

[Salam Taha · Rating 4 out of 5]

I always keep a copy of the Metropolitan Exhibition publishings, edited by Joan Aruz namely are comprehensive and very well looked after, this one is unique in the sense that it has a rare collection of artifacts from the Mediterranean to the Indus valley , namely Jewelry, feels like an encyclopedia, written by the best.

[Wendelle]

essays coinciding with the revelation and exhibit of collections from the Afghan National Museum that were courageously hidden by some Afghans following the policy of destruction of human-depicting art by the Taliban regime. Tracing a rich history from Ancient Bactria, separate essays evaluate the evident influence of Greek, Roman, Indian, and then the Eurasian steppes on Bactrian art and metalwork due to its position within the network of the Silk Road. The Afghan Museum's motto is that "A Nation stays alive when its culture stays alive"

[Megan · Rating 5 out of 5]

Catalog of the 2009 "Beyond Babylon" exhibit in the Metropolitan Museum of Art