Bibliographia Iranica

A predominantly bibliographic blog for Iranian Studies

  • Studia Iranica 48(2)

    The second issue of Studia Iranica 48 (2019) has been published. For a table of contents and access to individual articles, see below or visit this page.

    • Ryoichi MIYAMOTO: Étude préliminaire sur la géographie administrative du Tukhāristān
    • Gilles COURTIEU: La pratique du mazdéisme en Crimée selon l’Histoire Naturelle de Pline
    • Vera B. MOREEN: Echoes of the Battle of Čālderān: The Account of the Jewish Chronicler Elijah Capsali (c. 1490 – c. 1555)
    • Jean CALMARD: Le voyage de Louise de la Marnierre en Iran (1836-1837): Introduction, récit, notes
    • Philippe GIGNOUX & Dieter WEBER: Un papyrus en pehlevi égaré à La Sorbonne (Paris)
    • Comptes rendus

  • Handbook of Ancient Afro-Eurasian Economies

    Reden, Sitta von (ed.). 2020. Handbook of ancient Afro-Eurasian economies. Volume 1: Contexts. Berlin: De Gruyter.

    The notion of the “Silk Road” that the German geographer Ferdinand von Richthofen invented in the 19th century has lost attraction to scholars in light of large amounts of new evidence and new approaches. The handbook suggests new conceptual and methodological tools for researching ancient economic exchange in a global perspective with a strong focus on recent debates on the nature of pre-modern empires.The interdisciplinary team of Chinese, Indian and Graeco-Roman historians, archaeologists and anthropologists that has written this handbook compares different forms of economic development in agrarian and steppe regions in a period of accelerated empire formation during 300 BCE and 300 CE. It investigates inter-imperial zones and networks of exchange which were crucial for ancient Eurasian connections.Volume I provides a comparative history of the most important empires forming in Northern Africa, Europe and Asia between 300 BCE and 300 CE. It surveys a wide range of evidence that can be brought to bear on economic development in the these empires, and takes stock of the ways academic traditions have shaped different understandings of economic and imperial development as well as Silk-Road exchange in Russia, China, India and Western Graeco-Roman history.

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  • Methods and models in ancient history

    Mæhle, Ingvar, Per Bjarne Ravnå & Eivind Heldaas Seland (eds.). 2020. Methods and models in ancient history: Essays in honor of Jørgen Christian Meyer (Papers and Monographs from the Norwegian Institute at Athens 9). Athens: Norwegian Institute at Athens.

    According to the institute, the publications of the Norwegian Institute at Athens are available on-line at the digital collection of the Bergen University Library. However, we have been unable to find a download link for the above volume. Please check the above website for updates.

    Two papers of closer interest to scholars of Iranian Studies are available from the authors’ academia.edu pages:

  • The Legitimation of Conquest

    Trampedach, Kai & Alexander Meeus (eds.). 2020. The legitimation of conquest: Monarchical representation and the art of government in the empire of Alexander the Great (Studies in Ancient Monarchies 7). Stuttgart: Fanz Steiner Verlag.

    Within a single decade (334–325 BC) Alexander III of Macedon conquered much of the known world of his time, creating an empire that stretched from the Balkans to India and southern Egypt. His clear intention of establishing permanent dominion over this huge and culturally diverse territory raises questions about whether and how he tried to legitimate his position and about the reactions of various groups subject to his rule: Macedonians, Greeks, the army, indigenous elites. Starting from Max Weber’s “Herrschaftssoziologie”, the 15 authors discuss Alexander’s strategies of legitimation as well as the motives his subjects may have had for offering him obedience. The analysis of monarchical representation and political communication in these case-studies on symbolic performances and economic, administrative and religious measures sheds new light on the reasons for the swift Macedonian conquest: It appears that Alexander and his staff owed their success not only to their military talent but also to their communication skills and their capacity to cater to the expectations of their audiences.

  • The Conceptual Image of the Planets in Ancient Iran and the Process of Their Demonization

    Panaino, Antonio. 2020. The conceptual image of the planets in ancient Iran and the process of their demonization: Visual materials and models of inclusion and exclusion in Iranian history of knowledge. Zeitschrift für Geschichte der Wissenschaften, Technik und Medizin 28. 359–389.

    The Moon God (Klimova plate, Perm region, Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg S-43)

    The present contribution offers an overview of the main problems concerning the representation of the planets in the pre-Islamic Iranian world, the origin of their denominations, their astral roles and the reasons behind their demonization in the Zoroastrian and Manichaean frameworks. This is a preliminary attempt to resume the planetary iconography and iconology in western and eastern Iranian sources, involving also external visual data, such as those coming from Dunhuang and the Chinese world. The article offers an intellectual journey into a net of mutual cultural and spiritual relations, focusing on the image of the heaven (and of its celestial beings), thereby proposing a new synthesis and highlighting a number of intercultural contaminations.

  • Gandhāran Art Connections

    Rienjang, Wannaporn & Peter Stewarrt (eds.). 2020. The global connections of Gandhāran art. Oxford: Archaeopress Publishing.

    This volume is the third set of proceedings of the project’s annual workshop, and the first to address directly the question of cross-cultural influence on and by Gandhāran art. The contributors wrestle with old controversies, particularly the notion that Gandhāran art is a legacy of Hellenistic Greek rule in Central Asia and the growing consensus around the important role of the Roman Empire in shaping it. But they also seek to present a more complex and expansive view of the networks in which Gandhāra was embedded. Adopting a global perspective on the subject, they examine aspects of Gandhāra’s connections both within and beyond South Asia and Central Asia, including the profound influence which Gandhāran art itself had on the development of Buddhist art in China and India.

    Proceedings of the Third International Workshop of the Gandhāra Connections Project, University of Oxford, 18th-19th March, 2019. Like the previous volumes, this book is open access and available from the publisher’s website linked above.

  • The Archaeology of Mithraism

    McCarty, Matthew & Mariana Egri (eds.). 2020. The archaeology of Mithraism: New finds and approaches to Mithras-worship (Babesch Supplements 39). Leuven: Peeters.

    Over the course of the second century CE, worship of the Persianate god Mithras swept across the whole of the Roman Empire. With its distinctive traces preserved in the material record—including cave-like sanctuaries and images of Mithras stabbing a bull—the cult has long been examined to reconstruct the thought-systems of Mithraism, its theology, through such monumental trappings. This volume starts from the premise that, like much “religion” in the Roman world, the cult of Mithras must be examined through its practices, the ritual craft knowledge which enabled those rites, and the social structures thus created. What did Mithras-worshippers do? How do we explain the unity and diversity of practices observed? Archaeology has the potential to answer these questions and shed new light on Mithras-worship. Presenting new discoveries, higher resolution archaeological data on finds and assemblages, and re-evaluations of older discoveries, this volume charts new paths forward in understanding one of the Roman Empire’s most distinctive cults.

  • Maniiu et la mythologie protozoroastrienne

    Pirart, Éric. 2020. Maniiu et la mythologie protozoroastrienne: Étude de textes vieil-avestiques (Acta Iranica 59). Leuven: Peeters.

    Dieux et déesses aniconiques, abstraits, souvent anonymes, imbriqués les uns dans les autres, impliqués dans les rouages d’un rite méconnu, tel est le monde mythologique d’un Zarathushtra des origines, lorsque l’auteur des Cantates vieil-avestiques disait encore «lui et moi». Toutes les péripéties mythiques sont techniques, dictées par la haute idée que le poète se fait du grand dieu Ahura Mazda. Avec la certitude que le Roi vêtu du ciel a dispensé la connaissance à Zarathushtra, le poète officiant développe le Maniiu, l’idée, le sentiment, la conviction que, pour retrouver au-delà de la mort la vache qui a pu le nourrir, la science divine lui sera bien utile. En effet, elle régit la façon de conjuguer toutes les pièces, concrètes et abstraites, de la célébration cultuelle, un insaisissable complexe dont l’harmonieuse réussite portant le nom d’Asa donnera à la divinité les moyens de jouer son rôle.

  • Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan (AMIT): VOL. 49

    Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan (AMIT): Vol. 49, 2017 [2020], ed. by German Archaeological Institute (DAI), Tehran Branch of the Eurasia Department.

    Einzige deutsche Zeitschrift für Archäologie und Geschichte des iranisch-mittelasiatischen Raumes; Vor- und Frühgeschichte, Archäologie, Geschichte und Kunstgeschichte des Achämeniden-, Parther- und Sasanidenreiches sowie islamisches Mittelalter in Iran und Turan und angrenzende Gebiete; Fundvorlagen, Grabungsberichte, Materialauswertungen, auch Archäobotanik, -metallurgie, -zoologie etc.; Buchbesprechungen.

    The current volume is dedicated to Wolfram Kleiss in occasion of his 90th birthday

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  • Testing the Canon of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology

    Gansell, Amy & Ann Shafer (eds.). 2020. Testing the canon of ancient near eastern art and archaeology. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Testing the Canon of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology invites readers to reconsider the contents and agendas of the art historical and world-culture canons by looking at one of their most historically enduring components: the art and archaeology of the ancient Near East. Ann Shafer, Amy Rebecca Gansell, and other top researchers in the field examine and critique the formation and historical transformation of the ancient Near Eastern canon of art, architecture, and material culture. Contributors flesh out the current boundaries of regional and typological sub-canons, analyze the technologies of canon production (such as museum practices and classroom pedagogies), and voice first-hand heritage perspectives. Each chapter, thereby, critically engages with the historiography behind our approach to the Near East and proposes alternative constructs. Collectively, the essays confront and critique the ancient Near Eastern canon’s present configuration and re-imagine its future role in the canon of world art as a whole.

    This expansive collection of essays covers the Near East’s many regions, eras, and types of visual and archaeological materials, offering specific and actionable proposals for its study. Testing the Canon of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology stands as a vital benchmark and offers a collective path forward for the study and appreciation of Near Eastern cultural heritage. This book acts as a model for similar inquiries across global art historical and archaeological fields and disciplines.

    Testing the Canon of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology – Amy Gansell; Ann Shafer – Oxford University Press
    We had previously announced one article in this volume and are now adding an entry for the volume, as it relates to our discipline in more than one way.