Dear colleagues, members of the IAA,
As you may know, on July 24 in Warsaw, during the general meeting of the International Association for Assyriology, I was elected as the new president of the Association for the next four years. I am extremely honored for the confidence placed in me. With the help and goodwill of all IAA members, I shall do my best to be worthy of this trust.
Algaze, G.
Ancient Mesopotamia at the Dawn of Civilization: The Evolution of an Urban Landscape. University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 2014.
Gadotti, A.
‘Gilgamesh, Enkidu, and the Netherworld’ and the Sumerian Gilgamesh Cycle. Untersuchungen zur Assyriologie und Vorderasiatischen Archäologie 10. Berlin, 2014.
Holtz, S.E.
Neo-Babylonian Trial Records. Society of Biblical Literature, Atlanta, 2014.
by: Felix Levenson. The following paper will present a short abstract of the work I will be conducting for my PhD at the Freie Universität Berlin in collaboration with the Excellence Cluster Topoi and the DAI (German Archaeological Institute).
My doctoral dissertation will try to re-evaluate the traditionally used term of ‘monumentality’ in West-Asian Archaeology by contrasting it with the concept of ‘bigness’, thereby showing that size does in fact not matter for monumentality. By the term ‘bigness’ in architecture I mean large or extra-large structures without any notion of their social function.
An Interdisciplinary Conference on the Field:
1st Kültepe International Meeting (KIM). By Fikri Kulakoğlu & Cécile Michel
We are happy to announce that this issue of Mār Šiprim, again features an interview with a researcher and a student from one university for our “In the Spotlight” section. In our two previous issues, we were unfortunately unable to publish this recurring item. We are very grateful to Dr. Nicole Brisch and Sophus Helle from the University of Copenhagen, to have answered questions about their academic lives and the ins- and outs of this University.
It has been over a month ago since already the 60th Rencontre Assyriologique Internationale was held in Poland, Warsaw. It has been a great edition, featuring a fantastic venue and interesting lectures. And of course, during the General Meeting on Thursday a new president and new board members were elected. More on the new IAA president and board members can be found in this issue of Mār Šiprim
Since last year, the IAA and De Gruyter Publications have started two competitions to award promising young researchers: the IAA Prize and the De Gruyter Dissertation Award. Besides these two awards, there is also the Maureen Kovacs Fund, from which every year a financial donation towards a young researcher’s project is provided. The 2014 prize winners and the Maureen Kovaks Fund recipient have been announced during the General Meeting at the Rencontre in Warsaw.
It has come to the attention of the IAA, that many email addresses which have been provided over the years by our members, are no longer in use. We would therefore like to ask everyone who has changed their address recently, or at least since they have become a member of the IAA, to provide us with their new contact information.
By: Jonathan Taylor, Curator at the British Museum and Birger Helgestad, Project Curator. The Ur project is a dynamic new collaboration between the British Museum and the Penn Museum. It started in July 2013 with $1.28 million lead support from the Leon Levy Foundation. The project takes the successful cooperation of the 1920’s–1930’s excavations at Ur into the twenty-first century, digitally reunifying the remarkable finds from that site in a state-of-the-art online facility. All finds from Ur in our collections are being documented and photographed, and the original excavation photographs, archives, plans, and other documents are being digitised. These data will be made freely available in an open neoteric database that will preserve the complete finds and records in digital formats for posterity.
The International Association for Assyriology is proud to announce the launch of their new website! Please visit and wander through the pages, again filled with everything Assyriology. All information that used to be on the old website, has been transferred to the new one, but in a (we hope) more clear and compact state. The improved interface makes it easier to find what you are looking for and the new server allows a more streamlined appearance.