Author: Arash Zeini

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Events

Conference: The Past in the Present of the Middle East

The Past in the Present of the Middle East

Starts: 15 April 2016, 9:00 AM
Finishes: 16 April 2016, 5:00 PM
Venue: Brunei Gallery Lecture Theatre

Call for papers and posters for a two-day conference organised by the Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL) and the London Middle East Institute to showcase the work of CBRL and its partners in the region. The conference will present sessions on a number of themes linking the past to the present day in the Middle East.

  • Cultural heritage in conflict
  • Cultural heritage, society and economics
  • Britain and the Levant: Culture and (Mis)Communication
  • The past in the political present: the legacy of colonialism and intervention
  • The Politics of Dissent: challenges to Orientalism and Zionism
  • The impact of research – working with humanitarian agencies/practitioners

Closing session: The future of the past in the Middle East

Continue reading “Conference: The Past in the Present of the Middle East”
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Online resources

On Judeo-Persian 1

McCollum, Adam. 2015. On Judeo-Persian language and literature. Part One: State of the field. Ancient Jew Review.

In a two-part series, Dr. Adam McCollum addresses the possibilities for the field of Judeo-Persian language and literature. Part One addresses the state of the field and Part Two includes a helpful bibliography and four text samples.

You can find out more about Adam McCollum and his work over at his blog, hmmlorientalia, or at his highly recommended Twitter account: @adamcmccollum.

Categories
Articles

Latest issue of Iranian Studies

Special Issue: Russian Orientalism to Soviet Iranology:The Persian-speaking world and its history through Russian eyes

Cronin, Stephanie  & Edmund Herzig (eds.). 2015. Iranian Studies 48(5).

This collection comprises a collective study of the genesis and development of Iranian Studies, or Iranology, in imperial Russia and subsequently in the Soviet Union. It takes as its specific point of departure the controversies regarding whether Russian, or post-1917 Soviet, scholars and administrators and the discourses they produced on the Persophone world were Orientalist in the sense made famous byEdward Said.
This Special Issue is available from Taylor & Francis Online.
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Books

A Short Chronicle on the End of the Sasanian Empire and Early Islam

ssssal-Ka’bi, Nasir. 2015. A Short Chronicle on the End of the Sasanian Empire and Early Islam. New Jersey: Gorgias Press.

The Short Chronicle is probably part of a Church History that is no longer extant, and it was written by an Ecclesiastic living in the north of Mesopotamia and belonging to the Church of the East. It is an eyewitness report on a crucial historical period, the mid-7th century that witnessed the demise of two contending world empires, the Sasanian and the Byzantine, and their replacement by Islam, thus signaling the end of Late Antiquity and the beginning of the Middle Ages. The Chronicle may be the earliest Syriac document which relies heavily on official Sasanian sources, including Khwaday-namag, when it discusses secular history, and on church histories when dealing with ecclesiastical matters. It may also be the oldest Syriac chronicle which deals with the advent of Mu?ammad and the ensuing Arab conquest, and which mentions Arab cities for the first time ever, including Mosul, Kufa, and Basra.

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Articles Books

Daēuuas vertreibende Worte

Cantera, Alberto. 2015. Daēuuas vertreibende Worte: Die Läuterungsrituale in V9–12. In Philippe Swennen (ed.), Démons iraniens: actes du colloque international organisé à la Université de Liège les 5 et 6 février 2009 à l’occasion des 65 ans de Jean Kellens, 77–96. Liège: Presses Universitaires de Liège.

Many Avestan texts are considered to have a great protective capacity against the daēuuas, especially the names of the Amәѕa Spәta, their Yašts and the Staota Yesniia (above all the Ahuna Vairiia). They are combined in different forms to provide bāǰ „prayers that accompany the ritual action“ and keep the daēuuas away from the ritual. Most ritual actions are accompanied by three bāǰ: one opening, one closing and one accompanying bāǰ. The use of such bāǰ is especially frequent in the purification rituals. V10 and 11 are examined under this perspective and it is concluded that V10 presents probably the alternative accompa­nying bāǰ for a baršnum-ceremony and V11 for a purification ritual for different elements.

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Reviews

Review of Éric Pirart’s ‘Le sort de Gâthâs’

Ferrer, Juan. 2014. Review of Éric Pirart (ed.). 2013. Le sort de Gâthâs et autres études iraniennes in memoriam Jacques Duchesne-Guillemin (Acta Iranica 54). Leuven-Paris-Walpole, MA: Peeters Publishers. Aula Orientalis 32. 388–391.

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Articles Books

The steppe world and the rise of the Huns

de la Vaissière, Etienne. 2014. The steppe world and the rise of the Huns. In Michael Maas (ed.), The Cambridge companion to the age of Attila, 175–192.  Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

This book examines the age of Attila, roughly the fifth century CE, an era in which western Eurasia experienced significant geopolitical and cultural changes. The Roman Empire collapsed in western Europe, replaced by new ‘barbarian’ kingdoms, but it continued in Christian Byzantine guise in the eastern Mediterranean. New states and peoples changed the face of northern Europe, while in Iran, the Sasanian Empire developed new theories of power and government. At the same time, the great Eurasian steppe became a permanent presence in the European world. This book treats Attila, the notorious king of the Huns, as both an agent of change and a symbol of the wreck of the old world order.

For more information on the book, see the publisher’s website.

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Articles

Indo-Persian translations

Truschke, Audrey. 2015. Indo-Persian translations: A disruptive past.  Paper presented at a seminar.

The rendering of Sanskrit texts into Persian constitutes one of the largest translation movements in world history. Sanskrit and Persian coexisted as languages and cultural systems on the subcontinent for hundreds of years, chiefly between the 14th and 18th centuries CE. During this period, intellectuals and poets performed hundreds of translations and adaptions of Sanskrit stories, knowledge systems, and philosophies into the Persian language. This sustained movement of Sanskrit based ideas, narratives, and even words into Persian resulted in a distinctive realm of Persianate culture on the subcontinent that is often characterized by the modern descriptor Indo-Persian. Today, however, Persian translations of Sanskrit materials are largely forgotten. Most Indo-Persian translations are severely understudied; many moulder away in manuscript libraries, unpublished and in want of sustained philological attention. In this article, I highlight my research on these overlooked texts in light of current trends in Indian historiography and historical memory.

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Journal Online resources Reviews

Review of ‘The comprehensive history of Iran’

Yazdan Safaee, one of BiblioIranica’s team members, has written useful and accessible reviews of the first five volumes of the 20 volume comprehensive history of Iran, which were announced by Shervin in May 2015. The reviews are in Persian and accessible from Yazdan’s own website:

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Articles

A hoard from the time of the collapse of the Sasanian Empire

Heidemann, Stefan. 2014. A hoard from the time of the collapse of the Sasanian Empire (AD 638–9). Part II: Analysis of the minting system of Ardashir III. The Numismatic Chronicle 174. 333–351