Author: Yazdan Safaee

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Journal

Iran 57(2)

Volume 57, issue 2 of Iran, Journal of the British Institute of Persian Studies:

Iran 57(2).

Table of Contents:

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Books

New Perspectives in Seleucid History, Archaeology and Numismatics

Roland, Oetjen (ed.). 2019. New perspectives in Seleucid history, archaeology and numismatics: Studies in honor of Getzel M. Cohen (Beiträge zur Altertumskunde 355). Berlin: De Gruyter.

Dedicated to Getzel M. Cohen, a leading expert in Seleucid history, this volume gathers contributions on Seleucid history, archaeology, numismatics, political relations, policy toward the Jews, Greek cities, non-Greek populations, peripheral and neighboring regions, imperial administration, economy and public finances, and ancient descriptions of the Seleucid Empire. The reader will gain an international perspective on current research.

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Journal

Journal Asiatique 307 (1)

The first issue of Journal Asiatique 307 (2019) has been published. The following articles are related to the scope of Iranica:

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Articles

Should we say goodbye to the Median kingdom?

Parker, Victor. 2019. Sollten wir das medische Reich aus der Geschichte verabschieden?. Klio 101 (1): 1-56.

In spite of some scholars’ recent arguments that the Median Kingdom, which according to Herodotus preceded the Persian Empire, never existed, the Medisms within Old Persian show that the Medes had developed both an imperial ideology and institutions for ruling. The Persians inherited both from the Medes. This suggests that a Median Kingdom did exist. Besides, Near Eastern sources, independently of Herodotus, attest to the existence of some sort of a powerful Median state, and Jer. 51,28 actually attributes imperial officials to this state. Close examination of Herodotus’ Median Logos further demonstrates that this passage contains so much Iranian material that one simply cannot dismiss it as Herodotus’ own invention. On the contrary we should acknowledge the existence of Iranian source material which on its own attests to the existence of a Median Kingdom.

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Journal

L’histoire, volume 60

The latest volume of the magazine, “L’histoire”, is dedicated to Achaemenid Persia. Among other interesting subjects in this volume, the following articles are remarkable:

  • Pierre Briant: Achéménides: le premier empire-monde
  • Rémy Boucharlat: Pasargades, visite d’une capitale
  • Dominique Lenfant: Profession: médecin du Grand Roi
  • Wouter Henkelman: Le nouveau visage de la religion des Perses
  • Pierre Briant: Cyrus l’Iranien
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Articles

Aramaic traces through coins in the Iranian world

Šafiʿī, Ibrahim. 2018. Aramaic Traces through Coins in the Iranian World. Shodoznavstvo 82: 125–166.

Aramaic language(s) in its four phases with different scripts on various materials have been found in Iran (mostly from the western part of the land where Aramaic-speaking communities lived). Aramaic language traces in the Iranian world have remained in a large diversity on the coins. Besides some reigns whose coins bear Aramaic phrases, some others just minted coins with Aramaic derived legends and/or used ideograms on their coins. Almost from 3th BC to 10th centuries AD Aramaic words with Aramaic, Pah-lavi, Parthian, Sogdian and Chorasmian legends used as ideograms in the coinage. Due to producing ideograms, it is impossible to read the original pronunciation of the words but this heritage can introduce а concept of a larger Aramaic presence in the Iranian world.
The earliest type of ideograms on the coins can be found on Fratarkā’s coinage in the Pārs province roughly from 3th BC and the latest belongs to Būyids’ amir of the 10th century, Rokn al-Dawla, who ruled in Rayy (al-Muḥammadiya). During this period, circa 1300 years, some dynasties struck their own coins with ideograms in a large territory from the Middle East to Transoxania and another one also used these coins in their daily deals as a currency.

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Books

Assyromania and More

Pedde, Friedhelm & Nathanael Shelley (eds.). 2018. Assyromania and more. In memory of Samuel M. Paley. Münster: Zaphon.

Among other interesting subjects, this book contains three papers regarding ancient Iran:

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Books

Middle Persian Private Inscriptions

Nasrollahzadeh, Cyrus. 2019. Middle Persian Private Inscriptions in the Sasanian and Post-Sasanian Period: Funerary and Memorial Inscriptions, Vol I: Text & vol. II: picture. Tehran: Institute for Humanities and Cultural Studies.

The present book is a corpus of private inscriptions written in Middle Persian dated to, in words of the author, Sasanian and post-Sasanian periods. The first section of first chapter deals with the funerary in ancient Iran with special interest to the Sasanian period which is followed by an introduction of epitaphs in the second section of this chapter. Memorial inscriptions are presented and interpreted in chapter 2 and finally in chapter 3, the author investigates the private inscriptions from Sasanian period and those of the Iranian Christians.

نصراله‌زاده، سیروس. ۱۳۹۸. کتیبه‌های خصوصی فارسی میانه ساسانی و پساسانی (گورنوشته، یادبودی)، جلد اول: متن، جلد دوم: تصویر. تهران: پژوهشگاه علوم انسانی و مطالعات فرهنگی

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Books

Journey to the City

Tinney, Steve & Karen Sonik (eds.). 2019. Journey to the City :A Companion to the Middle East Galleries at the Penn Museum. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology.

The Penn Museum has a long and storied history of research and archaeological exploration in the ancient Middle East. This book highlights this rich depth of knowledge while also serving as a companion volume to the Museum’s signature Middle East Galleries opening in April 2018. This edited volume includes chapters and integrated short, focused pieces from Museum curators and staff actively involved in the detailed planning of the new galleries. In addition to highlighting the most remarkable and interesting objects in the Museum’s extraordinary Middle East collections, this volume illuminates the primary themes within these galleries (make, settle, connect, organize, and believe) and provides a larger context within which to understand them.
The ancient Middle East is home to the first urban settlements in human history, dating to the fourth millennium BCE; therefore, tracing this move toward city life figures prominently in the book. The topic of urbanization, how it came about and how these early steps still impact our daily lives, is explored from regional and localized perspectives, bringing us from Mesopotamia (Ur, Uruk, and Nippur) to Islamic and Persianate cites (Rayy and Isfahan) and, finally, connecting back to life in modern Philadelphia. Through examination of topics such as landscape, resources, trade, religious belief and burial practices, daily life, and nomads, this very important human journey is investigated both broadly and with specific case studies.

Steve Tinney is Associate Curator-in-Charge of the Babylonian Section and the Clark Research Associate Professor of Assyriology at the University of Pennsylvania.
Karen Sonik is Assistant Professor of Art History at Auburn University.

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Articles

Calendar as an Identity Marker of the Zoroastrian Community in Iran

Niechciał, Pauline. 2019. Calendar as an Identity Marker of the Zoroastrian Community in Iran. Iran and the Caucasus 23 (1): 35-49.

The article reflects on the idea of both calendric time and its material supports used by the Zoroastrians of Iran in reference to the identity of the group. The qualitative analysis of the data collected during the fieldwork among the Zoroastrian community has shown that a distinctive time-reckoning system plays the role of an important marker that strengthens the community’s Zoroastrian identity in the face of Muslim domination. In the post-Revolutionary Iran, the calendar is one of the key pillars of the Zoroastrians’ collective self-awareness—both as an idea of a specific time-reckoning system designating ritual activities, and as a material subject that acts as a medium to promote specific values and ideas.