From nation to empire:Ancient Eastern civilizations during the second millennium

Pre-requisites: No prerequisites

Course objectives: Familiarizing students with the characteristics(pros and cons)of using the comparative method to analyze ancient eastern civilizations.

Course description: Over the duration of the course, we will analyze relations between the Ancient east and other cultures during the second millennium B.C.E. that marked the great empires(new kingdom of Egypt, new Hittite kingdom,Mitanni, Assyria). Through applying the comparative method(in analysis of written, material and epigraphic evidence), students will be presented with the complexity of geopolitical changes in the Ancient east in the second millennium B.C.E.

Learning Outcomes: The ability to apply the comparative method to analyze ancient eastern civilizations .

Literature/Reading:

• J. Sasson, Civilization of the Ancient Near East, 4 Vols, New York 1995
• S. Pollock, Ancient Mesopotamia, Cambridge 1999
• D. C. Snell, Life in the ancient Near East: 3100-332, New Haven 1997
• A. Kurt, Stari Istok I-II, Beograd 2004
• H. Saggs, The might that was Assyria. London 1984
• D. Snell, Flight and freedom in the ancient Near East, Leiden 2001