Download Shipwrecks syllabus Fall 2017 Shipwrecks, Pirates and Palaces CL

Shipwrecks syllabus Fall 2017
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Shipwrecks, Pirates and Palaces CL 329/ANT385
Fall 2017
White Hall 112 T-Th 1 -2:15
Dr. Blakely [email protected]
Candler Library 221 F
Office hours: TBA
Course description:
Silver and bronze, wheat and wool, slaves and entrepreneurial shippers moved around the waterways of the ancient
Mediterranean from the fourth millennium to the height of the Roman empire. They created human, political, and
technological networks which left distinctive footprints in archaeological materials and cultural memories. In this
course we will use case studies to explore the evidence for accounting, globalization, responses to risk, mobility, the
relationship between warfare and profit, and information flows in the ancient Mediterranean. Our study will introduce
us to a range of archaeological types, including monumental palaces, desert archaeology, shipwrecks and underwater
archaeology, as well as the complex relationship between ancient texts, inscriptions, and material evidence.
Accountabilities:
At the conclusion of this course, you will be able to demonstrate your understanding of:
Ancient data: the texts, archaeological sites, monuments, and small finds which are preserved from antiquity
Archaeological methodology: the distinctive field methods and scholarly approaches to these data
Interpretation: the arguments regarding an ‘economic’ interpretation of these materials
Evaluation:
Short writing assignments
(12 total)
36%
Outside lectures
(2 total)
4%
Midterms
(3 total)
45%
Final writing assignment
15%
Good news: your lowest writing score will be dropped!
Bad news: half credit only will be given for late assignments.
Short Writing Assignments: these are given weekly, with the exception of midterm weeks. These are very short,
designed to help you keep up with the reading and engage critically with the primary data.
Midterms: we will have three midterms: Tuesday September 29; Thursday November 5; and Monday December 14 (the
final exam date)
Outside lectures: We have a range of archaeological speakers coming to Emory this fall: attend two different lectures
and write a brief response, indicating questions you would like to ask the speaker.
Final writing assignment: this is a 5-page essay, due by midnight on Wednesday December 16, in which you analyze
and synthetize materials from all three portions of the course, addressing a theme such as the uses of ideology to enable
long distance trade, evidence for women as economic actors, transportation costs, trade in raw materials, the
investigation of archaeologically invisible materials such as wheat and wool, etc. This essay is the only comprehensive
element of the course, and takes the place of a comprehensive final exam.
Classroom policies: Attendance is not taken; open computers are not allowed during class time.
Readings: All of the texts for this course are online in the Blackboard site, organized by week with the exception of two
books, posted separately:
Parkins, H. and C. Smith, ed.s. 1998. Trade, Traders and the Ancient City (Routledge)
Rich, J. and G. Shipley, ed.s. 1993. War and Society in the Ancient World (Routledge)
Honor code:
The honor code of Emory College is always in effect. Papers and quizzes MUST represent strictly your own work, and
sources of ideas MUST be acknowledged in the papers. For citations in your final essay, use the Chicago Manual of
Style, and include a separate bibliography, which will not count toward your total number of pages.
(http://www.chicagomanualofstyle.org/tools_citationguide.html). To refresh your memory on the particulars of the
honor code, please visit http://college.emory.edu/home/academic/policy/honor_code.html
SCHEDULE
The readings listed for each date are to be completed by the time of class
Aug 27 – Introduction to the class
WEEK 1: Uruk: the first city
Shipwrecks syllabus Fall 2017
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Sept 1 Urban complexity and temple economies in Uruk, 4000-3100 BC
Read: Nissen, ‘Uruk and the Formation of the City’; van Mieroop, “Origins: The Uruk Phenomenon”
Sept 3 : Uruk: World Systems and the Goddess’ Money
Read: Liverani, Uruk, selections; Eanna temple texts (selection); Kozuh, The Sacrificial Economy, 1-11.
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #1: The Goddess’ Goats
WEEK 2 Mari - palace, trading center and network hub
Sept 8 Mari: Palace and network
Read: Gates, “The Palace of Zimri-Lim at Mari”; Dalley, Mari and Karana, selections; Aruz, Beyond
Babylon, selections.
Sept 10 Mari: managing the palace, crossing the desert
Read: selections from cuneiform texts; Collon, Sealstones; Moorey, “Blue Stones in the Ancient Near East”
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #2: What’s on your sealstone?
WEEK 3: Old Assyrian Colonies: Desert traders or the first multinationals?
Sept 15: The site, the merchants, the market
Read: Özgüç, "Assyrian trade colonies in Anatolia"; Kuhrt, “The Old Assyrian Merchants”, 15-31 in Trade,
Traders and the Ancient City; Atici, “The Secondary Products Revolution in light of textual evidence from
Kültepe-Kanesh”; Karaduman, "Three Kültepe Texts Regarding the Payment of a Debt in Installments”.
Sept 17 Women in charge and modern paradigms
Thomason, “Her Share of the Profits: Women, Agency, and Textile Production at Kültepe/Kanesh in the
Early Second Millennium BC”; K. Moore and D. Lewis, “The First Multinationals: Assyria circa 2000 BC”;
Isakhan, Benjamin. "Engaging" primitive democracy": Mideast roots of collective governance."
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #3: 4 points of evidence in ancient-modern comparisons
WEEK 4: Mycenaean Palaces: warrior kings, scribes, and a (Trojan) war over tuna
Sept 22: Kingly invaders and long distance traders
Read: Demand, “ Mycenaean Greece”; Aegean Prehistoric Archaeology Lesson 16, The Shaft Graves
(http://www.dartmouth.edu/~prehistory/aegean/?page_id=788; Laffineur, “Aspects of Rulership at Mycenae
in the Shaft Grave Period”
Sept 24 – Running a palace: Linear B and the Mycenaean economy
Read: Aegean Prehistoric Archaeology Lesson 25, “The Linear B Tablets and Mycenaean Social, Political
and Economic Organization,” http://www.dartmouth.edu/%7Eprehistory/aegean/?page_id=659; Chadwick,
“The People of the Tablets” and “The social structure and administrative system”: Selections, Amarna letters
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #4: 4 points of comparison, Linear B and the Amarna Letters
WEEK 5 – A Bronze Age Shipwreck
Sept 29 MIDTERM #1
Oct 1 Ulu Burun: Bronze Age time capsule?
Read: Pulak, “The Uluburun shipwreck: an overview”; Gould, “Shipwrecks and our understanding of ancient
trade”
WEEK 6 – Small finds and sea raiders
Oct 6 Ulu Burun: small finds and sea raiders
Read: Hitchcock, L.A. and A.M. Maeir, “Yo-ho, yo-ho, a seren’s life for me!”; Haldane, “Organic Cargoes”;
Hauptmann, Maddin and Prange, “Ingots”; Payton, “The Ulu Burun Writing Board Set”
Oct 8 The Outlines of Mediterranean Piracy
Read: de Souza, P., “Greek Piracy”; selection of texts from Pritchett, The Greek State at War, on ancient
pirates
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #5: Piracy, good or bad?
WEEK 7 The economics of ancient piracy: comparative perspectives
Oct 13 FALL BREAK
Oct 15 Ancient functions, modern comparisons, and controls
Read: Gabrielsen, “Piracy and the slave trade”; Mack, Proxeny and Polis (selections); Braund, "Piracy under
the Principate and the Ideology of Imperial Eradication", in War and Society in the Roman World, 195-212;
Kraska, "Freakonomics of maritime piracy;" Little, “Paradigm shifts in Mediterranean Piracy”; Johnson and
Pladdet, “Maritime Piracy in Asia”.
WEEK 8 Early Greece: Colonies and Coins
Oct 20 Making Money Overseas: Greek colonies, east and west
Read: Hall, “New Homes Across the Seas”; Dillon and Garland, selections of ancient texts on colonization
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #6: The economics of religion in colonial contexts
Oct 22 The Invention of Coinage
Read: Papadopoulos, “Minting Identity: Coinage, Ideology and the Economics of Colonization in Akhaian
Magna Graecia”; Burnett, Coins; Peacock, “The Origins of Money”; Davies, “Temples, Credit and
Circulation of Money”.
WEEK 9: Social policy, Silver, and Slavery
Oct 27 Athens and her Sailors: life, insurance and social attitudes in the Piraeus
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Read: Tomlinson, From Mycenae to Constantinople, 68-72, ‘Piraeus’; Dillon and Garland, selections on
metics; Reed, Maritime Traders in the Ancient Greek World, selections; Millett, Lending and Borrowing in
Ancient Athens, selection on bottomry loans
Oct 29 Slavery and the Silver Mines
Read: Rihll, “Skilled Slaves and the Economy: the Silver Mines of Laurion”; Dillon and Garland, selections
on slaves, serfs and citizens; Humphrey, ancient selections on mining/quarrying; Kyrtatas, “Slavery and
Economy in the Greek World”
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #7: Reconstructing slavery
WEEK 10 The Hellenistic world: conflict and networks
Nov 3 Egypt and the Islands after Alexander
Read: Reger, Regionalism and Change in the Economy of Independent Delos; Archibald, “Making the most
of one’s friends: Western Asia Minor in the early Hellenistic Age; Peralta, “Gods of Trust”; Gabrielsen,
“Brotherhoods of Faith and Provident Planning”
Nov 5 MIDTERM #2
WEEK 11 Rome: Archaeologies of transport and retail
Nov 10 Rome: Shipping it, storing it and selling it
Read: Greene, The Archaeology of the Roman Economy, 1-44
Nov 12 Shopping in Rome: Structures and supply
Read: Selections from Halleran, Shopping in Rome: 1-10, Ostia, An Industrial Port City; Orbis.stanford.edu;
http://archaeologydataservice.ac.uk/archives/view/amphora_ahrb_2005/info_intro.cfm
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #8: ORBIS: Roman Shipping Routes Online
WEEK 12 Rome: shopping and predation
Nov 17 Shopping in Rome: Ostia, the Markets of Trajan, and the Forum
Read: Selections from Halleran, Shopping in Rome; 23-51; 62-87; 232-257
Nov 19 The Roman Army and the Economy: predation as an economic strategy
Read: Bang, “Predation”; Erdkamp, “The Corn Supply of the Roman Army during the Principate (27 BC –
235 AD)”; Haynes, “Britain’s First Information Revolution: the Roman army and the transformation of
economic life”; Verboven, “Good for Business. The Roman Army and the Emergence of a Business Class in
the Northwest Provinces of the Roman Empire”.
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #9: Profit and cost in the Roman army
WEEK 13 – THANKSGIVING
go home! Eat! Sleep! Ski!
WEEK 14: Bread and Pepper
Dec 1 Grain in Rome: feeding the city, from Egypt to the Annona
Read: Temin, “The organization of the grain trade in the early Roman Empire”; Charles and Ryan, “The
Roman Empire and the Grain Fleets: Contracting Out Public Services in antiquity”; ancient literary sources
on bread baking and bakers
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #10: The life story of a loaf of Roman Bread
Dec 3 Roman India: pepper, tigers, and piracy
Read: Begley and de Puma, Rome and India: The Ancient Sea Trade (selections); Prabha Ray, “Adventurers,
travelers and traders”; in The Archaeology of Seafaring in Ancient South Asia; Gupta, "Piracy and trade on
the western coast of India (AD 1–250)".
WEEK 15: Conclusion
Dec 8
Production, mobility, and economic models: gauging the ancient Mediterranean Economy
WRITING ASSIGNMENT #11: 2 artifacts, 2 stories: studies of small finds in Roman India
FINAL EXAM:
TBA