The Sumerians
Lost Civilizations
Published on 15. March 2021
208 pages
978-1-78914-423-9 (ISBN)
Description
The Sumerians are widely believed to have created the world's earliest civilization on the fertile floodplains of southern Iraq from about 3500 to 2000 BC. They have been credited with the invention of nothing less than cities, writing and the wheel, and therefore hold an ancient mirror to our own urban, literate world. But is this picture correct? Paul Collins reveals how the idea of a Sumerian people was assembled from the archaeological and textual evidence uncovered in Iraq and Syria over the last 150 years. Reconstructed through the biases of those who unearthed them, the Sumerians were never simply lost and found, but reinvented a number of times, both in antiquity and in the more recent past.
More details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
London
United Kingdom
File size
11,47 MB
ISBN-13
978-1-78914-423-9 (9781789144239)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Book
05/2021
Reaktion Books
€27.50
Article not available at the moment
Person
Paul Collins is Keeper of the Middle East Department at the British Museum. Specializing in the art and archaeology of Mesopotamia and Iran, his books include Assyrian Palace Sculptures (2008) and Mountains and Lowlands: Ancient Iran and Mesopotamia (2016).
Content
- Cover
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- Chronology
- 1. Origins
- 2. The Sumerian Problem
- 3. Invasion, Occupation and Ownership
- 4. The First Cities
- 5. The First Writing
- 6. Back to the Beginning
- References
- Bibliography
- Acknowledgements
- Photo Acknowledgements
- Index
