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Democracy's Ancient Ancestors

Democracy's Ancient Ancestors

Hardcover

AnthropologyAncient History General

ISBN10: 0521828856
ISBN13: 9780521828857
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Published: Jan 26 2004
Pages: 390
Weight: 1.47
Height: 1.14 Width: 6.14 Depth: 9.16
Language: English
This volume examines the political landscape of the ancient Near East through the archive of over 3,000 letters found in the royal palace of Mari. These letters display a rich diversity of political actors, encompassing major kingdoms, smaller states and various tribal towns. Mari's unique contribution to the ancient evidence is its view of tribal organization, made possible especially by the fact that its king, Zimri-Lim, was, first of all, a tribal ruler who claimed Mari as an administrative base and source of prestige. These archaic political traditions are not essentially unlike the forms of pre-democratic Greece, and they offer fresh reason to recognize a cultural continuity between the classical world of the Aegean and the older Near East. This book bridges the areas of archaeology, ancient and classical history, early Middle and Near East, and political and social history.

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