‘As It is Written’? Uses of Sources in Ancient Mediterranean Texts, Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen, October 11–12, 2018
The use of material from sources is a key feature of texts from throughout the ancient Mediterranean. Especially in texts pertaining to religion and myth, the attribution of information to historical or supernatural sources is a common strategy to endow it with authority, antiquity, or sacredness. The combination, incorporation, or redaction of source material also highlight the writers’ access to knowledge and tradition and emphasize their scholarly or literary acumen, while simultaneously legitimating, contesting, or manipulating the knowledge that is disseminated through re-use.
This workshop aims to bring together an international group of scholars from the fields of Classics and Ancient Near Eastern Studies to discuss and compare the uses of sources in ancient texts, with specific focus on works with a religious/mythological component. Through an interdisciplinary approach to this topic, the workshop seeks to shed new light on the dynamics of the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge related to religion and myth in cultures across the Mediterranean.
The organizers cordially invite proposals for papers focusing on the use of sources in ancient texts from scholars working in Classics, Hebrew Bible, and/or Ancient Near Eastern Studies. Papers should relate to one of the four main themes of the workshop:
- Methodological and practical approaches: modern scholarly methods for analyzing the use of sources in ancient texts, either discipline-specific or overarching;
- Sources and power: how the choice and treatment of sources reflects or produces religious authority;
- Divine sources: claims concerning deities or other divine beings as sources;
- Manipulation of sources: intentional or accidental misuses, misquotations, misinterpretations, as well as creative reinterpretation of sources.
Some funding for accommodations and/or travel to Göttingen will be available for accepted presenters if needed. No registration fee is required for presenters.