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The Faculty of Oriental Studies FACULTY OF ORIENTAL STUDIES UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD EGYPTOLOGY AND ANCIENT NEAR EASTERN STUDIES A handbook for Undergraduates reading Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies ACADEMIC YEAR 2013–2014 1 CONTENTS Introduction 3 Oriental Studies at Oxford 3 The BA in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies 5 About Egyptian 6 About Akkadian 7 Outline of the Course 9 Teaching 10 Further study resources, internships, and travel abroad 11 Structure of the academic years 12 First year 12 Second year 14 Third year 17 Examinations 20 Teaching and research staff 23 Joint Consultative Committee 24 Resources for EANES in Oxford 24 Set texts (or Prescribed texts) 28 Appendix A: Faculty Information 38 2 INTRODUCTION This handbook gives outline information about the BA course in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies. It is designed both as a source of information and as a guide to other sources of information. We hope that it will be particularly useful to you as you begin the course and when you start to study a second subject in your second year, but we also hope it will be a valuable source of information throughout the whole three years of the BA. Please read the booklet carefully. Comments and criticism of the handbook are always welcome; they should be sent to Dr Jacob Dahl, EANES Subject Group Co-ordinator, Oriental Institute, Pusey Lane. Faculty handbooks are available on the Oriental Studies Faculty’s website; this one is at http://www.orinst.ox.ac.uk/nme/eanes-hbk.pdf . Updates may be posted there; you can also find a great deal of related documentation through the website. Numbers on the course tend to be small and you see the teaching staff very frequently. You are also welcome to come and discuss the course and your needs at other times. Because of this frequent and close contact, the information in this handbook is kept quite brief. If you need more information or help, come and see one of us. You will receive much other documentation when you arrive at the University. A great deal of what you need to know about the running of the University is contained in the Proctors’ and Assessor’s Memorandum. At all points, if you need information or advice, be prepared to ask the teaching staff, fellows, and administrative staff in your college, or fellow students. ORIENTAL STUDIES AT OXFORD Oriental Studies embraces the study of Oriental cultures from prehistoric times to the present. People are becoming increasingly aware of these civilizations through travel, publications, and rising general interest. The faculty’s courses offer the opportunity to learn in depth about the ancient and modern traditions of these cultures. Many students are able to apply methods developed for the study of other languages, history, and literature to these challenging new subjects. Some enter Oriental Studies from quite different backgrounds, including music and science. The courses present the major traditions of the regions studied and, where appropriate, their modern development. All courses include language, literature, history, and culture, and there is a wide range of options in such fields as art and archaeology, history, literature, philosophy, religion, and modern social studies. Through its long-standing traditions and more recent gifts, Oxford has unparalleled resources for Oriental Studies. The Bodleian Library has a magnificent collection of Oriental books and manuscripts built up since the seventeenth century. The Oriental Institute, opened in 3 1961, is the centre where most teaching is done, acting as a focus for everyone working and studying in the field; it has a lending library of some 80,000 books. There are associated institutions for the Modern Middle East, for Hebrew and Jewish Studies, for Modern Japanese Studies, and for Chinese Studies. Adjacent to the Oriental Institute is the Ashmolean Museum, which houses superb collections of objects used in the teaching of most branches of Oriental art and archaeology; and the Sackler Library of the Ancient World, which houses the principal collection of books on Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, as well as general archaeology, Classical civilization, and Western and Eastern Art. The Griffith Institute (opened in 1939 and now housed in a wing of the Sackler Library complex) has unique resources for Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, including extensive archives and a publication series. Most of the teaching and research in EANES is carried out in the Griffith Institute wing of the Sackler Library complex. Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies at Oxford: background Egyptian civilization acquired its characteristic forms, including the hieroglyphic writing system, by 3000 BCE, and continued to develop into the early centuries of the Common Era, long after Egypt had been conquered by Alexander the Great and subsequently absorbed into the Roman Empire. The latest written material in ancient Egyptian dates to the 4th and 5th centuries CE. In Oxford, Egyptology has been represented since the appointment of F. Ll. Griffith as Reader, later Professor, at the beginning of the 20th century. Griffith subsequently founded the Griffith Institute in his will; the Institute, which is a research body, opened in 1939. Successors of Griffith in the professorship were T. Eric Peet, Battiscombe Gunn, Jaroslav Černý, and John Barns. The current holder is John Baines. In 1980 a second post in Egyptology and Coptic was created, and is held by Mark Smith with the title of Professor. An additional post in Egyptology was created in 2005 and was taken up by Elizabeth Frood. A further recent research appointment is that of Robert Simpson, who is a longstanding faculty tutor, as Griffith Egyptological Fund Research Fellow. The BA in Egyptology was introduced in the 1930s and revised successively from the 1960s. The current BA in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies, which absorbs and diversifies previous course offerings, was introduced in 1998. Ancient Mesopotamia (approximately modern Iraq) is the source of a wealth of texts in the Sumerian and Akkadian languages and cuneiform script. The script system emerged in about 3350 BCE and was developed by the Sumerians, Babylonians, and Assyrians. Akkadian continued as a learned language in Mesopotamia under the Greeks and the Parthians until the 1st century CE. Assyriology, the study of these ancient cultures, began at Oxford with the appointment of Archibald Henry Sayce as Professor of Assyriology in 1891. Subsequent post holders with the title of Professor have been Stephen Langdon, Oliver Gurney, and Marc Van De Mieroop. Other post holders in the field have included Reginald Campbell Thompson as 4 Reader, and C. J. Ball and Peter Hulin as Lecturers. Two key posts were established in 1987, a University Lecturership in Akkadian, filled by Jeremy Black (1987-2004), and a Shillito Fellowship in Assyriology, filled by Stephanie Dalley (1987-2007). Frances Reynolds was appointed to the long-term Shillito Fellowship in Assyriology in 2006, after holding a Departmental Lecturership. The most recent appointment in Assyriology is that of Jacob Dahl, who took up the University Lecturership in Assyriology in October 2008. The BA in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies The BA in Egyptology and Ancient Near Eastern Studies is a three-year undergraduate degree course that offers a wide range of options in the civilizations, history, literature, and material culture of Egypt and/or the Ancient Near East, approached in the first instance through the medium of the ancient languages and writing systems. A range of routes through the degree course are possible (the degree can be accessed through either of two UCAS codes: Q400 BA/Egy or Q401 BA/EANES). Students begin with the study of either Akkadian (the ancient Semitic language of Mesopotamia) or Egyptian. In your second year, you add a second subject. This may be a language, which can be Egyptian or Akkadian (depending on your choice of first language), or alternatively another language of the region. Those normally available are Coptic, Sumerian, Old Iranian, Biblical and Mishnaic Hebrew, Aramaic and Syriac, Arabic, and Hittite. The last of those may not be available every year. Depending on the languages chosen, different cultural and historical perspectives can be emphasized, making the course adaptable to the interests of each student. Some combinations of first and second languages are more suitable than others, and you should consult your teachers before making a choice. In addition, the BA in Classics and Oriental Studies (Oriental Studies with Classics) allows various combinations of EANES as a main subject with Egyptian or Akkadian as the first language and Classical languages (mainly Greek). This is a three-year course with the study of the Classical language(s) taking place in the second and third years. Students can either apply for this degree or switch to it after EANES Prelims at the end of the first year. As an alternative to a second language, it is possible to take EANES with Archaeology and Anthropology as a second subject (this is listed separately in the regulations because it is not a language). This combination complements the main language and civilization in a different way from the option of a second language, offering the opportunity to study in greater depth disciplines which are closely related to those used for much work on Egypt and the Ancient Near East. For students who are reading the BA in Oriental Studies with Arabic as their main subject, one of the options they can choose as an additional language is Akkadian; this is studied in the third and fourth years. Students with Hebrew as their main subject can choose either Akkadian or Egyptian as their additional language; the chosen language is studied in the second and third years. Students whose main subject is Classics can take Egyptology (Egyptian language) or Ancient Near Eastern Studies (Akkadian language) as an additional subject.
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