Anatolian Rivers between East and West: Axes and Frontiers Geographical, economical and cultural aspects of the human-environment interactions between the Kızılırmak and Tigris Rivers in ancient times A series of three Workshops * First Workshop The Connectivity of Rivers Bilkent University Faculty of Art, Design and Architecture & Faculty of Humanities and Letters Ankara 18th November 2016 ABSTRACTS Second Workshop, 4th – 7th May 2017, at the State University Shota Rustaveli, Batumi. The Exploitation of the Economic Resources of Rivers. Third Workshop, 28th – October 1st September 2017, at the French Institute for Anatolian Studies, Istanbul. The Cultural Aspects of Rivers. Frontier Rivers between Asia and Europe Anca Dan (Paris, CNRS-ENS,
[email protected]) The concept of « frontier », the water resources and the extension of Europe/Asia are currently topics of debates to which ancient historians and archaeologists can bring their contribution. The aim of this paper is to draw attention to the watercourses which played a part in the mental construction of the inhabited world, in its division between West and East and, more precisely, between Europe and Asia. The paper is organized in three parts: the first is an inventory of the watercourses which have been considered, at some point in history, as dividing lines between Europe and Asia; the second part is an attempt to explain the need of dividing the inhabited world by streams; the third part assesses the impact of this mental construct on the reality of a river, which is normally at the same time an obstacle and a spine in the mental organization of a space.