|
|
The Notion of Body and Illness in the Healing Rituals of the 1st Millennium BCE Mesopotamia: The Case of Fever
Loulová, Petra ; Koubková, Evelyne (advisor) ; Antalík, Dalibor (referee)
Body is a biological system, but also a medium, through which an individual as well as their culture are actualized in the world. Both the individual and culture conceptualize the body in notions that, together with physical perceptions, constitute bodily experience. In studying ancient cultures, such as Mesopotamia, the actual bodily experience is lost for us, but the cultural notions can be reconstructed. The present thesis focuses on the notions of body and disease in Mesopotamian healing practice recorded in professional medical literature that was being canonized and copied since the late second millennium BCE. The collections of prescriptions called "therapeutic texts" are of main interest, since they present the healing procedure itself. In these texts, I analyzed the verbal descriptions of disease and healing as well as the physical treatment of the body with regard to general context and with focus on cases of fever. The thesis concludes, that the texts present the interaction between the body and the disease as spatial and physical, in their metaphors as well as in the prescribed treatment of the body and of surrounding space. Fever entered from outer space, attached itself to the body, it "seized" or "took hold" of the person, and needed to be removed. Its independent agency, the way...
|
|
|
The Role of Dumuzi/Tammûz as a Shepherd and a King in Relation to the Mesopotamian Semantics of Space at the Turn of the 3rd and 2nd Millennium BCE
Loulová, Petra ; Koubková, Evelyne (advisor) ; Antalík, Dalibor (referee)
Mesopotamian god Dumuzi (Tammûz) appears in the roles of shepherd, king, lover of a goddess and a "dying god". The first two aspects show Dumuzi embodying popular Mesopotamian metaphor, presenting the king as his people's shepherd. The thesis, regarding sources of the turn of 3rd and 2nd millennia BCE, inquires, what could Dumuzi's character express about the Mesopotamian ideal of king. It centers on Dumuzi presenting the relation of shepherd-king to the meaningful landscape, mostly the city and the surrounding wild steppe. The text is inspired by structuralism in its basic approach, presenting human mind as arranging the world in meaningful structures, especially in the opposition of city and steppe. It examines images of shepherd and king in Dumuzi's scheme, the relation of these to landscape outside Dumuzi's context and the parallels in these concepts. The king appears mostly as keeper of the safe city, the shepherd then as a mediator of city and steppe. Dumuzi dies usually as a shepherd through contact with steppe's dangers. The royal concept appears implicitly in the doom of the dying Dumuzi's sheepfold, apparently symbolizing the city, dependent on king's activity. The thesis infers that Dumuzi's story expresses the risks of contact with chaos, e.g. as the strange space, necessarily undergone by king...
|
|
|
Washing the mouth of a kettledrum
Koubková, Evelyne ; Ahn, Gregor (advisor) ; Antalík, Dalibor (referee)
The purpose of the present thesis is to analyse a particular ritual treatment, the so-called mouth- washing, appearing in diverse rituals of ancient Mesopotamia and its implications for the status of the ritual object treated in this way. Instead of generalizing the function of this element as known from the eponymous Mouth washing ritual for induction of cult images, this thesis considers its employment in all its attested occurrences. The author assumes a strongly metaphorical character of mouth-washing and analyses the concept of purity underlying it. Its shifting significance in different rituals is observed and a typology of these is outlined. A following case study is devoted to the Ritual for covering a kettledrum. A close examination of the sources reveals a possible development of the tradition as well as the ritual's interconnectedness with the Mouth washing ritual. This relation is treated as a case of interrituality, a concept introduced by Burkhard Gladigow. The divine status of the kettledrum is achieved through the ritual for its covering which intentionally employs elements used in the ritual induction of cult images. A special emphasis laid on the kettledrum's status in Seleucid Uruk corresponds with wider socio-historical changes. Methodologically, the offered interpretation rests...
|
|
|
The Flood Motive in the Literature of Ancient Mesopotamia
Koubková, Evelyne ; Čech, Pavel (advisor) ; Antalík, Dalibor (referee)
The presented paper deals with the flood motive in the literature of ancient Mesopotamia from the 2nd mil. BC until the 2nd cent. BC as it appears repeatedly in a variety of texts in this period. Apart from the varied versions of the mythical flood narrative I will examine the king lists, especially the Sumerian king list in which the flood appears, and sources about antediluvian kings. In a separate chapter I will focus on the tradition of the sages (apkallu) who are sometimes situated before the flood. The common feature of all the treated sources seems to be that the flood is a watershed. Its importance stems not from the dividing of qualitatively distinct periods of time but from the possibility to get over the boundary. According to the anthropological theory of antistructure I will try to explain that the flood is a breakthough of chaos which can strengthen the order. I will examine god Ea, too, as he is intrinsically bound to the flood and I will show his position in pantheon as analogical to the role of the flood.
|
guest ::
RSS feed.