Royal Archives Research Articles

From writing to record-keeping: a study of York’s civic administrative literacy, 1272–1307

Abstract Using York during the late thirteenth and early fourteenth centuries as a case-study, this article discusses a pivotal aspect of the development of civic administrative literacy: the inception of record-keeping. Previous historians have failed to note the evident advancement in York’s civic administrative literacy during the late thirteenth century, and they have usually dated the earliest surviving urban records to the mid-fourteenth century. By comparing different classes of civic and ecclesiastical records, this article reveals that York’s civic administration was in fact engaged in archival preservation from the late thirteenth century. In addition, by examining evidence that appears sporadically in royal archives, this article argues that the commencement of York’s urban archive was significantly influenced by the policies and archival activities of the royal government. Overall, this article aims to contribute to the literature on the early history of civic administrative literacy.

Royal Attitudes to the Atlantic Slave Trade and Abolition in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries

Abstract Recent historiography has placed particular emphasis on the social origins and influence of individuals who took opposing sides in debates on the abolition of the slave trade between 1787 and 1807. There is no doubt that family networks and connections influenced patterns of pro-slavery and abolitionist support. Despite this familial focus, comparatively little attention has been paid to the attitudes and interventions in the debate of King George III and his family. As early as 1808, Thomas Clarkson’s History of the Rise, Progress, and Accomplishment of the Abolition of the African Slave-Trade by the British Parliament recorded how Prince William Henry, duke of Clarence, and his younger cousin, Prince William Frederick, second duke of Gloucester and Edinburgh, held diametrically opposed views on the issue. Evidence that has recently come to light in the Royal Archives makes it possible to assess whether the divide between George III’s son and nephew points to a royal family riven by disagreement on the rights and wrongs of slavery. By broadening the canvas of study to include other royal dukes, this article contributes to a much fuller understanding of the family’s reaction to one of the most pressing moral and economic questions of the day. Their views were not just a matter of their own personal opinions; their interventions in debate affected (and on balance, impeded) the progress of abolition and had direct repercussions on the lives of hundreds of thousands of enslaved Africans.

The history of archives in Central Asia: ancient times

The article devoted studies of the documents on the history of the archives in Central Asia on the basis of archeological researches having been conducted in Central Asia over the last decades. Until now there have not been conducted practical complex studies of Central Asian archives of ancient times. On the basis of certain facts this following article has described the life experiences of ancient people who lived in the territory of current Uzbekistan and indicated the process of preserving documents and transferring data from generation to generation in the form of rock paintings and archival documents-libraries. These references indicate to the existence of ancient scripts in Khorezm. On the basis of scientific studies of the scientists it can be concluded that the elements of scripts discovered on the ancient ceramic handcrafts may be considered as the samples of early economic archieves found in the territory of present Uzbekistan. In the period of Akhamanids in Iran and in Central Asia cuneiform was widespread and in the whole territory of the empire Aramaic script wasn’t the only language of paperwork. As it has been indicated in the article, according to its geographic scope, the Bactrian language took the second place after the Sogd language which was widely used in the territory extending from India to Eastern Turkestan. The fact that two biggest empires as Kushanids and Ephtalits and then also the state of Takhirids utilised this script demonstrates the significance of the ancient Bactrian language in the lives of ancient nations. This paper also shows the similar attributes of the Bactrian language used in making negotiations of Surkh-Kutal, Rabotak with the scripts used in the samples of the letters in the documents from the library of Ashurbanipal and with the Het script in which the texts of the anthems, national communal decisions and religious messages were inscribed on the rocks. There are also some evidences proving the existence of particular archives in the residences of ancient rulers of Central Asia in such places as Toprak Kala (Khorezm), and in the mount of Mug’ (Devashtich archives). Particularly in royal archives there was a systematic archival work and such materials as leather and wood were widely used to fix the data. Such documents as personal letters, diplomatic correspondence, contracts and economical records were kept in this period. It also should be noted that paperwork was far more enhanced in this epoch.

Review: Philip II of Spain and the Architecture of Empire

Review: <i>Philip II of Spain and the Architecture of Empire</i>

“Our Sultan Must Preserve His Religion, Just as You Preserve Your Own”: Al-Ghazzāl and the Re-Forging of Islamic Diplomacy in Eighteenth-Century Morocco

Abstract Aḥmed al-Ghazzāl served as the Moroccan court’s diplomatic negotiator with Spain between 1766 and 1775. In this role, he communicated regularly with his Spanish counterpart, the Marqués de Grimaldi, leaving behind nearly forty official letters, an unparalleled number in the Moroccan royal archives – the Mudīriyyat al-Wathā’iq al-Malakiyya (MWM). Nevertheless, al-Ghazzāl’s career is consistently overshadowed by his abrupt dismissal from the court of Muḥammad III (r. 1757–1790). Putting into conversation al-Ghazzāl’s letters and a riḥla (travelogue) he composed, in which he describes his 1766 mission to Spain, this article reconsiders al-Ghazzāl’s role in articulating Moroccan diplomatic practice and thought through his advocacy for commensurable inter-religious diplomacy. It demonstrates that a focus on al-Ghazzāl’s Islamic conceptual frameworks and terminologies offers a way to explore non-European diplomatic practices, shedding light on a more diverse group of early modern diplomatic thinkers.

The King George V Gensuitō: An Imperial Japanese rarity in the Royal Collection

In 1918, a Marshal’s sword (Gensuitō) was introduced into the Japanese honours system, to be presented to specially recognised admirals and generals of the Imperial Japanese military who had been awarded the honorific title of Gensui. Later that year, a very fine example of such a sword was presented to King George V at Buckingham Palace, on behalf of Emperor Taishō. These swords were made to the highest standards by master swordsmiths, with no more than 24 produced before the abolishment of the rank of Gensui in 1945. Very little has been written about Gensuitō in Japanese, much less in English. The King George V Gensuitō, today held in the Royal Collection, is recognised for its aesthetic value, but has been the subject of only limited scholarship. Drawing on primary sources held in the Royal Collection, Royal Archives, and National Archives of Japan, as well as secondary sources published in limited-circulation journals that have not been digitised, the author presents herein an overview of this important Gensuitō—believed to be the sole example held in a collection outside of Japan.

Complicated Lives and Collaborative Research: Mapping the Effects of Conversion to Christianity on Jewish Marriage Practices in Late Medieval Girona

This article explores how our work as collaborative historians has allowed us to map out the stories of Jewish families in Girona during the early decades of the fifteenth century - a crucial moment in their history - by pulling together documents from royal, municipal, and notarial archives. Here we focus on the Vidal family--Caravida, his first wife Bonafilla, and second wife Regina, analyzing hundreds of records to tell a tale of polygamy, accusations of theft, the death of a son, conversion to Christianity, divorce, a mixed marriage, and investigation and conviction by the inquisition. Interwoven with our narrative of the Vidals, we discuss some of the tools that have helped us bring together such varied sources. Making all this possible is our use of a relational database which has aided our ability to link together such rich documentation from a variety of archives. Finally, we also consider the role of happenstance in our examination of certain archival sources; specifically, the impact that stumbling across the registers of the local notary who worked with the inquisition had on our understanding of the troubles that Jewish and converso families faced as they became caught in conflicts between ecclesiastical, municipal, and royal officials.

Village Infernos and Witches’ Advocates: Witch-hunting in Navarre, 1608–1614 by Lu Ann Homza

Reviewed by: Village Infernos and Witches’ Advocates: Witch-hunting in Navarre, 1608–1614 by Lu Ann Homza Amanda L. Scott Village Infernos and Witches’ Advocates: Witch-hunting in Navarre, 1608–1614. By Lu Ann Homza. (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press. 2022. Pp. x, 260. $99.95. ISBN: 9780271091815. Between 1608 and 1614, Navarre was rocked by terrifying allegations that the Devil was recruiting villagers as witches, placing them in apprenticeships, providing them with demonic pet toads, and kidnapping and converting children to his cause. As Lu Ann Homza describes eloquently in her new book, the Basque witches’ sabbats [End Page 608] (akelarres) exemplified all the most terrifying elements of early modern witch-fantasy: witches flew to upside-down masses where the Devil presided like the Bishop of Pamplona, they feasted on corpses, they mixed poisons and called down destructive weather, and they danced and copulated with one another to cacophonous music. Entire villages were swept up in accusations; many of the accusers were children. After intense community breakdown and revoked confessions, the Inquisition called a halt, and began treating witchcraft as impossible to prosecute. These elements make the Navarrese witch-hunt one of the most famous episodes of the European witch-craze, yet strikingly one of the least studied. Part of this neglect stems from the lasting influence of Gustav Henningsen’s 1980 study The Witches’ Advocate, which focused on the Inquisitor Alonso de Salazar Frías’s skepticism over the witches’ confessions. To date, this is usually how the Navarrese witch-hunt fits into undergraduate witchcraft surveys: an example of how modernity and enlightened legal thinking triumphed over peasant (and Catholic) superstition. Homza decisively rejects this characterization. In a much-needed reappraisal, Homza returns to Henningsen’s original documentary base, while supplementing it with new and only recently discovered sources from the Navarrese royal archives and Inquisitorial correspondence in Madrid. She considers the poverty and worldly motives that fueled the hunt, but also the surprisingly coherent command of Tridentine religious reform possessed by the Navarrese laity. The result is a careful and sensitive re-evaluation of the witch-hunt and an important contribution to our understanding of early modern daily life. In crisp prose and vivid, humorous descriptions of village conflict, Homza unequivocally demonstrates that witch-accusations were anything but normal. Calling someone a witch was a profound social affront, and such slander had shattering social effects (p. 20). Yet, many of the accusers were children and there was no legal mechanism to stop or punish them from accusing parents and neighbors. In Homza’s telling, we see how Inquisitors stumbled into a complex social world they did not fully understand, and where Inquisitorial penalties might pale in comparison to the trauma and dishonor accused witches faced within their communities. Still, Homza’s most important contribution remains a dramatic rejection of Salazar as an enlightened jurist, who doubted the concept of witchcraft: rather than ushering in modern legal procedure, Salazar “came to doubt not whether witchcraft was possible in theory, but whether his tribunal was proceeding against witch-suspects with sufficient proof” (p. 9). Though Homza rejects geographic determinism—in both limited and broad senses—she nonetheless sees the Inquisition as suffering from a “tyranny of distance”: the cultural and geographic gulf between the Suprema in Madrid, the tribunal in Logroño, and the Pyrenean villages made communication and timely dispatches exceptionally difficult, stoking conflict between individual Inquisitors. Their choices effectively exacerbated the hunt, rather than remedy it (p. 87). The poverty of the Logroño tribunal and the exploding number of cases pushed familiars to search for extralegal mechanisms to help with the backlog, including coerced confessions, torture at the village level, and bringing suspects face to face (p. 100). Village Infernos is then, fundamentally, a portrait of a dysfunctional [End Page 609] Inquisition whose actions actually botched the processes their tribunal was bound to uphold (p. 16). Justice was usurped by individual townspeople and the clergy, some of whom fought back against abuses and mistreatment by bringing suit in other jurisdictions. There was nothing top-down about the use of the courts by these villagers, and the result was “a persecution [that] unquestionably had more witches...

Rereading Orphanhood: Texts, Inheritance, Kin, edited by Diane Warren and Laura Peters

Reviewed by: Rereading Orphanhood: Texts, Inheritance, Kin ed. by Diane Warren and Laura Peters Kimberly Reynolds (bio) Rereading Orphanhood: Texts, Inheritance, Kin, edited by Diane Warren and Laura Peters; pp. x + 276. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2020, £80.00, £24.99 paper, $105.00, $29.95 paper. Orphans were so plentiful in Victorian Britain that Mr. Bumble, the Parish Beadle in Charles Dickens's Oliver Twist (1837–39), created an alphabetical system for new arrivals at the foundling home: "The last was a S,—Swubble, I named him. This was a T,—Twist, I named him. The next one comes will be Unwin, and the next Vilkins. I have got names ready made to the end of the alphabet, and all the way through it again, when we come to Z" (Oliver Twist, edited by Kathleen Tillotson [Clarendon Press, 1966], 7). The twelve lively and well-written essays in Rereading Orphanhood: Texts, Inheritance, Kin, edited by Diane Warren and Laura Peters, venture into royal archives and the records of charitable institutions; they also explore periodical publication, a great many genres, and Philip Pullman's neo-Victorian novels about the female detective, Sally Lockhart, to give some sense of the abundance and variety of real and literary nineteenth-century orphans. And yet there is a notable absence of orphans such as Somalian-born Jaesell Macalonzie, who, in 1892, aged sixteen, was taken in by the charity Barnardo's. Jaesell's family was murdered during the siege of Khartoum (1884–5), and he was sold into slavery before finding safety in England. His is one of many accounts of Black and mixed-heritage children in the Barnardo's archives. Since October 2017, to mark Black History Month, the charity has published material about the Black children and teenagers cared for since its first children's home opened in 1870. The backgrounds of at least twenty Victorian orphans of color have been made available in this way, and they feature in published work such as Caroline Bressey's "Forgotten Histories: Three Stories of Black Girls from Barnardo's Victorian Archive" in Women's History Review (2007). The Barnardo's homes are discussed at length in Joey Kinglsey's essay for this collection, but his focus is on the staged nature of photographic images used to attract charitable donations, and all of the children in these images were white. Information about other Black orphans from the nineteenth century and earlier has been brought to light elsewhere, too. For instance, there are several books about Sarah Forbes Bonetta Davies. Rescued during a slave-hunt in which her parents were killed, she was subsequently presented as a gift to Queen Victoria when she was five years old. The Queen financed her education and maintained a relationship with her. I mention these examples because, in a collection that sets out to reread orphanhood, I hoped to see attention paid to orphans whose stories have largely been ignored or suppressed. [End Page 568] Instead, the kinds of orphans featured in the book are likely to be familiar to most readers of Victorian Studies. We have, for example, Fanny Price (not a genuine orphan but positioned as such in the Bertram household, Cheryl L. Nixon explains), Oliver Twist, Jane Eyre, Esther Summerson, Sara Crewe, and the many waifs and "Street Arabs" found in popular evangelical children's novels (61). There are exceptions: as well as considering the life of Charlotte Smith Richardson, who was well cared for the by charitable organizations in York, Kevin Binfold's chapter discusses her poem "Stanzas on the Decease of Margaret Russell" (1829). Russell was a mixed-race girl who was looked after by some of the institutions known to Richardson during the Regency years. Laura Peters, whose Orphan Texts: Victorians, Orphans, Culture and Empire (2000) was one of the first attempts to understand Victorian families and culture through the experience of orphans, also looks beyond the orphans of Britain. Her chapter illustrates what she describes as the "unique position the orphan occupies at the intersection of contemporary discourses on race, science, childhood and visual culture" in relation to a small group of orphans who featured in travelling exhibitions during the Victorian era (143...

أمراض الملوک فى تاريخ المملکة الحيثية الحديثة من خلال الفکر العقائدى

يهدف هذا البحث إلى دراسة الأمراض التي أصابت بعض الملوک الحيثيين خلال عصر المملکة الحديثة، وهم الملک شوبيلوليوما الأول والملک أرنوواندا الثانى والملک مورشيلى الثانى وأخيرا الملک خاتوشيلى الثالث، ومما لاشک فيه أن لتلک الأمراض أسبابا و أثارا متعددة، أوضحها الملوک في کتاباتهم، ومن ثم تقدم الباحثة في هذه الدراسة عرضا للملوک الحيثيين الذين أصيبوا ببعض الأمراض التي ترکت أثرا واضحا في حياتهم الملکية،وکذلک في قرارتهم وتوجهاتهم وعلاقتهم بالعقيدة الحيثية ،فالخلفية التاريخية هو جزءا أساسيا في تلک الدراسة لإيضاح جوانب متعددة تخص الأسباب و النتائج، وقد لزم التنوية إلى أن هذه الدراسة لا تتناول الأمراض بوجه عام وإنما تختص فقط بأمراض الملوک وعلاقتها بالمعبودات الحيثية، ووصفها في الکتابات الأثرية والوسائل التي استعان بها الملوک من أجل الشفاء، وکيف أثر الفکر العقائدى على اتخاذ الملوک تصرفات بعينها، مما يعنى أن العقيدة الدينية هى المؤثر الأول فى الفکر الحيثى،ولأن لکل حالة مرضية ملکية ظروفها الخاصة، فقد تختلف عناصر البحث من ملک لأخر. Diseases of kings in the history of the New Hittite kingdom through Religious belief The present study investigated the causes and impacts of diseases afflicting some of the Hittite kings such as; King Suppiluliuma I, king Arnuwanda II, King Mursili II and finally King Ḫattusili III. These diseases had been described in royal archives of a dynasty of Hittite kings. These diseases had remarkable impacts on their royal life, decisions, directions and their Hittite religion policy. The historical background is an essential part of this study to clarify various aspects of diseases affecting Hittite kings only, and to investigate their relationship to the recital idolatry and their description in the archaeological writings and the means used by the kings for the sake of recovery, and because each disease has a property of its circumstances, the elements of research may differ from one property to another.

Danish visions of the Scandinavian union (1809–1810): a genealogy of the rhetoric and pragmatics of justification

ABSTRACT Although nation and empire – as well as the organicist and universalist visions mirroring them – are usually put in opposition to each other, this article argues that the two can create synergistic alliances. The attempt of the Danish dynastic union proposal to Sweden in 1810 sheds light on the repertoire of rhetoric and arguments the state could harness to substantiate its potential to rule over diverse populations. First, the paper demonstrates how the trope of Scandinavian kinship was formulated in the Danish public debate during the transitional period, or what Koselleck calls Sattelzeit. Then, the article shows how this language was embedded into power relations and configured to reinforce the imperial aspirations of the Nordic amalgamation, meaning the fusion of the Scandinavian nations. The core sources I consult are the pamphlets published to advertise union-building and the documents stored in the folders of the Royal Archive in Copenhagen (Rigsarkivet).

Bringing early colonial astronomy to life

Abstract Anna Ridley describes a new exhibition at Old Government House, Sydney, that uses documents from the Royal Astronomical Society library and archive – and technology – to help tell the story of scientific endeavour in colonial New South Wales

Dating the historical old city walls of Songkhla Thailand using thermoluminescence technique

The Old Historical Wall, located in Bo Yang, Songkhla Province, Thailand, is an archaeological icon believed to have been constructed during the reign of Rama III, as indicated in the royal archives, around 1837–1840 CE. However, the recorded age is the result of unofficial documentation. The establishment was based on speculation from circumstantial evidence and local stories. The wall is made of bricks that underwent a heating process before being used for the construction. We therefore propose the use of the thermoluminescence technique for dating the wall. The samples include brick rubble from three excavation sites next to the wall. To determine the age, we estimate the radiation dose rate and the accumulated dose for each sample. The dose rate of the sample is determined using gamma spectroscopy with a high-purity germanium detector. For the accumulated dose, we employ the additive dose method using Co-60 with a dose range of 0–100 Gy. Glow curves are then deconvoluted using the general-order kinetics model. The results yield three superposition glow peaks at three different temperature ranges. Plateau tests are also carried out to find a proper temperature for dating purposes. Comparing the plateau test and the result of deconvolution, we find that the glow curve temperature suitable for dating was within 200–310°C. The accumulated doses are then evaluated using the area under the curve of the peak temperature. The date is then determined as the ratio between the accumulated dose and the dose rate. The results indicate that the age is approximately 174–192 years, so that the wall was built around 1827–1841 CE, with one standard deviation interval. The duration is in agreement with the recorded age of the wall inscribed in the country's historical archives.

Ivan the Terrible and Historians Testing the Limits of a Sixteenth-Century Biography

This essay focuses upon the limitations to Ivan iv’s biography set by the extant sources. Due to these limitations, some important episodes of the tsar’s life, including his participation in the administrative reforms carried out during his reign, remain unknown. Moreover, these lacunae cannot be filled in with mere logical conjectures. However, the situation is not totally hopeless. For instance, Ivan’s major concerns during the oprichnina can be revealed with the help of the marginal notes in the Royal Archive’s inventory which fixed the tsar’s uses of the documents. Apart from careful reexamination of the available sources, hopes for further insights into Ivan’s biography and reign are pinned on the applying of the emic approach, history of concepts and historical comparison.

La diffusion et la production de la canne à sucre (XIII-XVI siècles)

Le propos de cette contribution est de présenter les conditions qui ont prévalu lors de l'essor de la culture de la canne à sucre et de sa trans­formation dans le royaume de Valence aux XVe-XVIe siècles. Cette analyse est basée sur des sources inédites extraites des archives royales et de docu­ments notariés, concernant les compagnies exploitant les moulins sucriers, les contrats entre seigneurs et fermiers, ce travail révèle le rôle crucial que les communautés musulmanes locales ont joué dans ce cycle. Il montre aussi comment la concurrence du sucre des îles atlantiques amène le déclin définitif de cette culture a Valence. En discutant les problèmes de technolo­gie et de rapport de production, il est fait référence à des questions soule­vées par l'historiographie sur la production sucrière en Méditerranée.

Járványok és dögvész az ókori Mezopotámiában

Cuneiform texts from the second and first millennium are one of the oldest sources for plague or pestilence in the ancient times. Letters from the royal archive of the kingdom Mari written in the early second millennium inform us individual cases of contaminations in royal court and the outbreak of plague in various cities. Similarly to the conception of diseases, plague and pestilence were considered as a punishment of the gods. Moreover, the concept about illnesses including plague is closely connected to the impurity. The Mesopotamians used several medical and magical practices to protect themselves. In this paper magical amulets (so called ‘plague amulet’ and necklace made of various amulet stones) and a healing treatment (an ointment) were presented. Rituals were also performed to protect domestic animals against pestilence. A complex Neo-Assyrian ritual for purifying the military camp were here also presented.

History &amp; Geography

History & Geography Christopher T. Begg, Victor H. Matthews, Eric F. Mason, William J. Urbrock, Isaac M. Alderman, and Joseph E. Jensen 1137. [Twenty-Third Kushite Dynasty] Matthew J. Adams, "Manetho's Twenty-Third Dynasty and the Legitimation of Kushite Rule over Egypt," AntOr 9 (2011) 19-46. This paper considers the identification of the kings cited in the epitomes of Manetho's 23rd Dynasty and their function in the historiographical traditions of ancient Egypt. Against the long-standing scholarly rejection of Manetho's 23rd Dynasty as devoid of historical content, A. argues that the names of the 23rd Dynasty kings are part of an authentic historiographical tradition that originated with the Kushite king Taharka. A. further suggests specific reasons why, and a historical reconstruction of the process whereby, the 23rd Dynasty came to be integrated into other king-list traditions. Additionally, he identifies specific functions for the as-yet-unidentified names "Psammous" and "Zet" in Julius Africanus's version of the epitome of Manetho. The argument made by A. takes into account the political and cultural perspective of the Kushite kings who were responsible for a strand of the Egyptian king-list tradition and offers some interpretations of Kushite royal practices on this basis. [Adapted from published abstract] 1138. [Tello/Girsu] Daniel Arnaud, "Note sur les panthéons (officiel et populaire) de Tello à l'époque paléo-babylonienne," AO 33 (2015) 201-7. The onomastics of Old Babylonian Tello (ancient Girsu) offer an unexpected glimpse into the ideology of the site in the period in question: there were two pantheons, an administrative or official one and the other of a more popular character. The former reflected local nationalism, while the latter expressed nostalgia for the vanished Ur empire. [Adapted from published abstract] 1139. [First Temple Vessels] Debra Scoggins Ballentine, "Exile and Return of the First Temple Vessels: Competing Postexilic Perspectives and Claims of Continuity," NEA 82 (2019) 132-39. Biblical texts contain varying accounts of the temple vessels' "fate" during the Babylonian destruction of Jerusalem. Biblical historiography features a claim of continuity of the vessels despite repeated disruption and reformulation of their physical location and material. Cultural memory of the postexilic reconstitution of the cultus evokes the motif of the temple vessels returning to Jerusalem as a way of claiming continuity with preexilic cultus. The vessels serve as a "continuity theme" operating synecdochically for the temple [End Page 380] cultus as a whole. Thus, their physical integrity served to legitimate particular ideologies and social groupings within the literary portrayals of postexilic Jerusalem. [Adapted from published abstract] 1140. [Esarhaddon Succession Treaty] Christina Barcina, "The Display of Esarhaddon's Succession Treaty at Kalḫu as a Means of Internal Political Control," AntOr 14 (2016) 11-52. In 672 b.c., Esarhaddon made the citizens of Assyria swear a loyalty oath to his chosen successor, Ashurbanipal, in the Nabû Temple at Kalḫu, as we learn from three letters stemming from the royal archives of Nineveh. This oath and its related stipulations were inscribed on unusually large tablets and left on display in the Throne Room of the Temple. However, the identity of those pledging their loyalty to Ashurbanipal on the relevant lines of the tablets, i.e. city-lords from the eastern periphery of the empire, is at odds with the information on the matter given in the above-mentioned letters. The identical oath-tablet recently excavated at a temple at Tell Ta͑yinat in southwestern Turkey that was sworn by the provincial governor and the "apparat" of Kullania calls for a reassessment of the reasons behind the display of the tablets at Kalḫu that were seemingly intended for eastern chieftains. The religious nature of Esarhaddon's Succession Treaty as attested by the visual, textual, and findspot character of the tablets, which has been extensively analyzed by previous scholarship, should not obscure the fact that Esarhaddon may have taken advantage of these features as well as earlier practices associated with the display of vassal treaties to conceal his fear of treason on the part of the intended target audience, i.e. high-ranking Assyrian officials. [Adapted from published abstract] 1141. ["Midian alongside...

Hurrian Substrate in the Modern Ukrainian Language: Linguistic Outlines

If to concern the questions of modern Ukrainian spiritual space and, in particular, concepts of emotional, intellectual, and cultural spheres, the lists of key concepts will certainly include such words as “people”, “community”, “citizen”, “father”, “respect”, “duty”, “resilience”, “holy shrine”, “holy order”, “basis”, “praise”, “glory”, “to magnify”, “wisdom”, “village”, “home”, “gift”, “food”, “healing”, and many others. Each real Ukrainian nowadays would probably agree with this statement. However, only few intellectuals are able to elaborate on the origin of these terms. And as for the age of the above mentioned terms, only single connoisseurs would be able to correctly identify it. The same will be observed if to name less significant language units of the Ukrainian lexicon. Huge clusters of the Ukrainian-language concepts, including conceptual terms, even now, in the first quarter of the 21st century, constitute the category of orphans. However, the author has established that the origin of the above mentioned words must be searched for in the ancient Hurrian language. Thus, Ukrainian must be considered one of the direct descendants of this prehistoric language, forgotten by all and dead for three thousand years. Modern dictionaries of the Ukrainian language give such a name of this prehistoric ethnic group: Hurrians. However, we find this form of writing in Ukrainian awkward. After all, the world’s lead orientalists claim today that the lexeme “Hurrian” (this is the correct form of conveying the name of the specified people in Ukrainian) has derived from the Akkadian geographic appellation Ḫurri and its ethnic derivative Ḫurri. According to the cuneiform texts on clay tablets, discovered by archaeologists at different times, this name was well known to other peoples of the ancient Near East. The name “Hurrian” can be found in the then (prehistoric) documents of royal archives: compare the Hittite “ᵁᴿᵁḪur-ri” (used for the first time by the ruler Ḫattusilis I) and Ugaritic “ḫry”. We should also mention Hurrian “ᴷᵁᴿḪur-ru-u-ḫe” and “ᴷᵁᴿḪur-wu-u-ḫe”; Egyptian “Ḫu-ru” (used for the first time by Pharaoh Thutmose III). The Egyptian rendering of this name was “Ḫʒ-rw”. It is also found in their written records. The Hurrian form of the name shows that the ethnonym is built on the root “ḫur-”. This can be said, incidentally, about the ethnonym “Croats”. The author will return to this topic in his next research.

Selections From De La Manufacture Au Mur. PDF 2: Zuber’s ‘Indépendance’ (1853), a Hand-Painted Restatement of ‘Scenic America’ (1835) (Translation)

In the period 1770-1914 wallpaper became the premier decoration in Western interiors. Until recently, it has been studied in terms of style. Yet we continue to know little about wallpaper as a material object. Here, the full context surrounding wallpaper is under consideration: the manufacturer, the design studio, the workshop, how and to whom it was sold, and how it was hung. Beneath the style of wallpaper are the cultural foundations which give it meaning. During the eighteenth century, wallpaper was a relatively well-documented, elite product. Some questions about its context are answered by the royal archives and the extensive record-keeping of N. Dollfus & Company in Mulhouse. During the nineteenth century the consumption of wallpaper of all types increased with mechanization. This study concentrates on the better-documented products of the Zuber company in Rixheim such as panoramics and decors which were intended for elite markets. Wallpaper, often misinterpreted, is established here as a fundamental element of the culture of the interior at every level of society.

Selections From De La Manufacture Au Mur. PDF 1: A Historiography of Wallpaper (Translation)

In the period 1770-1914 wallpaper became the premier decoration in Western interiors. Until recently, it has been studied in terms of style. Yet we continue to know little about wallpaper as a material object. Here, the full context surrounding wallpaper is under consideration: the manufacturer, the design studio, the workshop, how and to whom it was sold, and how it was hung. Beneath the style of wallpaper are the cultural foundations which give it meaning. During the eighteenth century, wallpaper was a relatively well-documented, elite product. Some questions about its context are answered by the royal archives and the extensive record-keeping of N. Dollfus & Company in Mulhouse. During the nineteenth century the consumption of wallpaper of all types increased with mechanization. This study concentrates on the better-documented products of the Zuber company in Rixheim such as panoramics and decors which were intended for elite markets. Wallpaper, often misinterpreted, is established here as a fundamental element of the culture of the interior at every level of society.