Literacy in the Old Babylonian City of Nippur

ended

This project bridges a gap between the sciences and humanities by focusing on the acquisition, use, and development of literacy and knowledge in a distinct and remote population, the ancient city of Nippur (located in Southern Iraq in the early 2nd Millennium BCE). It asks, “in this time and place, how and to what extent did education relay the practical knowledge necessary for a professional career?” To answer this question, it will study prose, documentary, and numerical literacy, between male and female professionals from Nippur, the intellectual and ideological capital of early Mesopotamia. To do this, it will examine economic and academic texts originating primarily from Nippur. A key archive that is the basis to my study is currently in the process of being analyzed and published, and this fellowship would allow me to make a unique contribution to this effort. This study will be of use to economic and educational researchers and policy makers as a case study to compare against future endeavors. The applicability of education is an elusive subject in Assyriology (the study of ancient Iraq and its interactions with the greater Near East). No systematic study of the applicability of education exists for the ancient Near East. However, three methodological improvements will be developed with this project to allow such a study. My work at Yale University studying Old Babylonian archival practices, my work at Paris studying errors, mistakes, and rounded values in Old Babylonian mathematics, and my current research in numeric literacy at the Max Planck institute give me the ideal background to undertake this project. This project will be the first of a series of studies on literacy in the ancient world, which will allow for a comparative study of the impact of