New Books in Ancient History

Dec 02 2024 559 ep. 54 mins 223
New Books in Ancient History Podcast artwork

Interview with scholars of the Ancient World about their new books

  History
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Ibn al-Muqaffaʿs "Kalīlah and Dimnah: Fables of Virtue and Vice"

Dec 02 2024 73 mins  
Kalīlah and Dimnah: Fables of Virtue and Vice by Ibn al-Muqaffaʿ, translated by Michael Fishbein and James E. Montgomery, with a foreword by Marina Warner (Library of Arabic Literature, NYU Press, 2022), is a vibrant new rendition of a literary classic that has captivated readers for centuries. Rooted in ancient Indian storytelling and adapted into Arabic literature, this collect

Zsuszanna Szanto, "The Jews of Ptolemaic Egypt: The History of a Diaspora Community in Light of the Papyri (De Gruyter, 2024)

Nov 29 2024 46 mins  
The Jews of Ptolemaic Egypt: The History of a Diaspora Community in Light of the Papyri (De Gruyter, 2024) offers a comprehensive and nuanced history of the Jews of Egypt, who constituted an important ethnic minority ever since they first appeared in the country. As part of the Greek-speaking ruling class, the Jews played an active role in the political, social and cultural life of

Julia Kelto Lillis, "Virgin Territory: Configuring Female Virginity in Early Christianity" (U California Press, 2022)

Nov 25 2024 64 mins  
Women's virginity held tremendous significance in early Christianity and the Mediterranean world. Early Christian thinkers developed diverse definitions of virginity and understood its bodily aspects in surprising, often nonanatomical ways. Eventually Christians took part in a cross-cultural shift toward viewing virginity as something that could be perceived in women's sex organs.

Phillip Lieberman, "The Fate of the Jews in the Early Islamic Near East: Tracing the Demographic Shift from East to West" (Cambridge UP, 2022)

Nov 23 2024 88 mins  
In The Fate of the Jews in the Early Islamic Near East: Tracing the Demographic Shift from East to West (Cambridge UP, 2022), Phillip Lieberman revisits one of the foundational narratives of medieval Jewish history--that the rise of Islam led the Jews of Babylonia, the largest Jewish community prior to the rise of Islam, to abandon a livelihood based on agriculture and move into ur

Matthew Elia, "The Problem of the Christian Master: Augustine in the Afterlife of Slavery" (Yale UP, 2024)

Nov 11 2024 78 mins  
The Problem of the Christian Master: Augustine in the Afterlife of Slavery (Yale UP, 2024) offers a bold rereading of Augustinian thought for a world still haunted by slavery. Over the last two decades, scholars have made a striking return to the resources of the Augustinian tradition to theorize citizenship, virtue, and the place of religion in public life. However, these scholars

Naomi S. S. Jacobs, "Delicious Prose: Reading the Tale of Tobit with Food and Drink: A Commentary" (Brill, 2018)

Nov 08 2024 60 mins  
In Delicious Prose: Reading the Tale of Tobit with Food and Drink (Brill, 2018), Naomi S.S. Jacobs explores how the numerous references to food, drink, and their consumption within The Book of Tobit help tell its story, promote righteous deeds and encourage resistance against a hostile dominant culture. Jacobs' commentary includes up-to-date analyses of issues of translation, text-

Roberto Morales-Harley, "The Embassy, the Ambush, and the Ogre: Greco-Roman Influence in Sanskrit Theater” (Open Book, 2024)

Nov 07 2024 38 mins  
The Embassy, the Ambush, and the Ogre: Greco-Roman Influence in Sanskrit Theater (Open Book, 2024) presents a sophisticated and intricate examination of the parallels between Sanskrit and Greco-Roman literature. By means of a philological and literary analysis, Morales-Harley hypothesizes that Greco-Roman literature was known, understood, and recreated in India. Moreover, it is arg

Toni Alimi, "Slaves of God: Augustine and Other Romans on Religion and Politics" (Princeton UP, 2024)

Oct 28 2024 66 mins  
Augustine believed that slavery is permissible, but to understand why, we must situate him in his late antique Roman intellectual context. Slaves of God: Augustine and Other Romans on Religion and Politics (Princeton UP, 2024) provides a major reassessment of this monumental figure in the Western religious and political tradition, tracing the remarkably close connections between Au

Vicente Dobroruka, "Second Temple Pseudepigraphy: A Cross-cultural Comparison of Apocalyptic Texts and Related Jewish Literature" (de Gruyter, 2014)

Oct 25 2024 81 mins  
At this point of the scholarly debate on the nature of Second Temple pseudepigraphy, one may ask why another look at the problem is needed. Second Temple Pseudepigraphy: A Cross-cultural Comparison of Apocalyptic Texts and Related Jewish Literature (de Gruyter, 2014) is not the definitive answer to that problem but it proposes different paths - or better still, a two-fold path: on

Dominick Hernández, "The Prosperity of the Wicked: A Theological Challenge in the Book of Job and in Ancient Near Eastern Literature" (Gorgias Press, 2022)

Oct 24 2024 23 mins  
Does Job convincingly argue against a fixed system of just retribution by proclaiming the prosperity of the wicked, an argument that runs contrary to traditional biblical and ancient Near Eastern wisdom? Addressing this question, Dominick Hernández gives careful consideration to the rhetoric, imagery, and literary devices used to treat the issue of the fate of the wicked in Job's