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Past Events
November 2018
Ehsan Yarshater: A Homage
Please join the Pourdavoud Center in celebrating the life and scholarly contributions of Professor Eshan Yarshater (1920-2018), the Hagop Kevorkian Professor Emeritus of Iranian Studies at Columbia University. Professor Yarshater’s prolific career has had a global impact. At UCLA, he is remembered with the endowed Yarshater Biennial Lecture Series, and at Columbia University, his memory is celebrated with the recently established Eshan Yarshater Center for Iranian Studies. The commemoration will commence with introductions by M. Rahim Shayegan (University of California,…
Read MoreMedieval Armenia’s Artistic Beauty
Helen Evans is the Mary and Michael Jaharis Curator for Byzantine Art at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, NYC. She joined the Museum’s staff in 1991 and is responsible for the acquisition, study, and interpretation of the Museum’s collection of early Christian, early Jewish, and early-to-late East Christian and Byzantine art. Her exhibitions—including Byzantium and Islam (2012), Byzantium: Faith and Power (2004), and The Glory of Byzantium (1997)—have explored the importance of Byzantine art and its connections beyond its borders.…
Read MoreConcert of Early Modern Music of Eastern Europe and of the Armenian Communities of the Region
PROGRAM The first half includes sacred and secular music for chamber ensemble by composers from the Ukraine, Romania, and Poland, most of which is receiving its LA Premiere. The consort is directed by Morgan O’Shaughnessey (UCLA grad., Music Department) The second half features a series of Armenian sacred and secular music from the period performed by an Armenian Ensemble. The ensemble is directed by Areni Agbabian (experimental improvisatory vocalist). Refreshments Provided. All are Welcome. RSVP Below:
Read MorePhotographic Exhibition of Armenian Art and Architecture of Eastern Europe
The exhibition of thirty images illustrating the artistic achievement of the Armenian communities in the Crimea, Ukraine, Poland, Romania, and Bulgaria over several centuries in sacred and secular architecture, painting, silverwork, stone and wood carving, and other media complements the analytical discourse of the conference panels in introducing viewers directly to the objects themselves and thereby evoking the space of the merchant and artisan centers in that region that served as the matrix for those exquisite expressions of Armenian creativity.…
Read MoreHidden Treasures Unearthed: Armenian Arts and Culture of Eastern Europe
The conference seeks to contribute to a longue durée approach to Near Eastern engagement with Europe with an emphasis on the early modern period (16th-18thcc.), which marked the heyday of Armenian communities as a crucial component of international trade hubs in eastern Europe, involving an interdisciplinary focus on the multifaceted role those communities played in hemispheric commerce marked by exchange in commodities, ideas, technological innovation, and sociocultural values. Exploring the evolution of those centers as settings for the symbiosis the…
Read MoreNew Documentary Evidence for the Trade in Papers
Watermarked papers, which served as media for Islamic manuscripts (codices and documents), were imported from Europe at least since the 13th century. The study of trade in papers brings us, therefore, to Global history. This presentation will focus on recently published research on late production papers which were dispatched to the Yemeni and Ethiopian market at the end of 19th and the beginning of the 20th century through the networks of Bohra merchants, whose Companies were mainly based in Bombay…
Read MoreIsrael and the Samaria Highlands: A Nomad Settlement Wave or Urban Expansion during the Early Iron Age?
The Iron I period witnessed a wave of settlements in the highlands of Israel, mostly in Samaria but also to some extent in the Upper Galilee and Judah. This wave is usually associated with the genesis of Ancient Israel and is interpreted in light of the collapse of Canaanite urban centers at the end of the 12th century BCE. This lecture reconsiders the reasons behind this wave of settlement throughout the Samaria Highlands during the Iron I (1200-1000 BCE) in light of new…
Read MoreBetween Egypt and the Near East: Current Research on the Amarna Letters
Various aspects of the interaction between Egypt and other political and cultural centres of the Ancient Near East have always sparked the attention of scholars, trying to understand this multi-layered and complex issue — ranging from the interpretation of finds of Egyptian or Egyptianized objects at the ANE sites to a misapprehension in communication resulting from considerably different concepts of royal power and authority. The Amarna tablets are a collection of almost 400 cuneiform documents discovered in the later 1880’s…
Read MorePourdavoud Center Lecture Series: Mark Garrison
Please join the Pourdavoud Center for the first talk of our 2018-2019 Lecture Series, featuring the research of Dr. Mark Garrison of Trinity University. Deities and Ritual at Persepolis: The Evidence from the Persepolis Fortification and Treasury Archives The texts and seals preserved as impressions from two large archives of administrative tablets at Persepolis reveal remarkable rich and varied evidence for religion and religious ritual at and near Persepolis in the reign of Darius I (522-486 BC). The archives are…
Read MoreGraduate Student Research Presentations and Q&A
12:00 – 1:00pm Overspecializing the Specialist: Reevaluating the Role of Producers in the Study of Technological Interconnectivity Nadia Ben-Marzouk (Archaeology) Accounting for Kingship: The Samaria Ostraca as Royal Performance Jason Price (Hebrew Bible) An Image on the Stele or a Ghost in the Shell? A Cognitive Scientific Approach to the Material “Soul” in the Levant Timothy Hogue (Hebrew Bible) 1:00 – 2:00pm QWS, Edom, and Identities: Exploring the Use of Theophoric Elements in Onomastica as Markers of Identity Andrew Danielson…
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