SCHWEICH LECTURES ON BIBLICAL ARCHAEOLOGY

Ugaritic and the Beginnings of the West-Semitic Literary Tradition

Professor Dennis Pardee, Professor of Northwest Semitics, The Oriental Institute, The University of Chicago

Friday 30 November and Saturday 1 December 2007

Friday 30 November 2007, 5.30pm. Lecture I:  Alphabetic Origins

The site of Ras-Shamra, ancient Ugarit, has yielded over 2000 tablets and fragments bearing texts in the local language, 'Ugaritic', which were inscribed in a cuneiform alphabetic script of local invention. The first lecture will deal with the nature of the language and its place within the languages of the ancient Near East, the nature of the writing system, and the nature of the Ugaritic texts that have been preserved.  The archaic character of the language and of the traditions laid down in the literary texts will be stressed, as well as their unique antiquity as a source for the study of West-Semitic religious beliefs and practices.

Lecture Chair: Professor Hugh Williamson, FBA, Regius Professor of Hebrew, University of Oxford and Student, Christ Church

Saturday 1 December 2007, 11.00am. Lecture II:  Ugaritic Literary Composition

Of the roughly 175 Ugaritic texts that deal directly with religious matters, fewer than a third may be described as compositions of elevated literary quality, all poetic in form.  The literary corpus will be briefly described and illustrations offered of the differences between prose and poetry in how particular motifs are expressed.  The principal characteristics of Ugaritic literary composition will be discussed primarily in terms of the most important mythological text, that dealing with the god Baal.  This text is attested on six tablets; epigraphic and literary arguments will be offered for seeing these tablets as constituting a 'cycle'. The lecture will close with a brief discussion of the meaning and function of this text in Ugaritic society.

Lecture Chair: Profesor Alan Millard, Emeritus Rankin Professor of Hebrew and Ancient Semitic Languages, The University of Liverpool

Saturday 1 December 2007, 2.00pm. Lecture III:  Literary Composition in the Hebrew Bible:  the View from Ugarit

The similarities of thought and expression between the textual data from Ugarit and the next principal literary corpus, that to be found in the Hebrew Bible, will be demonstrated.  In keeping with the announced topic, the emphasis will not be on the theology or the theological politics of the two corpora, but on their literary qualities.  Two aspects of the Ugaritic-Hebrew parallels will be stressed:  first, the similarities between the two corpora in the aesthetics of poetic structure and imagery and, second, the evolution visible in the Hebrew Bible in the areas of literary genre, subject matter, and life setting of individual poems or collections of poems.

Lecture Chair: Professor Graham Daviews, FBA, Professor of Old Testament Studies, University of Cambridge, and Fellow of Fitzwilliam College

Professor Dennis Pardee teaches Northwest Semitic languages and literatures.  In addition to his work in Ugaritic, he has published books and articles on Biblical Hebrew poetry and on Hebrew inscriptions.

More on the Schweich Lectures on Biblical Archaeology