Ancient Mesopotamia Portrait Of A Dead Civilization MLA Sample

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Critical analysis essay

Ancient Mesopotamia: Portrait of a Dead Civilization

Oppenheim is an exceptional Assyriologist well endowed with interests and acquaintance

somehow wider compared to that of his fellow practitioners. Thus, his work is not only useful

but also exciting. Oppenheim’s work is about Mesopotamian culture between the Sargonid to the

commencement of the Neo-Babylonian age. The personal quality and uniqueness that he present

in his viewpoint regarding Ancient Mesopotamia’s cultural history has been satisfactorily

emphasized in the reviews, also the impact caused by the book can be weighed by the literature

stirred by its initial appearance. This book is a very helpful tool for scholars and intellectuals

who are concerned with ancient civilizations.

The key part of the book is subdivided into six comparatively prolonged chapters. The first

chapter (Oppenheim, pp. 7-73) is about conventional survey of the ecology and geography of

ancient Mesopotamia, its citizens and their languages, as well as development and spread of

Mesopotamian culture. The second chapter talks about kingship, society, the temple, and the

economics; what follows is a prolonged and fascinating part on the Mesopotamian urbanism and

the city itself (Oppenheim, pp. 74-142). Chapter three is about the historical writing, such as

dedications, kings list, royal inscriptions, year formulae among others. Chapter three materials is

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what most current scholars reconstruct the succession and chronology of the happenings in the

ancient Mesopotamia (Oppenheim, pp. 143-`70). In my point of view, I consider chapter four of

the book as the best, and it pertains Mesopotamian divination and religion. This chapter offers a

helpful corrective for the convincing interpretations and treatments often present in ancient

civilization books regarding Mesopotamia (Oppenheim, pp. 171-227). Oppenheim understands

how it would be tricky if not impossible for people to understand religion that is outside the well-

known Judaeo-Christian custom, whether Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Greek or other modern-day

exotic cult. The book also uses exceptional features to explain to the leader regarding

Mesopotamia religion since there is an extra issue of the very specialized forms of evidence that

hinders people from seeing the whole construction of Mesopotamian religion. The fifth chapter

deals with literature and writing, some examples of innovativeness in Mesopotamian literary

composition, as well as scribal education (Oppenheim, PP. 228-287). Lastly, chapter six

illustrates mathematics, technology, astronomy and medicine; the chapter offers a helpful, but

robust novel synopsis of the topics in question (Oppenheim, pp. 288-331). The rest of the book

(Oppenheim, pp.335-433) comprise of chronological tables, bibliographical notes section as well

as footnotes section being helpful for their citations; the glossary of terms and names, and the

index are also very important to the universal reader.

Oppenheim’s work is also objective since he concentrated on Mesopotamians rather than

Sumerians. There would be more serious problems if he included the Sumerians in the endeavors

to explain the developments that occurred over the years. It would not be feasible to treat

Mesopotamia civilization as a unit, thus this piece of work is exceedingly thought out hence I

support Oppenheim’s point of view.

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However, on the contrary there are some weaknesses in this literature. Oppenheim has made

many claims throughout the book, but he fail to provide a portrait regarding Mesopotamian

Civilization. In its place, his theme is really Assyriology; what an Assyriologist does and what

Assyriologist have accomplished. In addition, when dealing with Assyriology, its principles and

weaknesses, Oppenheim shows the frankness that appears to have impressed the confused writer

of the dust jacket blurb.

One of the objectives of Oppenheim’s book is to reach out to non-Assyriologists (Oppenheim,

P.3). He might fail to attain this due to some reasons. First, in every sentence of his book he acts

like all other Assyriologists depends on his shoulder. Therefore, even with glossary of terms and

names his work will be of less significance to a general reader since he presupposes a setting that

only a minority of his readers will possess. Secondly, though he is a knowledgeable person who

can write well, there are some instances when he trails off into the terminology of anthropology,

the gobbledygook of the Chicago school. Oppenheim could as well have articulated his opinion

in good honest Akkadian in such instances. For example, he had a misconception that

Assyriology requires help: “Assyriologists need the understanding and sustained co-operation of

interested scholars in economics, the social sciences, and, above all, in cultural anthropology, in

order to achieve a better understanding of the institutional structure of Mesopotamia…..If the

new directions here surveyed mean that Assyriology will eventually move away from the

humanities and nearer to cultural anthropology, I shall shed no tear (Oppenheim, pp. 29-30). The

unsuitable union between the Oriental Institute and anthropology has already given rise to such

outrage such as Trade and market in the early empires (1957) and City Invincible (1960). This

calls for an end to such links that are detrimental.

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Oppenheim insisted that the topic was a “dead” civilization, since the death of his topic was a

prerequisite for its productive research. He also had the notion that his study required a thorough

and conscious recreation as a constructed item of the mind. Thus, he only focused all his efforts

to determine what construct Mesopotamia’s civilization. In addition, he had a notion that by

understanding it in totality would help him forget about other civilization. This is just a claim

that lack proper supportive facts. Nevertheless, the objective of this book was not to offer all the

answers, but was projected to raise questions that would take long to find solutions. This

therefore necessitates an edition that would assist in the research, instead of altering the book’s

viewpoint. The word portrait in the subtitle refers to the form of presentation of civilization that

was intended. Thus it would not be feasible to propose that there is kind of civilization in

Mesopotamia. This implies that new approaches had to be developed to present civilization in

Mesopotamia. Oppenheim did not talk about how to achieve a multifaceted civilization in

Mesopotamia. The portrait technique was necessary since it would help to present some leading

attitudes and features in Mesopotamian civilization appropriately.

In conclusion, laying aside the complains regarding this piece of literature, fact remains that

Oppenheim’s book will continue to be studied with gratitude and appreciation especially by

individuals who have bit of Oriental studies and understands bits of its chapters. This book is a

vital tool to scholars and general leaders who reconstruct the events of ancient Mesopotamia. I

also support his work that did not include Sumerians since it would compound the already

existing issues. The only regret would be that such a grand scholar, full of intelligence and

ingenuity failed to include more details regarding himself in his book. In addition, he only

focused on Assyriology principles and weaknesses.

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Works Cited

Oppenheim, A. L. Ancient Mesopotamia: portrait of a dead civilization. University of Chicago

Press, 1964.

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