Writing science before the Greeks : a naturalistic analysis of the Babylonian astronomical treatise MUL.APIN
Author(s)
Bibliographic Information
Writing science before the Greeks : a naturalistic analysis of the Babylonian astronomical treatise MUL.APIN
（Culture and history of the ancient Near East / edited by B. Halpern ... [et al.], v. 48）
Brill, 2011
Available at 2 libraries
Note
Includes bibliographical references (p. [177]-185) and indexes
Description and Table of Contents
Description
The beginnings of written science have long been associated with classical Greece. Yet in ancient Mesopotamia, highly-sophisticated scientific works in cuneiform script were in active use while Greek civilization flourished in the West. The subject of this volume is the astronomical series MUL.APIN, which can be dated to the seventh century BCE and which represents the crowning achievement of traditional Mesopotamian observational astronomy. Writing Science before the Greeks explores this early text from the perspective of modern cognitive science in an effort to articulate the processes underlying its composition. The analysis suggests that writing itself, through the cumulative recording of observations, played a role in the evolution of scientific thought.
"All in all, the authors should be congratulated for this groundbreaking study. Apart from significant new insights into MUL.APIN it has opened up a new avenue for research on ancient scientific texts that is likely to yield further interesting results, particularly if the cognitive analysis is combined with other approaches."
Mathieu Ossendrijver, Humboldt University
Table of Contents
Foreword
Introduction
Chapter 1 MUL.APIN
Chapter 2 Writing and Conceptual Change
Chapter 3 Terms of Analysis
Chapter 4 MUL.APIN Text and Analysis
Chapter 5 Summary of Results
Chapter 6 Discussion: MUL.APIN, Writing, and Science
Chapter 7 Further Thoughts: The Cognitive Functions of Writing in MUL.APIN
Chapter 8 A Final Word: From List to Axiom
Bibliographical References
Appendix I Complete translated text of MUL.APIN from Hunger & Pingree
Appendix II List of Babylonian Month-names, in Akkadian, with Hebrew equivalents and Modern equivalents
Appendix III Tablet and line correspondences with Hunger & Pingree
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