Iconic Books and Texts - Sacred texts (HRLC) - James W. Watts
22. Ancient Iconic Texts and Scholarly Expertise
Iconic Books and Texts - Sacred texts (HRLC) - James W. Watts
James W. Watts [+]
Syracuse University
James W. Watts is Professor of Religion at Syracuse University and the author of Ritual and Rhetoric in Leviticus: From Sacrifice to Scripture (Cambridge University Press, 2007).
Description
This chapter probes the origins of iconic textuality in the ancient Near East, informed by post-colonial perspectives on iconic texts. The surviving art and texts from ancient Egypt and Mesopotamia exhibit at least four forms of iconic textuality: monumental inscriptions, portraits of scribes, displays and manipulations of ritual texts, and beliefs in heavenly texts.