Thinking, Recording, and Writing History in the Ancient World

Thinking, Recording, and Writing History in the Ancient World presents a cross-cultural comparison of the ways in which ancient civilizations thought about the past and recorded their own histories. Written by an international group of scholars working in many disciplines Truly cross-cultural, covering historical thinking and writing in ancient or early cultures across in East, South, and West Asia, the Mediterranean, and the Americas Includes historiography shaped by religious perspectives, including Judaism, early Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism

Thinking, Recording, and Writing History in the Ancient World presents a cross-cultural comparison of the ways in which ancient civilizations thought about the past and recorded their own histories.* Written by an international group of scholars working in many disciplines* Truly cross-cultural, covering historical thinking and writing in ancient or early cultures across in East, South, and West Asia, the Mediterranean, and the Americas* Includes historiography shaped by religious perspectives, including Judaism, early Christianity, Islam, and Buddhism

Series Editor's Preface viiNotes on Contributors ixIntroduction 1Kurt A. Raaflaub1 On Being Historical 6David Carr2 The Task and Ritual of Historical Writing in Early China19Stephen W. Durrant3 History and Primordium in Ancient Indian Historical Writing:Itiha¯sa and Pura¯nòa in the Maha¯bha¯rataand Beyond 41James L. Fitzgerald4 Historical Consciousness and Historical Traditions in EarlyNorth India 61Romila Thapar5 Thinking, Recording, and Writing History in Ancient Japan: TheNihon shoki as a Text of Transition 79Christian Oberländer6 As the Dharmacakra Turns: Buddhist and Jain MacrohistoricalNarratives of the Past, Present, and Future 97Jason Neelis7 History as Festival? A Reassessment of the Use of the Past andthe Place of Historiography in Ancient Egyptian Thought 117Thomas Schneider8 The Presence of the Past in Early Mesopotamian Writings144Piotr Michalowski9 "Two Old Tablets": Thinking, Recording, andWriting History in Hittite Society 169Theo van den Hout10 Thinking and Writing about History in Teispid and AchaemenidPersia 187Robert Rollinger11 Historical Texts in the Hebrew Bible? 213Marc Zvi Brettler12 The Many Faces of the Past in Archaic and Classical Greece234Jonas Grethlein13 How the Romans Remembered, Recorded, Thought About, and UsedTheir Past 256Andreas Mehl14 Patterns of Early Christian Thinking and Writing of History:Paul - Mark - Acts 276Eve-Marie Becker15 Byzantine historia 297Stratis Papaioannou16 The Past in the Early and Medieval Islamic Middle East (circa750-circa 1250) 314Andrew Marsham17 Sources and Scales of Classic Maya History 340Nicholas P. Carter18 The Poetics and Politics of Aztec History 372Lori Boornazian Diel19 Corn and Her Story Traveled: Reading North American GraphicTexts in Relation to Oral Traditions 391Lisa BrooksIndex 417