From the Euphrates to the Nile: The Language of Patronage during the Middle Bronze Age

FLAMMINI, ROXANA

Baltimore, MD

Congreso; 2013 ASOR Annual Meeting; 2013

American Schools of Oriental Research

The ancient texts mirror different socio-political practices without analyzing or explaining them.Through a hypercritical analysis of the sources we can elucidate the way the inter-elite relationships developed in antiquity. Its purpose is to distinguish between the discourse under analysis, and the discourse researchers use to explain it. With regard to patronage, one of the socio-political practices held in the Ancient Near East, the late Raymond Westbrook stated that ?patronage is bound to remain a shadowy phenomenon, reflected in the sources rather than displayed by them? (JESHO 48/2, 2005, 231). Taking into account these statements, I shall reevaluate the evidence coming from different locations from the Euphrates to the Nile during the Middle Bronze as proof of the existence of this kind of sociopolitical bond.