University of Heidelberg

The Transport of Goods between Athens and the Levant during the Achaemenid Period 

Researcher: Dr. Nicolas Zenzen                                                                               

The purpose of this archeological subproject is to get an idea of ‘everyday relations’ between Greece and the Ancient Near East. Through the medium of material flows, we hope to move beyond – and presumably even in contrary to – the political propaganda of the different phases of confrontation. 

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"Oriental" Cults in Greek Cities before and after Alexanderde/personen/person/persdetail/trampedach.html

Researcher: Dr. Bjørn Paarmann

This research project proposes to investigate religious exchange between Greece and the Near East. The still current and stereotypical image of Greek hostility toward the Orient has been undermined by recognition of the fact that so-called oriental cults were in fact broadly received by Greeks of the Hellenistic period. The animosity toward oriental “barbarians” seen in the literary sources does not appear to reflect everyday life, at least when it comes to religion: the Greeks happily imported foreign gods from the lands of their nominal enemies.
In the course of this research project, we will scrutinize the sources – literary, epigraphic, and iconographic – to determine whether the importation of oriental cults constitutes an exception to the hostility toward the East posited by the literary sources, or whether such hostility was restricted to a certain social level of Athenian society.

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