Am Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte (MPIWG) wird 2022 mit der Internationalen Max Planck Research School „Knowledge and Its Resources: Historical Reciprocities“ (IMPRS-KIR) eine neue internationale Graduiertenschule zum Thema der historischen Wechselwirkungen zwischen Wissen und Wissensressourcen starten. Sie basiert auf einer Kooperation des MPIWG mit der Freien Universität Berlin, der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin und der Technischen Universität Berlin im Rahmen des Berliner Zentrums für Wissensgeschichte. Am Max-Planck-Institut für Wissenschaftsgeschichte (MPIWG) wird 2022 mit der Internationalen Max Planck Research School „Knowledge and Its Resources: Historical Reciprocities“ (IMPRS-KIR) eine neue internationale Graduiertenschule zum Thema der historischen Wechselwirkungen zwischen Wissen und Wissensressourcen starten. Sie basiert auf einer Kooperation des MPIWG mit der Freien Universität Berlin, der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin und der Technischen Universität Berlin im Rahmen des Berliner Zentrums für Wissensgeschichte.

An der Graduiertenschule werden Promovierende darin ausgebildet, Wissen, Ressourcen des Wissens sowie die vielfältigen Wechselwirkungen zwischen diesen beiden Kategorien zu analysieren. Im Zentrum des Programms steht eine „historisch-politische Epistemologie“, die eine Vielzahl historischer Ressourcen der Wissensentstehung in den Blick nimmt: politische Systeme, technische Infrastrukturen, soziale Interaktion, materielle Objekte und Medientechnologien.

Mit den Dissertationen wird die Wissensgeschichte an den Schnittstellen wissenschaftlicher Disziplinen neu gestaltet. Auf der einen Seite stehen die Wissenschafts-, Technik- und Medizingeschichte und -philosophie (HPSTM: History and Philosophy of Science, Technology, and Medicine), auf der anderen Regional Studies, Global Studies, Science & Technology Studies (STS), alle Felder der Geschichtswissenschaften, Medienwissenschaften, Museumswissenschaften, Archäologie, Kunstgeschichte, Literaturwissenschaft, Philologie, Umweltwissenschaften und Forschung im Bereich der Digital Humanities. Die Studierenden werden darin geschult, innovative Forschungsmethoden anzuwenden. Sie werden zu Fachgrößen ausgebildet, die in der Lage sind, die dringend benötigte vergleichende Perspektive, Reflexion und historische Tiefe in die Gestaltung von Wissensgesellschaften weltweit einzubringen und sich in einem breiten Spektrum von Berufsfeldern zu betätigen, ob im Journalismus, in sozialen Medien, Kunst, Museen und Archiven oder im Bereich der Wissenschafts- und Bildungspolitik.

Das Leitungsgremium der IMPRS-KIR, dem Prof. Dr. J. Cale Johnson von der Wissensgeschichte des Altertums an der Freien Universität Berlin beigetreten ist, ist die „Principal Teaching Faculty“, der neun Professorinnen und Professoren der vier Partnerinstitutionen angehören. Sie werden von der Sprecherin, Prof. Dr. Dagmar Schäfer (MPIWG), und den beiden Co-Sprecherinnen Prof. Dr. Viktoria Tkaczyk (HU) und Prof. Dr. Christine von Oertzen (MPIWG/HU) repräsentiert. Ihnen obliegt die Federführung beim Aufbau der neuen Graduiertenschule. An der IMPRS-KIR wird es insgesamt 15 Promotionsstellen geben, die erste Kohorte von fünf Studierenden wird am 1. September 2022 ihre Arbeit aufnehmen.

Für weitere Informationen zu IMPRS-KIR klicken Sie bitte hier.

NinMed makes available for the first time the world’s most standardised, structured and systematised corpus of medical literature prior to Galen: the „Nineveh Medical Encyclopaedia“ from the library of Ashurbanipal, King of Assyria (669-c.630 BC).

The project is funded by a Wellcome Research Resources Grant, with the title „Introducing Assyrian Medicine: healthcare fit for a king“ (220149/Z/20/Z), 2020-2023.

NinMed benefits from resources developed by the Ashurbanipal Library Project, and the BabMed project.

On December 10, 2021 NinMed was mentioned in a Times’ article, written by Sara Tor: “Assyrians couldn’t face the bald truth 2,600 years ago. The secrets of clay tablets, thought to be the world’s first encyclopaedia for medicine, are being revealed at last – including a bizarre and complex remedy for hair loss.”  

The International Max Planck Research School “Knowledge and Its Resources: Historical Reciprocities” (IMPRS-KIR) invites applications for

5 doctoral positions, to begin on September 1, 2022.

Each position will run for 3.5 years, with the possibility of extending once by six months. The IMPRS-KIR is a new, research-driven PhD program based in the history and philosophy of science, technology, and medicine (HPSTM). It is a collaboration between the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science and Freie Universität Berlin, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, and Technische Universität Berlin. The IMPRS-KIR will trace the deep entanglements of knowledge and its resources from a long-term and global perspective. Key to its agenda is a “historical-political epistemology” that highlights how knowledge is shaped historically by a great variety of resources – political systems, technological infrastructures, social interaction, material objects and media
technologies. Knowledge, in turn, is understood as a means to define and unlock such resources, while being, in and of itself, one of the key resources of human culture.

The School offers training in historical-political epistemology, combining HPSTM with regional and global studies, Science & Technology Studies (STS), all fields of history, media studies, museum studies, archaeology, art history, literary studies, philology, environmental studies, and digital humanities research. Prospective doctoral students with projects on any specialty and period within these and related fields are invited to apply.

The doctoral positions are open to applicants of all nationalities holding a Master’s degree (or equivalent) in the aforementioned fields and having proficiency in English, and, preferably, in one or more additional languages. Candidates are expected to be able to present and discuss their work and
that of others in English; dissertations may be submitted in German, English, or any of the supervisors’ working languages. Selection criteria relate to the excellence of the individual candidate and project and the closeness of the project’s fit with the School’s agenda.

The IMPRS-KIR is located at the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Dahlem, Berlin. Students will work in a stimulating international and interdisciplinary research environment.

The School’s program entails one year of courses held in conjunction with the three Berlin universities involved in the IMPRS-KIR (FU, HU, TU), as well as mentored reading groups, workshops, training in digital humanities methods, a tailored coaching program, and language courses. A research budget will be available for travel to archives worldwide. Additionally, students may opt to
spend up to one semester at one of our international partner universities (University of Pennsylvania, Nanyang Technological University Singapore, Singapore University of Technology and Design).

The PhD degrees will be awarded by one of the Berlin university departments represented in the Principal Teaching Faculty. Additionally, an IMPRS certificate of the Max Planck Society will be awarded.

Applicants are asked to submit the following materials:
• a cover letter with a personal statement of your motivation for applying to the IMPRS-KIR (max. 1,000 words)
• a dissertation proposal (max. 2,500 words, excluding bibliography) including working title, abstract (max. 250 words), research topic and state of the art in the field of study concerned, research questions and objectives, methodology, short description of the project’s feasibility and how it would be carried out (including a list of archives if applicable), bibliography (max.- 30 titles)
• a curriculum vitae (1–2 pages)
• copies of degree certificates/proof of the finishing date of your Master’s degree
• transcript of grades achieved during your Master’s studies
• proof of fluency in English (preferably at level C1, but at least at level B2). If English is your native language or if you went to a university where the language of instruction was English, you do not need to submit an English certificate.
• contact details of two academic referees. Our Selection Committee will contact referees for shortlisted applicants.

Please submit these materials as separate PDF documents, exclusively through the following application portal: https://recruitment.mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de/position/19628037

Only complete applications submitted via the application portal will be accepted. The portal will close on January 31, 2022, 23.59 Central European Time.

The IMPRS-KIR aims to foster diversity within its four collaborating institutions. We welcome applications from all qualified individuals regardless of age, disabilities, ethnicity, gender, nationality, religion or sexual orientation

For more information, please consult the FAQs on the website of the MPIWG: https://www.mpiwgberlin.mpg.de/research/departments/imprs

For further inquiries about the new PhD program and the recruitment process, please contact Sophie Schwarzmaier: sschwarzmaier@mpiwg-berlin.mpg.de
For questions about the application portal, please contact Tanja Neuendorf: applications@mpiwgberlin.mpg.de

Please note that we cannot consider applications sent by email or post. The email addresses given above are only for your questions.

24. November 2021, by Mathieu Ossendrijver

In October 2021, the ZODIAC project brought me to Istanbul for an eagerly awaited research visit to the cuneiform collection of the Ancient Orient Museum (Eski Şark Eserleri Müzesi). The Ancient Orient Museum belongs to the Archaeological Museums complex, which is located near the Topkapı palace in downtown Istanbul. The building overlooks Tophanı park, where one can also visit a History of Science museum, apart from admiring its ancient trees and squeaking parrots. The Ancient Orient Museum was designed by a French architect under the guidance of Osman Hamdi Bey – the Ottoman official, scholar, writer and painter, who was the founding father of archaeology and museology in the Ottoman empire.

The purpose of my visit was to study Babylonian astronomical tablets from Uruk. They came to light in 1912/13 during the first excavation campaign of the German Orient Society (Deutsche Orientgesellschaft). How did they end up in Istanbul? In accordance with the regulations of the Ottoman empire, to which Iraq belonged at that time, the finds were divided between Berlin and Istanbul. The 1912/13 campaign was the only one covered by these regulations. World War I brought an end to the German excavations in Iraq and when they were resumed in 1928, the Ottoman empire no longer existed. From then on the finds were sent to Baghdad. In the early 1940s the tablets were catalogued by the German Assyriologist Fritz Kraus, who was then in exile in Istanbul. Kraus identified about 100 astronomical tablets, for the most part small fragments of tables with computed data for the planets, the moon, and the sun – a type of texts known as mathematical astronomy. As it turns out, only very few astronomical tablets from the 1912/13 campaign ended up in Berlin. Most of the astronomical fragments were published by Otto Neugebauer in „Astronomical Cuneiform Texts“ (1955). My own investigation is part of an ongoing project that will result in a new edition and analysis of the Babylonian tablets with mathematical astronomy.

Where in Uruk do the tablets come from and who wrote them? The documentation about their findspots is incomplete, but it is believed that they were excavated near the Rēš temple, residence of the Babylonian skygod Anu and his spouse Antu. The fragments date from about 250-160 BCE, when Babylonia was under Seleucid rule. At that time the Rēš was Uruk’s main temple and an important center of Babylonian scholarship, comparable only the Marduk’s temple Esagila in Babylon. The tablets were produced by scholarly priests connected to the Rēš. Originally they were probably stored in one or more libraries within the temple – later excavations uncovered the remains of one such library in the south-eastern gate of the temple complex. For an animated reconstruction of the Rēš during this period see https://vimeo.com/62772222.

What is written on these tablets? Babylonian mathematical astronomy is all about the motion of the planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter, Saturn), the moon and the sun. A defining feature of the computations is that positions (longitudes) are expressed as a zodiacal sign and a number of degrees within the zodiacal sign. Some computations also deal with the distance of a planet or the moon above or below the ecliptic, which is the circle through the center of the zodiac. Babylonian scholars created the zodiacal framework near the end of the fifth century BCE. They named 12 zodiacal signs after nearby constellations, starting with the Hired Man (Aries), and ending with the Tails (Pisces). Each sign was divided into 30 units corresponding to 30 modern degrees of arc. All computations are executed and expressed in the 60-based number system known as sexagesimal place value notation. For instance, 10;0,45 Aries denotes a position in 10 degrees, 0 arcminutes and 45 arcseconds = 10 + 0/60 + 45/60² degrees of Aries. A special sign – the so-called Glossenkeil – was used for indicating vanishing digits („0“) within a number.

            The tables were filled from top to bottom and from left to right like Excel spreadsheets. Having filled the top row with initial values, each column was filled from top to bottom by „updating“ the numbers from one to the next instance of a phenomenon, or from day to day, depending on the type of table. The fragment from Istanbul shown above belongs to a table with daily positions of the moon. By zooming in on a few positions, we can recognize a pattern:

(day) 12: 30;08,40 (Capricorn),

(day) 13: 12;23,50 Aquarius ,

(day) 14: 24;57 (Aquarius),

(day) 15: 7;48,10 Pisces.

On day 12 the moon is said to be in 30;08,40 degrees of Capricorn. This number appears unusual for two reasons. First, it contains an extra „zero“ (Glossenkeil), which was added to indicate that the 30 and the 8 are separate digits and not a single digit 38. Secondly, the position is actually beyond 30 degrees of Capricorn, in the first degree of Aquarius. But this is how the scholars in Uruk usually expressed a position in the first degree of a zodiacal sign. In order to see the promised pattern in the numbers, we compute the differences from day to day:

from day 12 to 13 = 12;15,10 degrees,

from day 13 to 14 = 12;33,10 degrees, from day 14 to 15 = 12;51,10 degrees.

These differences represent the moon’s daily motion along the zodiac. We can easily see a pattern now, because they increase by 18 in the second digit. The value 0;18 is used throughout the tablet. It is repeatedly added until the moon’s daily motion reaches a maximum, and then repeatedly subtracted until it reaches a minimum, etcetera, resulting in a „zigzag sequence“. Only the positions in the zodiac were written on the tablet, not the zigzag sequence that was used for computing them. The Babylonian scholars also used such zigzag sequences for modeling periodic variations in the motion of the planets and the sun.

The Babylonian evidence for mathematical astronomy is limited to Babylon and Uruk. But some of this knowledge, including the most complex algorithms for computing positions of Mercury or the moon, somehow made it to Greco-Roman Egypt, where they show up in Demotic ostraca and Greek papyri. The project ZODIAC aims to develop a convincing account of this remarkable phenomenon of the cross-cultural transfer, translation and adaptation of Babylonian astronomical methods and the associated astrological practices.

25. October 2021, by Michael W. Zellmann-Rohrer

The origins of the „time-lords“ in Greek astrology (chronokratores), rulers of sequential and cyclical periods in a human life whose calculation relates to that of the lifespan, remain to be explained. Our earliest references to them as a cohesive system are in the work of the astrologer Vettius Valens of Antioch, who wrote in the mid-second century CE. With little in the way of introduction, Valens speaks of 129-month periods assigned by turns to the five planets and two luminaries, each of which also takes a subdivision of a fixed length (Sun: 19 months; Moon: 25 months; Mercury: 20 months; Venus: 8 months; Mars: 15 months; Jupiter: 12 months; Saturn: 30 months), during which it has special influence over incidents in the life of the individual. Claudius Ptolemy, in keeping with his more systematic approach, at least situates the chronokratores in relation to the more familiar natal astrology, that is, as a check on the appropriateness of predictions to various stages in a human life, while also developing a more sophisticated system of subdivisions. Hephaestion of Thebes claims ancient Egyptian origins for the system in broad terms, without further specifics.

In the mass of original horoscopes in the Greek papyri from Roman Egypt, we have robust evidence for the fact of the practice of astrology but so far disappointingly little detail on how it was practiced. A new attestation of the system of the chronokratores allows us to glimpse one way in which the raw data of the traditional horoscopes, which essentially present the planetary positions at birth, could have been used. That is, these positions would have informed the arrangement of the sequence of chronokratores, which in turn could predict more specific aspects and moments of a person’s life than the general characteristics assigned by the constellations of celestial bodies at birth.

In a forthcoming article in Harvard Studies in Classical Philology, within the framework of the Zodiac project hosted in the Institut für Wissensgeschichte des Altertums, I publish an extensive Greek horoscope on papyrus from the Egyptian city of Oxyrhynchus in the Roman period. But it is a „horoscope“ only in the broad sense: it is surely the work of an experienced astrologer, but it does not in fact tell us anything directly about the moment of a client’s birth, but rather gives detailed predictions for this person’s life, at least as far as early adulthood (where the papyrus breaks off), based on the cycle of the chronokratores. This post focuses on another refraction of the celestial chronokratores „on the ground.“ In a papyrus codex of some 36 folia (PGM IV), probably part of an archive of magical and alchemical manuscripts owned in the region of Egyptian Thebes in Late Antiquity, mixed in among rituals for divine revelation, exorcism, and adjuration of supernatural entities for various purposes, we find an excerpt from what must have been a longer sequence of predictions from the course of the chronokratores in the lifetime of an anonymous person. It would be tempting to place that person in turn somewhere in the textual tradition of this codex: the owner, for whom it was copied (if not in fact the copyist), or the owner of an older manuscript that served as source for part of this compilation and copying? The excerpt begins at the age of 53 years, 9 months, which is precisely the start of the sixth 129-month period of a lifespan. The period as a whole is assigned to Mercury, with subdivisions for the standard lengths of months to Mercury, Venus, the Sun, Mars, the Moon, Jupiter, and Saturn, in that order. For the subdivisions assigned to the Sun, Mars, the Moon, Jupiter, and Saturn, short forecasts are added: in the first, the individual is encouraged to „undertake that which you seek“ (sc. to do; or understand perhaps, „what you are asking about“), and in the rest simply advised whether the time is „good“ or „bad.“

In this context we can also observe the integration of astrological doctrines, but of the catarchic or judicial as opposed to natal branch, with magic in Egypt of the Graeco-Roman and late ancient periods. This is a ritual handbook in the form of a papyrus book-roll (PGM VII: for images see here) roughly contemporary with the Theban codex. Among contents broadly similar to the latter, we find a lunar calendar for the timing of the sorts of ritual procedures generally found in the codex, structured on the principle of the zodiac: that is, for example, when the Moon is in Sagittarius, it is a good time to make invocations to the Sun and Moon, when it is in Aquarius and Aries, to perform various kinds of love-magic, or when it is in Gemini and Cancer, to undertake rituals to win favor and produce amulets, respectively. This same manuscript also coopts the Greek names of the zodiac signs, along with associated occult names and pictorial signs (charakteres), as talismanic elements to be inscribed in a ritual for obtaining a significant dream in oneiromancy (dream-divination). The appearance of astrology within the magical papyri raises the question, which calls for further study, of the relations between „magicians,“ that is, practitioners of the individualistic, instrumental religion of the rituals attested in handbooks like the two discussed here, and astrologers. Could these two sets of personnel have overlapped in part, or could they have exchanged technological expertise in the form of technical literature?            

The ultimate origins of the chronokratores, as those of not a few other astrological concepts with wide later currency, remain to be elucidated. We hope to shed further light on such questions in the course of the Zodiac project, testing among other things the claim by Hephaestion of Egyptian origins and comparing this system in detail with the idiosyncratic lifetime-periodization of the „Old Coptic Horoscope“ of 95 CE. The implication of the chronokratores and of the zodiac in the complexities of knowledge transfer, and of the wider landscape of religion and culture, in Graeco-Roman and late ancient Egypt already suggests interesting results for the history of knowledge.

Text by Michael W. Zellmann-Rohrer, Freie Universität Berlin, ERC-Projekt „ZODIAC – Ancient Astral Science in Transformation“.

Dies ist der offizielle Blog des Instituts für Wissensgeschichte des Altertums an der Freien Universität Berlin. Unser Blog soll einerseits über die laufende Forschung und Lehre am Institut selbst und andererseits über Vorträge, Publikationen und spannende Veranstaltungen berichten, die für die Wissensgeschichte des Altertums relevant sind.

Die Geschichte des Wissens beginnt mit der Entstehung von Wissenspraktiken, die in Artefakten, insbesondere Notationssystemen und Schriftsystemen, verkörpert sind. Der Hauptfokus unseres Instituts richtet sich derzeit vor allem auf den Mittelmeerraum im Altertum, aber auch auf den Nahen Osten bis nach Asien und darüber hinaus und umfasst den Zeitraum von den frühesten Phasen menschlicher Aktivität bis zum ersten Jahrtausend unserer Zeitrechnung.

Die Wissensgeschichte des Altertums umfasst sowohl jene Felder der Wissenschaftsgeschichte, die oft als exakte Wissenschaften bezeichnet werden, aber auch andere Wissensformen wie die Geschichte der Medizin. Aus unserer Sicht sind alle Wissensformen zu berücksichtigen, soweit Belege für deren Praxis oder Konzeptualisierung in der Antike vorliegen.

Seit dem 2. April 2021 ist am Institut auch das Projekt ZODIAC – Ancient Astral Science in Transformation (ERC Advanced Grant) angesiedelt. Das Projekt ZODIAC untersucht textliche und ikonographische Quellen aus Babylonien, Ägypten, der griechisch-römischen Welt und darüber hinaus, um herauszufinden, wie der Tierkreis und die astronomischen, astrologischen und sozialen Praktiken, die mit dem Tierkreis verbunden sind, in der Antike zirkulierten. Das Projekt wird von Mathieu Ossendrijver geleitet. Zum Projektteam gehören Andreas Winkler (Ägyptologie), Marvin Schreiber (Altorientalistik) und Michael Zellmann-Rohrer (Papyrologie, klassische und semitische Philologie).

Cale Johnson und Mathieu Ossendrijver

This is the official blog of the Institut für Wissensgeschichte des Altertums/ History of Knowledge in the Ancient World, at the Freie Universität Berlin. It is meant to highlight the ongoing research and teaching in the institute itself, but also report on talks, publications and fascinating events that are relevant to the history of knowledge in the ancient world.

 The history of knowledge starts with the emergence of knowledge practices embodied in artefacts, especially notation systems and scripts. The focus of our institute is currently on the ancient world of the Mediterranean, but it stretches from the Middle East to Asia and beyond, spanning the period from the earliest phases of human activity to the first Millennium of our era.

Wissensgeschichte des Altertums embraces both traditional work on the history of science, sometimes referred to as the exact sciences, and also other forms of knowledge such as the history of medicine. In our view, all forms of knowledge should be taken into account, in so far as evidence of their practice or conceptualization in the ancient world is available.

Since April 2, 2021 the Institute is also the home of ZODIAC – Ancient Astral Science in Transformation (ERC Advanced Grant). The project ZODIAC investigates textual and iconographic sources from Babylonia, Egypt, the Greco-Roman World and beyond in order to find out how the zodiac and the astronomical, astrological and social practices connected to the zodiac circulated across the ancient world. The project team is headed by Mathieu Ossendrijver and includes Andreas Winkler (Egyptology), Marvin Schreiber (Assyriologie), and Michael Zellmann-Rohrer (papyrology, classical and semitic philology).

Cale Johnson and Mathieu Ossendrijver