Notes to Chapter 1. The Establishment of Society

April 2024

General notes on Chapter 1
1.1 Nature and Dynamism of Tensionality
1.2 The First Axial Age
1.3 The Three Fundamental Characteristics
1.4 The Externalization of Faculties
1.5 The Invention of Time
1.6 The Reification of Thought
1.7 The Identifiability of People and Places
1.8 The Group as Community
1.9 Culture and Tradition
1.10 The Presages of Politics

ERRORS in databases:

"Boson1918Assiriologia.d": duplicate bibliography "Boson1918Assiriologia" for site "Akk-lg".
"Bottero1992Reasoning.d": duplicate bibliography "Bottero1992Reasoning" for site "Mes-rel".
"Buccellati1972Teodicea.d": duplicate bibliography "Buccellati1972Teodicea" for site "Mes-lit".
"Cauvin2000Birth.d": duplicate bibliography "Cauvin2000Birth" for site "Mes-rel".
"DMB.d": duplicate bibliography "DMB" for site "Mes-rel".
"Edzard2003Sumerian.d": duplicate bibliography "Edzard2003Sumerian" for site "Mes-rel".
"Oshima2014Sufferers.d": duplicate bibliography "Oshima2014Sufferers" for site "Mes-rel".
"Trinkaus1983Shanidar.d": duplicate bibliography "Trinkaus1983Shanidar" for site "Mes-rel".

General notes on Chapter 1

Examples for inference: Marshack 1972 Roots, Marshack 1991 Tai and Bahn 2009 Marshack; cf. also Wynn 1989. On invention, cf. Golden Toohey 1997 Inventing Ancient Culture. On nature of society, see Schloen 2001 Houseofthe Father, especially p. 17 with reference to Weber 1978 Economy, Ricoeur 1991 From Text.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
A very useful handbook about the archaeology of Syro-Mesopotamia, from the hunter-gatherers societies until the first millennium BC, is Akkermans- Schwartz 2003 Archaeology.

As for the formation of complex societies, see e.g. Sanders &al 1984 Evolution; cf. also Sanders 1984 Demography.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]
As for the development of state in ancient Mesopotamia (and in the Mediterranean in general), see e.g. Bang 2013 Handbook; cf. also Bryce 2016 Atlas.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]

1.1 Nature and Dynamism of Tensionality

«Questa la sorte…», from Giacomo Leopardi’s, A Silvia.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On the concept of urban revolution, see the fundamental paper Childe 1950 Urban (see also excerpts). Cf. also Buccellati 1977 Urban Revolution and Smith 2009 Childe (a critical r-evaluation of Gordon Childe’s 1950 paper; cf. further Harris 1994 Childe and Brami2019Invention). Cf. also the related theme.
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]
As fot thr very first cities, see e.g. Trolle Larsen 2015 Kanesh and Ur 2014 Households.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]

1.2 The First Axial Age

On the concept of Axial Age, see mostly Jaspers 1953 Origin (see also excerpts).
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]

1.4 The Externalization of Faculties

See the concept of chaîne opératoire; on spacial competence, cf. Wynn 1989 and also 3.1.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
Cf. further the aforementioned (note a) bibliographical entry in CAR, Wynn 1989, with the related monograph.
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]

1.5 The Invention of Time

On the concept of invention, see Vivaldi 1725 Cimento and Sanders 2009 Hebrew.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On time, see Buccellati 2014 Time.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
About the term “invention”: the term has to be understood here in its twofold meanings, current and etymological, as clearly stated by G. Buccellati: “I use the term ‘invention’ in a dual sense – the current sense of ‘creation’ and the archaic sense of ‘finding,’ the latter derived from the original value of the Latin etymon invenire, as found, for example, in the title given by Vivaldi to his opus 8, Il cimento dell’armonia e dell’inventione (twelve concertos of which the first four take their title from the four seasons)” (Buccellati, Origins, p. 17, fn. 1).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
On the concept of absolute, a cornerstone of G. Buccellati book about religion (i.e. Buccellati 2024 When), see Mes-Rel.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
We could maybe advance an equation or, at least a comparison, between this ‘chain of time’ and the well-known ‘chain of rhapsodic inspiration’ told by Plato (see Ion, 533d-534a).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]
On calendars, see e.g. Stern 2012 Calendars.
– [ Marco De Pietri, February 2024]
Further on the concept of invention, see also the separate Theme.
– [ Marco De Pietri, August 2024]

1.6 The Reification of Thought

On the relationship between language and thought, see Gadamer 1976 Philosophical Hermeneutics (with a good summary in Schloen 2001 Houseofthe Father).
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
An interesting discussion on the topic of human language (and its development and evolution) can be found in Hawking 2018 Questions, chapter 3, on p. 58 (for which see excerpts).
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On ethnography of speaking, see Palmer 1996 Theoryof Cultural Linguistics.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
See Duranti on cultural linguistics.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
For a wider discussion about the possible origins of language, see Johansson 2005 Language; cf. also Johansson 2021 Dawn.

On the importance of myths (and language) in the construction of complex societies, see the fundamental work of Cassirer 1946 Language; cf. also Dalley 2000 Myths.
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]
Cf. also, about the relationships between language and religion, the companion website Mes-Rel, note 1.1u and note 1.1u; see also Buccellati 2014 Time with the related excerpt.
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]
For a cronological overview, refer to Tables; for this specific period, look particularly at Table 1.
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

1.7 The Identifiability of People and Places

Banana names, Proto-Euphratian (cf. Mes-Rel: 6.2 (j)).
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
On presence/absence, see Sokolowski 1978 Presence Absence.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]
Naming, i.e. the act of giving/’inventing’ a name to something/somebody, has been retained by many ancient (and even modern) cultures as a kind of religious and magical operation (see e.g. the value of names in the Egyptian [rn = ‘name’], Hebrew [שֵׁם, šēm = ‘name’], and Arabic [اِسْم, ysm = name] cultures).
– [ Marco De Pietri, October 2023]
I use here this definition of ‘pluri-vocal’ vs. univocal because I think we cannot exclude that the same place was referred to by the same human group with different names, as it happens, for instance, even today with the name of the city of Jerusalem, named as such by English speakers, while it is known by the Jews as יְרוּשָׁלַיִם, Y^erūšālayim (close to ‘Jerusalem’, even if grammatically a ‘false-dual’) but القُدس, al-Quds (‘the Holy’) by the Muslims (in any case, we would have to admit that this distinction is correlated to different ethnical/cultural identities and traditions) [maybe, add also the example of the Hittite Maraššantiya = classical Ἅλυς/Halys = Turkish Kızılırmak, where it is worth noticing the origin/etymology of the toponyms: from a divinity name the first, after (even with not certainty) a salt deposit in Ximene region the second, and after the color of its sand the third].
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]

1.9 Culture and Tradition

On apprenticenship, see Kelly Buccellati 2012 Apprenticeship.
– [ Giorgio Buccellati, July 2020]

1.10 The Presages of Politics

The term ‘control’ is here used not in the sense of ‘verification’ but in the sense of ‘domination’ as in the expressions ‘self-control,’ ‘birth control,’ ‘access control,’ ‘put’ or ‘keep under control,’ and so on (cf. Buccellati, Origins, p. 22, fn. 2).
– [ Marco De Pietri, December 2023]