Elephantine

C’erano elefanti in Italia prima dell'arrivo di Pirro? E 'difficile immaginare che due o trecentomila anni fa la campagna romana era attraversato da branchi di elefanti, ma il territorio di Roma è tra i più ricchi al mondo per l’enorme quantità di siti con resti fossili databili tra il Pliocene e il Pleisocene. I primi ritrovamenti risalgono alla metà del 500 e continuano fino alla urbanizzazione moderna, che ha sepolto sotto il cemento, un grande quantità di siti in cui erano stati scoperti resti fossili
La campagna romana costituiva, nel passato, un ambiente particolarmente favorevole, sia per gli esseri umani e per gli altri mammiferi. Tra i numerosi animali che hanno accompagnato la presenza dell'uomo in queste terre, gli elefanti costituiscono una realtà curiosa, quasi incredibile da immaginare oggi nei territori altamente antropizzati della capitale italiana.
I protagonisti di questo libro sono gli elefanti e le loro relazioni con l'ambiente e gli esseri umani nel corso del tempo. Gli argomenti trattati comprendono, problematiche geologiche climatiche e ambientali e inoltre molti temi di carattere paleontologico, antropologico ed evolutivo.
Per la prima volta sono pubblicati tutti i dati relativi alle centinaia di resti fossili di elefanti rinvenuti nel tempo nel territorio di Roma. Inoltre sono presentati siti e musei in cui è possibile acquisire informazioni più dettagliate.
Infine sono presi in considerazione  i problemi legati al ruolo di questo grande mammifero nell'immaginario collettivo, dalla sua rappresentazione nell'arte preistorica fino alla sua influenza, reale e simbolica, nella storia antica e la sua iconografia in epoca classica.

There were elephants in Italy before the arrival of Pyrrhus? It is difficult to imagine that two or three hundred thousand years ago the Roman Campagna was crossed by herds of elephants, however the Rome territory is among the richest in the world for prehistoric fossil evidences connected with the oldest prehistory. The first findings date back to the mid-500 and continue until the modern urbanization which has buried under concrete, a lot of sites where the fossils were discovered
The Roman Campagna constituted, in the past, a particularly favorable environment, both for humans and for other mammals. Among the numerous animals that have gone together with the man presence in these lands, the elephants are a curious reality, almost incredible to imagine today in the highly anthropized quarters of Italian capital.
The leading actors of this book are elephants and their relationships with the environment and humans over time. The discussed topics include environmental, geological and climatic issues and moreover paleontological, anthropological, and evolutive questions.
For the first time are published all the data related to the hundreds of fossil remains of elephants in the territory of Rome. Furthermore the museum-areas, where you can acquire more detailed information are described.
Finally, problems linked to the role of this large mammal in the collective imagination, from its representation in prehistoric art up to his influence, real and symbolic, in ancient history and its iconography in classical times, are focused.
"""

In 2009-2012 the northern area of the museum garden on Elephantine was investigated before the construction of a magazine.  This was the area of the north-eastern town extension of the 2nd Dynasty, which was surrounded by a city wall. A stone path led from the landing place for ships to a gate. From the 11th Dynasty onwards, the area in front of the city wall was also built on.  Among other features, several ceramic kilns from the 12th Dynasty were found here. The youngest phase was a house of the 19th century.

This study will consider the materiality of the Jedaniah collection from Elephantine through the lenses of process theory of identity and temporal-spatial discourse. The Jedaniah collection is composed of ten Aramaic documents, spanning at least twenty years in the mid-fifth century BCE. The documents include copies of letters sent and received by members inside of the "Jewish" community as well as Persian-backed authority figures. Since these texts were discovered in 1907, many scholars have discussed their content in relation to their "Jewish" themes, but few have questioned the theoretical frameworks employed for examining the material nature of the documents. A methodological framework will be presented that sets process theory of identity in conversation with Thomas Tweed's temporal-spatial theory. Process theory of identity has developed in the context of post-colonial discourse in order to explore how colonialized communities construct hybrid, dynamic identities in response to the internalized experience of colonialization. The works of Jon L. Berquist, Christiane Karrer-Grube, and Katherine E. Southwood, in particular, suggest that both the rule of the Persian Empire over the community at Elephantine and the broader inter-cultural interactions in this sub-province of the Persian Empire should be examined through a lens that accounts for the dynamics of imperial power and the hybridity of process identity common to colonized communities. Moreover, it is appropriate to consider temporal-spatial movement in the Persian Empire as it is reflected and developed through the material artifacts of the Aramaic missives in the Jedaniah collection, since a missive by nature is a temporally-delayed text sent between geographically separated communities. The result of this missive communication is an imperially-structured distal community discourse, which develops over time in a network of spatially removed community nodes and authorities. Tweed's analysis of space as differentiated, kinetic, interrelated, generated, and generative is used in this study as a productive means of analyzing these Aramaic letters as texts that actively construct the identity of this colonized group across space and time. In addition, analysis in light of process theory of identity and temporal-spatial theory will shed light on the challenges of this community's debated "Jewish" identity. As a conquered province within the Achaemenid empire, the population of Yev (‫,יב‬ that is, Elephantine), and its subgroups are an ancient context ripe with characteristics in common with modern day displaced and colonized communities. Having been dispossessed of their lands and political autonomy, the inhabitants of Yev exhibit the hybridity of their colonial identities through their intertwined relationships with the Persian authorities and one another. The missives central to this study, the Jedaniah letters (5 th c. BCE), are a fruitful source of data for the process of identity formation, since they themselves both record and advance an inter-group conflict on the island of Yev. 1 The letters in this collection originated over the course of at least twenty years on Elephantine Island, from 419 to post-407 BCE. The majority of them are addressed to or mention an individual named Jedaniah bar Gemariah, a leader in the community. 2 The content of the letters 1 This collection is composed of 10 documents, including copies of letters sent to Yev and letters received at Yev from other locations, referenced in The Textbook of Aramaic Documents as A4.1-A4.10 (Porten, Bezalel, and Yardeni, Ada, eds, Textbook of Aramaic Documents from Ancient Egypt (Magnes, 1986)). 2 P. Grelot, 'Études sur le 'Papyrus Pascal' d'Elephantine', Vetus Testamentum, 4 (1954), 349-384.

Elephantine papyri are letters (B23 to B42) dated in both the lunar calendar and the Egyptian civil calendar, so they provide absolute dates (Porten et al: 1996), assuming that the lunar calendar started at the new moon to be in line with conventional Babylonian chronology, but it doesn't work well (Stern: 2000). In fact, the Egyptian lunar calendar began with the full moon, which corresponds perfectly to the absolute dates of the Babylonian astronomical tablets. Abnormal intercalary years with respect to the Metonic cycle (A** and U**) are simply the result of the observation process.
Article available on achemenet.com
http://www.achemenet.com/fr/table/?/publications-en-ligne/nabu/tableau-des-notes/1/96

Inside:
-- How Egyptian cats shaped the modern cats we love today.

-- We meet the world's first cat with a name.

-- The Governors of Elephantine, and the new insights into life in Egypt's southern outpost.

-- A brand new feature: The Quiz! Put your Egyptology IQ to the test!

-- The Coffin of Ramesses II: who was the original owner, and how did Ramesses end up with it.

-- The Met's stunning new, golden acquisition.

-- The Noble Vulture: How did such an unappealing bird become the titular goddess of Upper Egypt?

-- The mission to turn Luxor into Egypt's first disability-friendly ancient heritage site.

-- Belzoni's discovery of the spectacular tomb of Seti I.

The purpose of this paper is to present new results concerning the ancient Egyptian 'river measure', called by them the iteru . It will include the appropriate placement of the iteru into the world views of these ancient people and their forbearers, revealing previously elusive understanding of the sacred geographical establishment of sites and how they played a expansive role in worship of the sun throughout empire and time. By returning to temple texts and contextualizing them with classic authors, contemporary beliefs and pre-dynastic inhabitants of the northeast African region we will be able to appreciate the overall connection and its import spanning millennia.

This important volume contains 175 documents from the Egyptian border fortresses of Elephantine and Syene (Aswan), which yielded hundreds of papyri in hieratic, Demotic, Aramaic, Greek, Latin, Arabic, and Coptic, spanning a period of 3,000 years. The documents include letters and legal contracts from family and other archives, and are thus an invaluable source of knowledge for scholars of varied disciplines, such as epistolography, law, society, religion, language, and onomastics. The volume includes seven sections, each containing carefully translated and extensively annotated documents of one language group. Excellent cross-referencing allows the user to trace forerunners and successors. Each section is preceded by an introduction; the Aramaic, Demotic, and Greek sections are concluded with a prosopography. The book closes with a select topical index.

Praise for the first edition
“This is a groundbreaking work, intensely focused in its conception, comprehensive in scope, a priceless resource for students of law, society, and history. I wish I had written it.”
— Joseph Mélèze-Modrzejewski, Professeur à la Sorbonne-Université de Paris-I and author of Droit et justice dans le monde grec et hellénistique (2011) and The Jews of Egypt (1997)

“This publication, unique in its conception, provides the English reader with a window into three thousand years of continuity and change in the archival documents of a major Ancient Near Eastern site. It is an essential resource for all those interested in the social, political, religious, legal, or linguistic history of Upper Egypt and those who lived in it and ruled it from earliest historical times up to the rise of Islam.”
— Stephen A. Kaufman, Professor of Bible and Cognate Literature, Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion, Cincinnati, Ohio; Editor-in-chief, the Comprehensive Aramaic Lexicon Project

Praise for the second revised edition
“There have been many books and articles about the ancient Jewish community of Elephantine in Egypt, first discovered more than a century and a half ago. But this book is unique: the only one to set that community within the sources for Elephantine and its environs over three millennia of Near Eastern history, from the Egyptian Old Kingdom to the early Islamic period. Porten’s book thus opens up Elephantine as a laboratory for studying long-term historical continuity and change in many dimensions. The challenge here is greatly enhanced by the meticulous presentation of the diverse textual sources for Elephantine, carried out by Porten and his associates; accompanying the careful translations are concise and yet comprehensive introductions to the texts and their historical contexts, detailed philological notes, and indices to the persons and topics mentioned. For the present new edition, the whole has been brought up to date, reconsidering issues of translation and historical background, and supplying missing textual elements. One can only congratulate Bezalel Porten for a major achievement: giving new life and accessibility to a volume that will remain an essential reference on Elephantine and much more in the ancient and classical history of the Near East.”
— Peter Machinist, Hancock Professor of Hebrew and Other Oriental Languages, Harvard University.

Like in almost every past and present society, feasting behaviour has had a considerable impact on the material world of Ancient Egypt. Festivals were important aspects within the Ancient Egyptian life cycle and affected all kinds of social strata. Numerous evidence attesting to the popularity of festivals and feasting has survived particularly from the New Kingdom.

Throughout history, the Seleucid military might demonstrated
many times its importance for the maintenance, expansion and defense of the Empire. Rarely the Seleucid army was defeated in a campaign and it happened in front of the almighty Rome. After the defeat at Thermopylae and Magnesia, and following the imminent withdrawal must conquer the Ptolemaic Empire, the new king Antiochus IV Epiphanes held a military parade as never been done before, its real purpose is unknown, but the Seleucids showed the world the power that still had the Empire. Through the stories of several classic sources, we can come closer to this event and what
it could entail.

Nanaya is a latecomer … she appears from nowhere to become the greatest Mesopotamian goddess of all times-greater than the Sumerian Ninhursaga, the highest lady of the Sumerian pantheon, more enduring than even the Semitic goddess par excellence, Ištar, who was worshipped from one end of the Near East to the other … Despite this fame, she remains a lady of mystery.

Introduction to a conference sponsored by the Austrian Science Fund, the Egypt Exploration Society and the Universit of Würzburg at 12th to 13th of June 2013 in London on Palaces in Ancient Egypt. This article gives a survey on the present research on this topic in Egypt.

This article aims at giving an overall view of the real and mythical topography of the Abaton of Biggeh, which housed a relic, the left leg of the God Osiris, in connection with the rituals. After a geographical and archaeological presentation, I will stress in particular the different species of trees growing on and around the Abaton. A new French translation will be provided, with commentary, of the Abaton Decree, in relation to the depictions on the Gate of Hadrian in the temple of Philae. A discussion of all the classical sources in chronological order will follow, in order to draw comparisons with the Egyptian sources. Lastly, the possible location and spatial organization of the Abaton in comparison with other sacred mounds will be addressed.

Review article of E. Edel, K.-J. Seyfried & G. Vieler, Die Felsgräbernekropole der Qubbet el-Hawa bei Assuan. I. Abteilung (Paderborn, 2008). Three major questions are addressed: 1. Does the new report contain information on all the tombs presently known? 2. Does it provide a complete and reliable epigraphic documentation of all the decorated tombs? 3. What is the quality of the archaeological and architectural documentation? Appended is a lengthy series of bibliographical notes, organized in six sections: Early explorers and excavators of the site; Work of the Bonn mission; General sources on the necropolis; Notes on specific tombs; Excavations undertaken since 1984; Coptic remains.

The article examines evidence for polytheism at Judaean Elephantine in southern Egypt during the Persian period. Employing anthropomorphism as a hermeneutical framework for exploring ancient deity concepts, analysis of the available material shows that the Judean community worshiped a small pantheon modeled on the royal patriarchal household. The polytheistic cult of Yahu at Elephantine likely had its roots in Iron Age Israel-Judah but also reflects a degree of acculturation to the Syrian-Aramaean cult of Bethel in Egypt.

“Papyrus Amherst 63 and the Arameans of Egypt: A Landscape of Cultural Nostalgia.” Pp. 323-51 in Elephantine in Context: Studies on the History, Religion and Literature of the Judeans in Persian Period Egypt, ed. R. G. Kratz and B.U. Schipper. Forschungen zum Alten Testament 155. Tübingen: Mohr Siebeck, 2022. The publisher does not currently allow posting on a website. If you would like a copy of the article, please ask the author.

The Achaemenid religious policy is discussed and the focus is in particular on the ‘Judaean garrison’ (חילא יהודיא) in Elephantine. Above all, it is discussed what the documents of the Jedaniah communal archive (A4.1-10) say about the involvement of Achaemenid officials in Judaean (religious) affairs, and how influential theories on the Achaemenid religious policy vis-à-vis the Judaeans should be assessed in light of the Jedaniah archive.

The present article analyses different epigraphic material from Elephantine for the reconstruction of the sequence of governors of the first nome of Upper Egypt during the reigns of Senwosret I and Amenemhat II. Detlef Franke, in a study of the local cult of Heqaib, established a line of succession from the reign of Senwosret I until the first third of the Thirtieth Dynasty. However, in this study
he did not discuss a graffito discovered by Labib Habachi in Elephantine four decades earlier. In that graffito, the high official Ameny is mentioned in connection with some important epithets and titles. Although his appointment to office was made by the king, he took care to legitimize his position vis-à-vis the previous ruling lineage, the local community and its gods.

Edition of an opistographic papyrus (Brooklyn 47.218.18) acquired by Ch. Wilbour. It is an unpublished letter of the end of the 3rd Millennium belonging to the palatial archives of Elephantine. On the recto, the address and some elements of the Memphite Formula introduce the body of the letter. A son writing to his father mentions the action sfḫ – "to release" – that Satis and Khnum accomplished in favour of the letter recipient. On the verso, rank titles, a greeting formula and probably the object of the missive are hastily recorded. The date and the style (the calligraphy, the palaeography and the use of metatextual marks), the phraseology (ex. ʿnḫ wd3 snb), the scribal culture (ex. from the Memphite Formula to the Kemyt) and the cultic landscape of Elephantine (mostly the epithet "lord of Elephantine" in this epoch) are the subject of an extended commentary.

The present paper gives an short overview on the history of Elephantine and Aswan in the extreme south of Egypt. A second part is devoted to some micro historical events as they represent themselves in the Demotic texts from the island. Both are intended as an introduction for students and scholars of Theology and Ancient History.

Despite the renewed attention for Persian period Elephantine, the focus of many publications is still on the history, identity, and religion of the Yehudite group in the Persian border garrison. This article displays the data on the other ethnic groups. Next to Persians, Egyptians, and Judeo-Arameans, some fifteen ethnic groups are referred to in the Aramaic and Demotic inscriptions. The analysis of the material leads to the conclusion that members of these other groups had various social roles in the local community: mercenaries, merchants, administrators, and slaves.

The Judean community at Elephantine has long fascinated historians of the Persian period. This book, with its stellar assemblage of important scholarly voices, provides substantive new insights and approaches that will advance the study of this well-known but not entirely understood community from fifth-century BCE Egypt.

The main aim of this paper is to analyse a well known inscription (today lost) dated to the end of the 5th Dynasty, which originally belonged to the tomb of a nobleman called Hnw. The fragmentary biography mentions two missions that Hnw carried out successfully. The first one was interpreted by Henry G. Fischer and Elmar Edel as an account of the transport of the granite columns from Aswan to the funerary temple of Unas in a very short period of time. However, the technical impossibilities of that achievement move us to think that in reality Hnw was referring the time that he needed to erect the columns. The second mission took Hnw to a quarry.

This is the module outline for the introduction to the Aramaic language in ancient Judaism, which explores the Aramaic in the Hebrew Bible, early Targums, and other Second Temple sources, including  Genesis Apocryphon. Emphasis in this course will be placed particularly on the role of Aramaic in early Judaean history, where the significance of the Elephantine papyrii will also be examined. In addition students will examine the complex relationship between text, translation, and commentary in pre-rabbinic sources. The module is a compulsory for trainee rabbinic students at Leo Baeck College, London, prior to entrance into the second year and the study of Babylonian (Talmudic) Aramaic.

Ouvrage disponible en libre accès sur la page de l'éditeur : https://books.openedition.org/momeditions/193

En Égypte ancienne, la mort semble être une préoccupation constante. Pour affronter cette étape tant redoutée, le dogme prévoit une existence dans l'au-delà, mais celle-ci demeure conditionnée au maintien de la mémoire des individus parmi les vivants. Chaque personne va donc tenter, en fonction de son statut et de ses capacités, de développer certaines stratégies pour rendre son propre culte éternel et garantir ainsi son immortalité.
Cette étude, fondée principalement sur l'analyse des pratiques post-inhumatoires, souhaite mettre en évidence les différents leviers qui sont utilisés en vue de pérenniser les cultes mémoriels : le choix du lieu, celui des supports et enfin – peut-être surtout – l'intégration à de multiples matrices sociales complémentaires. Car le maintien de la mémoire est avant tout affaire de société. L'individu, pour exister, se doit d'interagir avec la communauté, qu'il soit vivant ou bien mort.

Introduction

One of the topics mentioned in classical texts is the narration of a decree that Darius I sent to Carthage and asked the Carthaginians to give up some of their traditions and rituals (Justinus, Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus, 19. 1). From the second half of the 7th century BC, the grounds for conflict between the Greeks and the Carthaginians became more prepared (Ameling 2011: 42). The reason for the formation of these conflicts was the beginning of the Greek attempts to expand their influence in western Sicily and near the Phoenician settlements. Military conflicts between the Greeks and the Phoenicians opened the door of Carthage to the Sicilian wars. Carthage soon took control of Sicily's Phoenician settlers and entered into military conflicts on the island. It was under such circumstances that Darius's envoys came to Carthage and took the order of the Achaemenid emperor with them. Description of this command from Trogus (1st century BC) has been quoted by Justinus (the historian of 2nd and 3rd centuries AD):

During the course of these transactions, ambassadors came to Carthage from Darius king of Persia, bringing an edict, by which the Carthaginians were forbidden to offer human sacrifices, and to eat dog's flesh, and were commanded to burn the bodies of the dead rather than bury them in the earth; and requesting, at the same time, assistance against Greece, on which Darius was about to make war. The Carthaginians declined giving him aid, on account of their continual wars with their neighbours, but, that they might not appear uncompliant in everything, willingly submitted to the decree.  (Justinus, Epitome of the Philippic History of Pompeius Trogus 19. 1)

The main question is why and in which historical context this decree was issued?

Evidence of human sacrifice and eating dog meat in Carthage

In a narration from Theophrastus, there is information about human sacrifice ceremonies in Carthage (Hughes 1991: 116 cited from Theophrastus 13. 22-6 ). There is another narration from Cleitarchus, speaks about burning children as human sacrifice in Carthage (Mosca 1975: 22). In a part of the book of Levicitus, Yahweh asks Moses to tell to the Israelites not to pass their children through the fire for a god called Molech (Levicitus 18. 21). In 1921, intact evidence of a Phoenician temple in Salammbȏ, near the northern port of Tunis, was first identified. On one of the stelae obtained from the Tanit Temple in Salammbȏ, there is a relief that shows picture of a person holding a naked child and wearing a thin dress. This relief has been dated to 7th-4th centuries BC that is almost contemporary with the Achaemenid period. In the early horizon of the Tanit Temple, the remains of jars containing ashes have been found, inside which a number of deciduous teeth have been reported (MacKendrick 1980: 8).

There is also important evidence of eating dog meat in Carthage. We know from historical accounts that this tradition has been practiced since ancient times among the Berber peoples from Egypt to North Africa and even the Canary Islands (Simoons, 1994: 227).

Such traditions was not acceptable for Iranian peoples. We do not have meaningful evidence about human sacrifice and eating dog meat from Achaemenid sites. But we know, similar traditions has been continued in non-central Achaemenid territory. So why the Achaemenid king forbade the Carthaginians from this traditions?

Conclusion

Darius sent the decree to the people of Carthage around 491 BC and before the Battle of Marathon. It seems, he wanted to conspire with the Carthaginians against the Greeks. The Carthaginians spent all their money on the conflict with the Greeks and got into trouble. Under such circumstances, Carthage naturally needed a military and political supporter, and that supporter could be the Achaemenid Empire. Darius's military support of the Carthaginians and Phoenicians against the Greek immigrants probably must have been accompanied by sending troops to Carthage and Sicily. Military forces, most of whom were Iranians and Persians, and traditions such as human sacrifice and eating dog meat, were unfamiliar and unacceptable to them. The continuation of these religious traditions in the midst of the Sicilian wars could cause religious conflict between the Iranians and the Carthaginians. According to the papyri of Elephantine, we know that the Achaemenid Empire was interfering in religious issues just for preventing a conflict between two groups of people and Darius's order to the Carthaginians can be considered as a strategy to prevent a religious conflict between the Iranians and the allied Carthaginians.

در روایتی از تروگ پمپه‌ای، به فرمانی از داریوش اول خطاب به مردم کارتاژ اشاره شده است. فرمانی که داریوش در آن، کارتاژی‌ها را از قربانی کردن انسان و خوردن گوشت سگ منع کرده و از آن‌ها خواسته تا مردگانشان را بجای دفن کردن در زمین، بسوزانند. شواهد باستان‌شناختی نشان می‌دهد، در میان جامعۀ کارتاژ، قربانی انسانی و خوردن گوشت سگ، از سنت‌های کهن محسوب می‌شد. اما چرا داریوش، کارتاژی‌ها را از اجرای آن‌ها منع کرده بود و فرمان او در کدام بستر تاریخی صادر شده بود؟ برای پاسخگویی به این پرسش، مقایسۀ روایت‌های تاریخی با شواهد باستان‌شناختی، امری ضروری است. بر اساس شواهدی همچون پاپیروس‌های الفانتین، هخامنشیان تنها در صورتی در امور مذهبی سرزمین‌های تحت سلطه دخالت می‌کردند که در یک سرزمین، اجرای یک سنت مذهبی از سوی یک قوم، با باورهای مذهبی قوم دیگر در تناقض بود و این تناقض به منازعات مذهبی می‌انجامید. فرمان داریوش، در آستانۀ وقوع نبرد ماراتن صادر شده بود. همزمان، کارتاژی‌ها نیز درگیر یک نبرد سرنوشت‌ساز با یونانی‌ها برای تسلط بر جزیرۀ سیسیل بودند. داریوش می‌توانست با ارسال کمک و نیروهای نظامی به کارتاژ، همزمان با مغلوب ساختن یونانیان در جبهۀ آتن، آنها را در سیسیل نیز دچار مشکل کند. بخش عمدۀ نیروهای اعزامی داریوش، احتمالاً ایرانیان بودند و قربانی انسانی و تغذیه از گوشت سگ برایشان مأنوس و پذیرفتنی نبود. طبق فرضیۀ این مقاله، صدور فرمان مذهبی داریوش به مردم کارتاژ، احتمالاً برای جلوگیری از وقوع درگیری‌های مذهبی میان ایرانیان و کارتاژی‌ها در آستانۀ یک نبرد مهم با یونانیان صورت گرفته است.

“Documents of Wifehood” from Elephantine contain a stipulation in which either the husband or wife can stand up in an assembly and say שׂנאת , after which they follow the stipulations laid out in the contract. This verb שׂנאת in the context of these contracts is a performative utterance, which is demonstrated by the act of speaking it in front of an assembly and by the verb’s suffix-conjugation form. The purpose of this paper is to
demonstrate the existence of a performative perfect in Aramaic as a function of the suffix-form and to establish the legal meaning of שׂנא in Aramaic as “divorce”. This paper argues that שׂנא cannot mean “demotion”, as has been previously argued.

In the last six years, a multidisciplinary team has been working in the funerary complexes of the second half of the Twelfth Dynasty in Qubbet el-Hawa. In the present article we will focus on the results obtained from the archaeological work in the funerary complex catalogued as QH33. The preliminary results show that the governor of Elephantine Heqaib III, who died before the end of the works, originally constructed QH33. His brother and successor Ameny-Seneb decided to bury him in a -by then- completed area of the funerary complex. Although our archaeological research is not yet finished - we are still excavating the main shaft and its associated chambers- we can suggest that Ameny-Seneb finished the construction work in the main burial area and he and his closest relatives occupied the subterranean chambers of the main shaft, originally destined for Heqaib III and his family.

[This article investigates the role that mercenaries could have played in disseminating cultural elements from the Near East (especially Egypt) to Greece. The topic has previously been pursued by scholars but only from a theoretical perspective. This article uses the Judean mercenary community at Elephantine as a test case to explore the potential contributions that similar Greek communities at Daphnae, Memphis, etc. could have played for Greeks. Furthermore, this article traces the diffusion of a literary structure throughout the East Mediterranean with a conclusion of its significance for the community at Elephantine.]