Paper short abstract:

In this paper I will analyse the geo-political evolution of the Persian Gulf coast and the impact this had on ancient Mesopotamian mythology, in particular how the sea and seascape from the main scenarios of the oldest Sumerian literature became a marginal and marginalizing element in later cosmological thought.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper I will analyse the geo-political evolution of the Persian Gulf coast and the impact this had on ancient Mesopotamian mythological thought. In the "Land between the two rivers", the crucial role of watercourses caused the gradual displacement of sea to a marginal and marginalizing function. The earlier state formations of the IIIrd millennium BCE had risen on the shores of the sea, and the Sumerian city-states were part of a network of intense cultural and commercial exchange that connected the cultures of the Persian Gulf with those of the Indian Ocean and, most probably, with those of the East Africa coast as well. Later on, the crisis that hit the region and the shift of power towards the territories of the north condemned this area to abandonment. The neglect of canal systems in Sumer caused the formation of marshes that hindered direct access to the sea. All this process of transformation finds an echo in the mythical and cosmological thought. The lagoon, the sea, and overseas lands (Dilmun) are the main scenarios of the oldest Sumerian literature, whereas in later composition this waterscape is marginal, if not absent. If the sea had been a key means of communication, it now becomes a limit. The expression “from the Lower Sea to the Upper Sea”, in fact, is used by the Mesopotamian rulers to refer to the borders of the known world. The hendiadys marks two geographical limits, the Persian Gulf, on the one hand, and the Mediterranean sea or the lake of Van, on the other. In the cosmological view the world is encircled by a sea or better a river of "bitter waters". Therefore, the sea is not anymore at the center of the political and mythological geography, but at its margins.

Paper short abstract:

From the period of the Dark Ages to the 4th century BC the Eastern Adriatic was quite an unexplored area for the Greeks. That fact can be perceived from archaeological records and from written sources. Some elements of the Greek mythology may reflect an ancient perception about the Adriatic world.

Paper long abstract:

In the Prometheus Bound (837) The Great Gulf of Rhea (ἡ μέγας κόλπος Ῥέας) is mentioned as an old name of the Ionian Sea. According to the ancient commentators Hesychius of Alexandria and Photios of Constantinople, Rhea's Great Gulf implied both Ionian and the Adriatic seas. A similar mythological name appears in the Argonautica of the Alexandrian poet Apollonius of Rhodes. He uses the name The Cronian Sea (ἡ Κρονίη ἅλς) for the Adriatic (IV, 327; 509; 548).

These specific names - The Great Gulf of Rhea and The Cronian Sea - belong to the old mythical geography, according to which the divine couple lived far in the west. Ancient authors wrote that Cronus was ruling in the west over the Isles of the Blessed where souls of noble deceased were spending their eternity (Hes. Op. 109f; Pind. Ol. II, 77).

From the perspective of the Dark Ages and the Early Colonization Period, the Adriatic might have been regarded as the northern edge of the world, and the Greeks considered it a part of the Ocean that circulates around the globe. Later, when geographical and spatial knowledge expanded, the Isles of the Blessed were relocated further west, to Britain, or to the shores of the Northern Ocean (Plin. NH. IV, 95; 104; Plut. De. Def. Orac. 420a). This paper raises questions about early Greek perception of the Adriatic and about the centuries long absence of a more significant foreign influence on the eastern Adriatic coast.

Paper short abstract:

In Mesopotamian literature, the primeval ocean represented, simultaneously, the force from which life, and therefore time, came to be and the chaotic state which preceded the ordained world. Thus, I intend to explore the role of the primeval ocean as a maker and marker of time.

Paper long abstract:

In the opening lines of the epic of creation, enūma eliš, the reader is transported into a time where the world did not exist and life was yet to be created. In this chaotic atmosphere the only element present was the primeval ocean, composed of two intertwined and complementary parts: Apsû and Tiāmat. Before they begot the generations of gods that would follow, the two forces coexisted in a state of inactivity. If, at this moment, the world was not yet created and therefore time was not flowing, what did the ocean represented in the temporal conception of the Mesopotamian man? Or, in other words, what was the notion of time in this pre-world phase characterized by the primordial couple? We seem to be confronted with an idea of a time before Time, which we will try to explore in this communication. When does it all start? Is there a clear beginning?

Likewise, a similar dilemma is presented: was there a notion of and end? And, if so, how was it represented in Mesopotamian literature? What was the role played by the Sumerian story of the diluvium that so clearly announced the possibility of a return to the chaotic state where the world was once submerged?

In sum, with this presentation I intend to explore the different conceptions of time having in consideration the role played by the primeval ocean in the structure of the universe and in the construction of the ordained world.

Paper short abstract:

Several cosmological narratives in the ancient world present creation as the separation of dry land from a primeval watery chaos. In antiquity tsunamis were represented in cosmological terms as a conflict between two cosmic elements, the Earth and the Waters, and as a relapse into primeval chaos

Paper long abstract:

Tsunamis had a huge impact upon symbolic systems in ancient Mediterranean societies. It is possible to identify a model with which the tsunami was represented and managed in cosmological terms throughout the ancient world and specifically in the Biblical and Classical traditions. In my paper I will try to show that the tsunami was understood within a cosmological model characterized by the idea that since creation the universe was governed by the harmony between the cosmic elements, and specifically governed by the harmony between the Earth and the Waters. This equilibrium finds its focal point in the space of the seashore, perceived as a cosmic boundary between the Sea and the Earth. But in this cosmological model the equilibrium between the elements is thought of as essentially unstable: the relationship between the Sea and the Earth is conceived as full of underlying tension, so the threat of a conflict is always present. In cosmological terms the tsunami is then understood as a breakdown of the harmony between the elements and consequently as a product of the discord between them, as a case of 'discordia elementorum'. Once triggered, the tsunami is perceived as a transgression of the cosmic boundaries established during creation, and as a relapse into primeval chaos. This way of understanding the tsunami provided a framework to manage religious and apotropaic responses against the threat of an invasion of the sea that can be identified in different scenarios of the ancient world

Paper short abstract:

This paper traces several classical motifs and their reception in an age of overseas expansion—the Underworld, a southern Paradise, Ulysses, Jason and the Argonauts, sea monsters, Cyclops, a Great Outer Sea and the Eternal Return—revealing continuities between Antiquity and the seafaring Portuguese.

Paper long abstract:

Like Jason, Henry the Navigator is renown for sending his seafarers to the end of the world and making the promise of return a reality. Nicknamed "Captain of the End", Dias' voyage was also likened to the Argo's descent into the Underworld, a world of initiation, and his treacherous passage from Tormentoso to Esperança seen as a transition from suffering to salvation. There could be no Cape of Good Hope without a Cape of Storms, no Paradise without a Purgatory.

It was Dante who invoked this motif by placing his Paradiso on a mountain above a watery transit. Centuries earlier, sailing under the southern stars, Ulysses encountered "a mountain obscured by distance and of a height never seen before". This inspired Camões' mythopoetic one-eyed Adamastor to challenge Gama on entering Cape waters. Their confrontation serves as a metaphor for the struggle between modern man and the classical gods.

Inspired by the gods, Nearchus of Crete, Alexander's admiral, believed his ships had found the Great Outer Sea in the East. Two millennia later, Viceroy D'Almeida compares himself to Nearchus and sets out to fulfill Alexander's dream of rounding Africa to expand an empire on new-found shores. In turn, his successor Albuquerque becomes "Caesar of the East". These examples echo Virgil's description of how "the great line of centuries begins anew as a second Argo carries its chosen heroes to another war, to another shore". It's not only history that repeats itself but we who do. We return to fight another day.

Paper Download (3.1 MB)

Paper short abstract:

Drawing on the accounts of early modern explorers, naturalists, and cartographers, this paper examines European and Native American coastal mythologies, revealing that as geographic knowledge changed so too did human networks across the Atlantic world.

Paper long abstract:

This paper examines the environmental history and cultural geography of the North Atlantic shore during the Age of Exploration. How, it asks, did early modern coastal imaginaries shape the contours of cultural contact and exchange among Native Americans and Europeans? And how did those imaginaries shape the ways both groups interacted with coastal spaces in more material ways? Imagined geographies such as the Northwest Passage, Norumbega, Hy Brasil, the Isle of Demons, and Antillia, as well as numerous Native American land and waterscape mythologies provide deep insight into the ways humans understood the natural world. But as geographic knowledge changed, so too did the human understanding of and interaction with coastal and oceanic nature.

A closer look at these imaginary landscapes and their tendency to migrate across European maps, moreover, serves to blur the boundaries between contemporary imperial spheres of influence, thereby adding fresh perspective to the "spatial turn" in early American history. Ultimately, this careful consideration of the Atlantic littoral adds to the burgeoning field of "thalassography," which acknowledges the existence of many seas nested within the Atlantic world. Drawing on the accounts of early modern explorers, naturalists, and cartographers, this interdisciplinary look at how culture, ecology, geography, and mythology became firmly entangled alongshore reveals that the material and conceptual complexities inherent in coastal spaces played a powerful role in creating new human networks and identities.