The Melammu Project: The Intellectual Heritage of Assyria and Babylonia in East and West

"The Assyrian and Babylonian Intellectual Heritage Project (Melammu) investigates the continuity, transformation and diffusion of Mesopotamian culture throughout the ancient world from the second millennium BC until Islamic times. A central objective of the project is to create an electronic database collecting the relevant textual, art-historical, archaeological, ethnographic and linguistic evidence and making it easily accessible on the Internet. In addition, the project organizes annual symposia focusing on different aspects of cultural continuity and evolution in the ancient world. Each symposium of the Melammu Project has a central theme, selected by the members of the Project at the previous symposium. The purpose of the Melammu Symposia is to promote interdisciplinary research and cross-cultural studies by providing a forum in which cultural continuity, diffusion and transformation in the ancient world can be assessed systematically on a long-term basis. The emphasis is on continued interchange of ideas between specialists in different disciplines, with the goal of gradually but steadily increasing the number of participants and thus breaking down the walls separating the individual disciplines. Although each symposium focuses on a different theme, since the primary purpose of the symposia is to encourage interdisciplinary cooperation per se, papers not necessarily related to a specific theme but contributing to the overall scope of the project are welcome at every meeting. This website houses the International Database of the Melammu Project."