Dr. Irving Finkel, assistant keeper of ancient Mesopotamian Script at the British Museum, will discuss how the near-universal belief in ghosts goes back to the beginning of time; and reveal how the oldest known writing, in cuneiform script on tablets of day, gives us a full picture of the ancient Mesopotamian ghost experience: who might be expected to be a ghost, how to keep the dead happy in the Netherworld, how to banish annoying ghosts that keep appearing and how to summon the dead to come back and disclose the future.
Dr. Irving Finkel, assistant keeper of ancient Mesopotamian Script at the British Museum, will discuss how the near-universal belief in ghosts goes back to the beginning of time; and reveal how the oldest known writing, in cuneiform script on tablets of day, gives us a full picture of the ancient Mesopotamian ghost experience: who might be expected to be a ghost, how to keep the dead happy in the Netherworld, how to banish annoying ghosts that keep appearing and how to summon the dead to come back and disclose the future.
Dr. Irving Finkel, assistant keeper of ancient Mesopotamian Script at the British Museum, will discuss how the near-universal belief in ghosts goes back to the beginning of time; and reveal how the oldest known writing, in cuneiform script on tablets of day, gives us a full picture of the ancient Mesopotamian ghost experience: who might be expected to be a ghost, how to keep the dead happy in the Netherworld, how to banish annoying ghosts that keep appearing and how to summon the dead to come back and disclose the future.