The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Iran

ICJ-Online, a service of The Classical Journal The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Iran commendably achieves its goal of providing an authoritative, up-to-date, multidisciplinary overview of this region for all periods up to the Islamic conquest, thanks in large part to the meticulous oversight of its editor D. T. Potts. ... This is a volume in which experts in history, archaeology, numismatics, linguistics, and other fields have been brought together to give a rich, multifaceted picture. ... The volume is sweeping, ambitious, and exemplary. Classicists will find within these thousand pages many nuggets of scholarly gold.

Steve Renette, BiOr no. LXXI 3/4
The Oxford Handbook of Ancient Iran at last provides a comprehensive overview and bibliography of the archaeology of pre-Islamic Iran. Potts has done a remarkable job bringing together scholars from every country that has played an important role in the archaeology of Iran. This book will certainly become the first source to turn to when embarking on a study on aspects of ancient Iran.

<strong>D. T. Potts</strong> is Professor of Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology and History at the Institute for the Study of the Ancient World, New York University.

Contributors Acknowledgements List of abbreviations Introduction Part I. Background and beginnings 1. The history of archaeological research in Iran: A brief survey Ali Mousavi 2. Key questions regarding the palaeoenvironment of Iran Matthew D. Jones 3. The Paleolithic of Iran Nicholas J. Conard, Elham Ghasidian and Saman Heydari-Guran 4. The development and expansion of a Neolithic way of life Lloyd R. Weeks Part II. The Chalcolithic period 5. The Chalcolithic of northern Iran Barbara Helwing 6. The Chalcolithic in the central Zagros Abbas Moghaddam and Ardashir Javanmardzadeh 7. The Later Village (Chalcolithic) period in Khuzestan Abbas Moghaddam 8. The Chalcolithic in southern Iran Cameron A. Petrie Part III. The Bronze Age 9. The Early Bronze Age in northwestern Iran Geoffrey D. Summers 10. The Bronze Age in northeastern Iran Christopher P. Thornton 11. Luristan and the central Zagros in the Bronze Age D. T. Potts 12. Khuzestan in the Bronze Age Javier Alvarez-Mon 13. Early writing in Iran J.L. Dahl 14. The use of Akkadian in Iran Katrien De Graef 15. Bronze Age Fars Bernadette McCall 16. Eastern Iran in the Early Bronze Age Holly Pittman Part IV. The Iron Age 17. The Late Bronze and Early Iron Age in northwestern Iran Michael D. Danti 18. Luristan during the Iron Age Bruno Overlaet 19. The central Alborz region in the Iron Age Ali Mousavi 20. Linguistic groups in Iran Ran Zadok 21. Iranian migration M. Witzel 22. Assyria and the Medes Karen Radner 23. Elam in the Iron Age Javier Alvarez-Mon 24. Elam, Assyria, and Babylonia in the early 1st millennium BC Matt Waters 25. Iron Age southeastern Iran Peter Magee Part V. The Achaemenid period 26. Southwestern Iran in the Achaemenid period Remy Boucharlat 27. Administrative realities: The Persepolis Archives and the archaeology of the Achaemenid heartland Wouter F.M. Henkelman 28. Avesta and Zoroastrianism under the Achaemenids and early Sasanians P.O. Skjaervo 29. Royal Achaemenid iconography Mark B. Garrison 30. Color and gilding in Achaemenid architecture and sculpture Alexander Nagel 31. Eastern Iran in the Achaemenid period Bruno Genito 32. Old Persian Jan Tavernier 33. Greek sources on Achaemenid Iran Maria Brosius VI. Seleucid, post-Achaemenid and Arsacid archaeology and history 34. Alexander the Great and the Seleucids in Iran Paul Kosmin 35. Media, Khuzestan and Fars between the end of the Achaemenids and the rise of the Sasanians Pierfrancesco Callieri and Alireza Askari Chaverdi 36. Fratarak? and Seleucids Josef Wiesehoefer 37. The Arsacids (Parthians) Stefan R. Hauser 38. Parthian and Elymaean rock reliefs Trudy S. Kawami 39. Arsacid, Elymaean and Persid coinage Khodadad Rezakhani 40. Aramaic, Parthian and Middle Persian Seiro Haruta 41. The use of Greek in pre-Sasanian Iran Georges Rougemont VII. The Sasanian period 42. Sasanian political ideology M. Rahim Shayegan 43. Sasanian coinage Nikolaus Schindel 44. Sasanian interactions with Rome and Byzantium P. Edwell 45. Sasanian rock reliefs Matthew P. Canepa 46. Kuh-e Khwaja and the religious architecture of Sasanian Iran Soroor Ghanimati 47. Sasanian administation and sealing practices Negin Miri 48. Luxury silver vessels of the Sasanian period Kate Masia-Radford 49. Sasanian textiles Carol Bier 50. Pre-Islamic Iranian calendrical systems in the context of Iranian religious and scientific history Antonio Panaino 51. The Islamic conquest of Sasanian Iran Michael Morony