Spring 2019
Please join us for the following lecture on April 8 at 4pm in Woodburn Hall 109.
Prof. Dan Potts, Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology and History, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World (New York University)
Topic: "A walk with the water buffalo: Zoological peregrinations from the Indus Valley to Mesopotamia"
Since the first proper excavations of archaeological sites belonging to the Harappan civilization in South Asia during the early 20th century, generations of scholars have discussed the evidence for contact between the Indus Valley and southern Mesopotamia during the late 3rd millennium BC. This talk focuses on one piece of evidence that was identified by 19th century zoologists and their 20th century successors as a feature in need of explanation, namely, the presence of the water buffalo, commonly thought to have originated in South Asia, in what is today southern Iraq. This problem will be examined using a wide range of zoological, archaeological, historical and art historical data, spanning over six millennia, with some surprising results.
The College of Arts