In this chapter some of this evidence will be considered in order to present a modest overview of the social position and intellectual processes of knowledge acquisition and inquiry during the first phase of Mesopotamian history and to address preliminarily some of the many questions that can be asked about scholarship and inquiry in early Mesopotamia. Since these texts provide ample evidence that scholarship occupied a central place in Mesopotamian culture and society during the period in question, examining their content is essential to reconstructing what can be known about scientific knowledge and practice in the ancient world. Thousands of texts documenting the activities of scribes and scholars that shed light on the social context of scholarship and scientific inquiry survive from the first half of Mesopotamian history (c. The chapter as a whole draws on recent research into social space and mental maps, and on Hayden White's concept of 'emplotment' in history. Whereas patriotic Greeks appropriated and subverted the terms of imperial discourse, the Achaemenids themselves adopted a two-pronged approach: a continued emphasis on the sea in the imperial heartlands, and a new focus on continental boundaries in the northwestern theatre. In a final section, the article investigates how Greeks and Persians responded to Xerxes' defeat. It then considers more specifically some of the ways in which Darius and Xerxes staged a conquest of the sea through symbolic gestures, building projects, and military campaigns. It starts by tracing the ancient Near Eastern tradition whereby successive rulers had to prove themselves by conquering the sea, from mythical kings such as Gilgameš and Sargon of Akkad down to Cyrus the Great and his successors. This article looks at the conquest of the sea as a way of projecting world rule during the Achaemenid period.
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