Amélie Kuhrt

Amélie Kuhrt FBA (23 September 1944 – 2 January 2023) was a British historian and specialist in the history of the ancient Near East.

Amélie Kuhrt FBA
Born	(1944-09-23)23 September 1944
Died	2 January 2023(2023-01-02) (aged 78)
Academic background
Alma mater	Somerville College, Oxford King's College, London
Academic work
Discipline	History
Sub-discipline	Ancient Near East
Institutions	King's College London University College London SOAS

Kuhrt was educated at King's College London, University College London and SOAS.

Professor Emerita at University College London, she specialised in the social, cultural and political history of the region from c. 3000–100 BC, especially the Assyrian, Babylonian, Persian and Seleucid empires.^[1]

Kuhrt died on 2 January 2023, at the age of 78.^[2]

Achaemenid History Workshops

Kuhrt was co-organiser of the Groningen-based Achaemenid History Workshops with Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenberg from 1983 to 1990.^[3] These workshops were noted for their "multidisciplinary approach... [which] saved Achaemenid history from being viewed from a Hellenocentric stance" and inspired other thematically focused scholarly activities in the 1980s and 1990s.^[4]:522–23 Proceedings from Achaemenid History Workshops were published in eight volumes (Achaemenid History: I-VIII, 1987–94).^[5]

Awards and honours

In 1997, Kuhrt's book The Ancient Near East : c.3000-330 BC was awarded the annual American History Association's James Henry Breasted Prize for the best book in English on any field of history prior to the year 1000 AD:^[6] the committee noted "enormous breadth and depth of Amelie Kuhrt’s work, her ability to elucidate even the most confused periods and deftly to incorporate both source problems and scholarly disagreements in her text, and her lucid prose make this volume a pleasure to read... she has expanded the parameters of the field of world history."^[7]

Kuhrt was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2001.^[8] She was a member of the British Academy's Projects Committee, which is responsible for assessing the scope for new projects and initiatives sponsored by the Academy.^[9] Kuhrt was elected to Honorary Membership of the American Oriental Society in 2009.^[10]

Publications

Selected books

• The Persian Empire: A Corpus of Sources of the Achaemenid Period. London: Routledge, 2007. ISBN 0-415-43628-1
• The Ancient Near East : c.3000-330 BC. London : Routledge, 1995. ISBN 0-415-01353-4 (v.1), ISBN 0-415-12872-2 (v.2)
• Images of Women in Antiquity. With Averil Cameron. London : Routledge, 1993. ISBN 0-415-09095-4

Selected articles

• "Ancient Near Eastern History: The Case of Cyrus the Great of Persia", in Hugh G. M. Williamson (ed), Understanding the History of Ancient Israel. Oxford University Press. 2007. ISBN 0-19-726401-8, pp. 107–127
• "Cyrus the Great of Persia: Images and Realities", in M. Heinz & M. H. Feldman (eds), Representations of Political Power: Case Histories from Times of Change and Dissolving Order in the Ancient Near East, pp. 174–175. Eisenbrauns, 2007. ISBN 1-57506-135-X
• "The Problem of Achaemenid Religious Policy", in B. Groneberg & H. Spieckermann (eds.), Die Welt der Gotterbilder, Walter de Gruyter, 2007, pp. 117–142
• "Sennacherib's Siege of Jerusalem", in A.K. Bowman et al. (eds) Representations of Empire: Rome and the Mediterranean World. Oxford University Press. 2004. ISBN 0-19-726276-7 pp. 13 – 33.
• "The Achaemenid Persian empire (c. 550-c. 330 BCE): continuities, adaptations, transformations", in S.E. Alcock et al. (eds.), Empires: perspectives from archaeology and history. Cambridge University Press. 2001, pp. 93–123
• "Women and War", Journal of Gender Studies in Antiquity 2 (1) (2001) 1 - 25
• "The Persian Kings and their subjects: A unique relationship?", Orientalistische Literaturzeitung, vol. 96 no. 2 (2001), pp. 165–172
• "Israelite and Near Eastern historiography," in A. Lemaire & M. Saebo (eds), Vetus Testamentum Supplementum 80 (2000), pp. 257–279
• "Usurpation, conquest and ceremonial: From Babylon to Persia", in D. Cannadine, S. Price (eds), Rituals of Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies, Cambridge University Press, 1992, pp. 20–55
• "Babylonia from Cyrus to Xerxes", in John Boardman (ed), The Cambridge Ancient History: Vol IV - Persia, Greece and the Western Mediterranean. Cambridge University Press, 1982. ISBN 0-521-22804-2 p. 124
• "The Cyrus Cylinder and Achaemenid imperial policy", Journal of Studies of the Old Testament 25 (1983), pp. 83–97

References

1. . 20 April 2015. Archived from the original on 20 April 2015. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
2. "Professor Amélie Kuhrt, FBA (23 September 1944 – 2 January 2023)". UCL. 20 February 2023. Retrieved 27 October 2023.
3. "SANCISI-WEERDENBURG, HELEEN". Encyclopedia Iranica.
4. Imanpour, Mohammad-Taqi (2015). "Re-establishment of Achaemenid History and its Development in the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries". Iranian Studies. 48 (4): 515–530. doi:10.1080/00210862.2014.881083. ISSN 0021-0862. JSTOR 24483139. S2CID 162809562.
5. Continuity and change : proceedings of the last Achaemenid History Workshop, April 6-8, 1990, Ann Arbor, Michigan. Heleen Sancisi-Weerdenburg, Amelie Kuhrt, Margaret Cool Root, Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten. 1994. ISBN 90-6258-408-X. OCLC 32931799.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
6. "AHA Award Recipients - James Henry Breasted Prize". American History Association. Accessed 2008-11-11.
7. . American Historical Association. Archived from the original on 17 March 2017.
8. "Professor Amelie Kuhrt FBA". The British Academy. Retrieved 23 January 2023.
9. "Research programmes". British Academy. Accessed 2008-11-11.
10. "Honorary Membership - American Oriental Society". www.aos-site.org. Retrieved 23 January 2023.