BABYLON: THE MOTHER OF ALL CITIES
Schedule
Mon, 13 Jul, 2026 at 11:00 am to Fri, 17 Jul, 2026 at 05:15 pm
UTC+01:00Location
University College London, Gower Street, WC1E 6BT London, United Kingdom | London, EN
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Monday 13 to Friday 17 July (in person, livestreamed, and video recorded)with Dr Irving Finkel (British Museum) and Prof. Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones (Cardiff University)
This is a 5-day course to be held in person, livestreamed, and will also be available on video recording afterwards.
Sometimes a single word conceals an entire conceptual universe. ‘Babylon’ is such a word. It has a double life, denoting the great ancient Mesopotamian city with a long and complex history and a fictive allusion with numerous connotations, from the Hebrew bible’s Tower of Babel through to ‘Babylon Berlin’, the name given to the hotbed of decadence that was 1920s Weimar Germany. Situated along the Euphrates in modern-day Iraq, the city of Babylon set the agenda for what it meant to be an urban civilisation. King Hammurabi provided its law code, while scribes copied out the legendry exploits of Gilgamesh, the story of the Great Flood, and the creation of the world. In his towering ziggurat, the god Marduk was worshipped by the mighty monarch Nebuchadnezzar and a powerful cohort of priests and nobles. Babylon is both history and myth; real and imagined. This absorbing and entertaining course, taught by two very popular and renowned experts of the Ancient Near East, explores the city’s dual legacy: its rich ancient past and its astonishing mythic legacy. What emerges is a fresh and exciting exploration of the world’s first and most illustrious metropolis — Babylon: The mother of all cities.
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Where is it happening?
University College London, Gower Street, WC1E 6BT London, United Kingdom, 8 Gower Street, London, WC1E 6DP, United KingdomEvent Location & Nearby Stays:
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