'I Undertook Great Works' - The Ideology of Domestic Achievements in West Semitic Royal Inscriptions

Traditionally, scholars study ancient Near Eastern royal inscriptions to reconstruct the events they narrate. In recent decades, however, a new approach has analyzed these inscriptions as products of royal ideology and has delineated the way that ideology has shaped their narration of historical events. This ideologically-sensitive approach has focused on kings' accounts of their military campaigns. This study applies this approach to the narration of royal domestic achievements, first in the Neo-Assyrian inscriptional tradition, but especially in nine West Semitic inscriptions from the 10th to 7th centuries B.C.E. and describes how these accounts also function as the products of royal ideology.

Born 1953; 1978-82 Lawyer in Sydney; 1985 MDiv (Westminster Theological Seminary, Philadelphia); 2003 PhD (Yale University); since 1992 has taught Old Testament at Westminster Theological Seminary; since 2005 Professor of Old Testament.