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History of the Mediterranean in the Ancient World

Code: 100389 ECTS Credits: 6
2024/2025
Degree Type Year
2500501 History OT 4

Contact

Name:
Jordi Cortadella Morral
Email:
jordi.cortadella@uab.cat

Teaching groups languages

You can view this information at the end of this document.


Prerequisites

Basic knowledge (introductory) in Ancient History of the Near East, Greece and Rome


Objectives and Contextualisation

The aim of the subject is to analyze the main social and political structures of Mediterranean civilizations during Antiquity. First, we will focus on the context of the Eastern Mediterranean of the 3rd millennium BC, and on the impact of this area on the peripheral Mediterranean areas, affected by the phenomena of exchange, colonizers, migrations and conquests. Secondly, we will focus on those phenomena and events that led to Mediterranean unity, both culturally and politically. It will also be important to delve deeper into the institutional aspect and everyday life issues. In order to achieve our objectives, it will be important to become familiar with the available primary sources (textual and archaeological), which will need to be related to historical interpretations.


Competences

  • Contextualizing the historical processes and analysing them from a critical perspective.
  • Developing critical thinking and reasoning and communicating them effectively both in your own and other languages.
  • Respecting the diversity and plurality of ideas, people and situations.
  • Students must be capable of applying their knowledge to their work or vocation in a professional way and they should have building arguments and problem resolution skills within their area of study.
  • Students must be capable of collecting and interpreting relevant data (usually within their area of study) in order to make statements that reflect social, scientific or ethical relevant issues.
  • Students must be capable of communicating information, ideas, problems and solutions to both specialised and non-specialised audiences.
  • Students must have and understand knowledge of an area of study built on the basis of general secondary education, and while it relies on some advanced textbooks it also includes some aspects coming from the forefront of its field of study.

Learning Outcomes

  1. Applying both knowledge and capacity for analysis to the resolution of problems related to the field of study.
  2. Autonomously searching, selecting and processing information both from structured sources (databases, bibliographies, specialized magazines) and from across the network. Expertly making use of the possibilities of Internet.
  3. Carrying out oral presentations using an appropriate academic vocabulary and style.
  4. Effectively communicating and applying the argumentative and textual processes to formal and scientific texts.
  5. Identifying the context of the historical processes.
  6. Identifying the main and secondary ideas and expressing them with linguistic correctness.
  7. Identifying the specific methods of history and their relationship with the analysis of particular facts.
  8. Interpreting material and documentary sources.
  9. Mastering and identifying one's own national history.
  10. Mastering the Universal Ancient History.
  11. Mastering the general diachronic structure of the past.
  12. Mastering the relevant languages to the necessary degree in the professional practice.
  13. Recognising the importance of controlling the quality of the work results and their presentation.
  14. Using specialized knowledge acquired in an interdisciplinary context when debating.
  15. Using suitable terminology when drawing up an academic text.
  16. Using the specific technical and interpretational vocabulary of the discipline.

Content

1. The Sea, the mountains, the Sahara and the Atlantic. The Long March to Civilization: The First Agricultural Civilization (Fertile Crescent and Asia Minor).

2. Mesopotamia and Egypt. The potter's wheel, domestic animals, textiles, wood. Copper and bronze, the scriptures. The cities: earthly life and eternal life.

3. River boats, Mediterranean ships (the first sailors). Syria, Egypt and the Red Sea; The Mediterranean Levant. The expansion of the megaliths: from the Levant into the Atlantic.

4. Centuries of unity. The seas of the Levant from 1500 to 1200: The acceleration of exchanges. Crete. Accidents, evolutions and catastrophes: mountaineers and sailors (nomadism). The Hittites and the Semites.

5. The Sea Peoples. Everything changes from the 12th to the 8th century: The "balkanization" of the Middle East. The peoples of the steppes (the horse).

6. Indo-Europeans and Celtic invasions. Iron metallurgy and alphabetic writing.

7. The colonizations. 10th to 6th centuries. The Phoenicians and Carthage. The Etruscans.

8. The Greek colonization. The “Greek miracle.” The polis: hoplites and rowers, democracy and slavery.

9. The empire of Darius and the mistake of Alexander the Great.

10. The example of Pyrrhus. " Graecia capta " (146 BC). Roman imperialism: Rome against Carthage.

11. The Near East: the coveted prey. From the city to the Empire (131-31 BC).

12. Beyond the Mediterranean. Shoring and Teutons.

13. Caesar conquers Gaul (59-50 BC). Trajan, the Dacians and the Euphrates.

14. Mediterranean civilization: landscapes, cities and techniques.

15. Roman originalities.

 


Activities and Methodology

Title Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Type: Directed      
Practices and seminars 10 0.4 1, 3, 4, 6, 7, 8
clases teóricas 35 1.4
Type: Supervised      
Preparation of practical activities 15 0.6 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, 16
Tutorials 10 0.4 2, 13
Type: Autonomous      
Preparation of activities and written tests 45 1.8 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 13, 15, 16
Reading bibliography 30 1.2 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 16

- Attendance at theoretical classes led by the teacher.
- Comprehensive reading of texts and interpretation of maps, graphs, tables and archaeological documents.
- Realization of reviews, works and analytical comments.
- Personal study.
Note: 15 minutes of a class will be set aside, within the calendar established by the center/degree, for students to fill in the teacher performance and subject evaluation surveys /module.

Annotation: Within the schedule set by the centre or degree programme, 15 minutes of one class will be reserved for students to evaluate their lecturers and their courses or modules through questionnaires.


Assessment

Continous Assessment Activities

Title Weighting Hours ECTS Learning Outcomes
Test 40 1.5 0.06 4, 5, 7, 9, 10, 11, 12, 14, 16
Work placement 60 3.5 0.14 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, 16

The evaluation of the subject will be based on 3 grades:

1.- CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT-A (30% of the final mark): An individual practical activity related to the analysis of primary sources. Practices are mandatory, necessary to take the exam.

2.- CONTINUOUS ASSESSMENT-B (30% of the final grade): An individual practical activity related to the analysis of specialized bibliography. Practices are mandatory, necessary to take the exam.

3.- EXAM (40% of the final grade): It will be done during class time and will consist of 2 activities: a) the

development of a theme, to choose from several options; b) the comment of a literary document or

archaeological

To have the right to re-evaluate a suspended activity, you must have taken all the tests (examination and practical activities) and passed at least one.

This subject offers the possibility of taking a "Single Assessment". This option assumes a single assessment date, but not a single assessment activity. Therefore, the Single Assessment of this subject will be carried out, like the Continuous Assessment, based on two grades:

- PRACTICES (50%): Two practical activities will be proposed (comments on primary sources) of which a short written comment must be submitted. The student must deliver these activities, equivalent to those contemplated in the Continuous Assessment, on the established assessment date.

- FINAL EXAM (50%): It will take place on the established evaluation date and will consist of: a) Test 30 short questions; b) Develop two theme questions, to choose from four options.

The Single Assessment exercises may coincide with dates reserved for the Continuous Assessment.

The same recovery system as for the Continuous Assessment will be applied.


Bibliography

- AUBET, M.E., Tiro y las colonias fenicias de Occidente (3a ed. ampliada), Ed. Bellaterra, Barcelona 2009.

- BRAUDEL, F., Memorias del Mediterráneo: Prehistoria y Antigüedad, Ed Cátedra, Madrid, 1998.

- DICKINSON, O., El Egeo, de la Edad del Bronce a la Edad del Hierro, Ed. Bellaterra, Barcelona 2010.

- GRACIA, F., MUNILLA, G., Protohistoria: pueblos y culturas en el Mediterráneo entre los siglos XIV y II a.C., Universitat de Barcelona, Barcelona 2004.

- GRIMAL, P., La formación del Imperio romano, Siglo XXI, Madrid 1990.

- GÓMEZ ESPELOSÍN, F.J., Historia de Grecia Antigua, Akal Textos, Madrid 1995.

- GRAS, M., El Mediterráneo arcaico, Alderabán, Madrid, 1999.

- HUMBERT, M., Institutions politiques et sociales de l’Antiquité, Précis Dalloz, París 1986.

- KARAGEORGHIS, V., Chipre, encrucijada del Mediterráneo Oriental 1600-500 a.C., Bellaterra, Barcelona 2004.

- LOPEZ BARJA, P., Historia de Roma, Akal Textos, Madrid 2004.

- NICOLET, C., Roma y la conquista del mundo mediterráneo, 264-27 a. de J.C. (2 vols), Labor, Barcelona 1982.

- REDFORD,D.B., Egypt, Canaan and Israel in Ancient Times, Princeton University Press, Princeton 1992.

- ROLDÁN HERVÁS, J.M., Citerior y Ulterior, Istmo, Madrid 2001.

- PLÁCIDO, D., ALVAR, J., GONZÁLEZ WAGNER, C., La formación de los estados en el Mediterráneo occidental, Síntesis, Madrid 1991.

- POTER, D.S. (ed.). A companion to the Roman Empire, Blackwell, Oxford, 2006.

- OSBORNE, R. La formación de Grecia, 1200 – 479 a.C., Crítica, Barcelona, 1998.


Software

Virtual Campus, projected in the classroom with a projector cannon.


Language list

Name Group Language Semester Turn
(PAUL) Classroom practices 1 Catalan second semester morning-mixed
(TE) Theory 1 Catalan second semester morning-mixed