Puritans in Babylon
Subtitle: the ancient Near East and American intellectual life, 1880-1930
By: Bruce Kuklick.
Publisher: Princeton University Press
Published: 1996
Place of publication: Princeton, N.J
Language: eng
Number of pages: 253
Subjects: United States -- Intellectual life -- 1865-1918; United States -- Intellectual life -- 20th century; Middle East -- Civilization -- To 622 -- Study and teaching -- United States; Middle East -- Civilization -- To 622 -- Research -- United States
Description: From the 1880s through the 1920s a motley collection of American scholars, soldiers of fortune, institutional bureaucrats, and financiers created the academic fields that give us our knowledge of the ancient Near East. Bruce Kuklick's new book begins with the story of the initial adventure of these determined investigators - a twelve-year dig near the Biblical Babylon, at Nippur, conducted at intervals from 1888 through 1900 and bankrolled by the Babylonian Exploration Fund.

To unearth tens of thousands of cuneiform tablets, the leaders of this venture faced harsh living conditions in the desert and an academic war of each against all that was quickly begun at the site itself. As their knowledge increased, they risked their personal religious beliefs in the search for historical truth.

Kuklick discusses their tribulations to illuminate two other contemporary developments: first, the maturation of the American university, particularly in contrast to its German counterpart, and second, the influence of religious-secular conflict on the ways in which Western scholarship appropriated or appreciated other cultures.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.