Bulletin of the Asia Institute

The Bulletin of the Asia Institute (BAI), newly moved to the Yarshater Center for the Study of Iranian Literary Traditions (UCLA), is a well-known journal in our discipline that has variously re-invented itself since 1931. In 1987, the editors of the Inaugural Issue of the newly reborn Bulletin of the Asia Institute noted: fledgling flight was made in 1931 as the…

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Bulletin of the Asia Institute

The Bulletin of the Asia Institute is under new editorial management at the Yarshater Center for the Study of Iranian Literary Traditions, UCLA. Volume 32, the newest issue, is available in open access from its new home: The Yarshater Center for the Study of Iranian Literary Traditions at UCLA is privileged to continue the publication of the Bulletin of the Asia Institute beginning with Volume 32, newly available as of Summer 2026. About Previous issues of this reputable journal, going back to volume 21 (2012), are available here.

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Seeds of Mantra

MANTRAMS, Oxford Workshop at Harris Manchester College 26 September – 2 October 2026

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The Medes. 25 Years Afterwards

The Medes. 25 Years Afterwards International MeetingAccademia Galileiana di Scienze Lettere ed Arti, Padova, Italy29 September – 2 October 2026 Twenty-five years after the 2001 meeting dedicated to the Medes and their place in the history of the Ancient Near East, an international group of scholars will gather once again in Padova for “The Medes. 25 Years Afterwards.”

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Fake Prostration in Late Antique Literature and the Ambiguities of Domination

Nabel, Jake. 2026. Fake Prostration in Late Antique Literature and the Ambiguities of Domination. Studies in Late Antiquity 10 (3). 265-293. Ancient Greek literature transmits two episodes in which a petitioner before a king performs a fake act of prostration. The deceiver creates the appearance of a submissive bow, but he actually executes a dierent gesture unrelated to court protocol—or so he tells himself.

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Elephantine in Its Persian Imperial and Administrative Context

Moore, James D. 2026. Aspects of Judean Life. Elephantine in Its Persian Imperial and Administrative Context. Pennsylvania: Eisenbrauns. Aspects of Judean Life focuses on Elephantine during the fifth century BCE, developing a comprehensive model of Achaemenid Persian imperial governance in Egypt and situating the Judean colony within that framework. It reconsiders the colony at Elephantine not as a band of foreign mercenaries living private lives but as colonial state dependents embedded within Achaemenid systems of land-for-service taxation and imperial administration. Far from isolated, the Judeans emerge as active participants in—and beneficiaries of—the structures of empire.

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Bulletin of the Asia Institute 32

Volume 32 (2024-2025) of the Bulletin of the Asia Institute (New Series) has been published. Table of contents: Robert Rollinger and Josef Wiesehöfer: Designating the King in the Womb of His Mother: From Assyrian through Sasanian Times M. Rahim Shayegan: Rethinking the Achaemenid World Order: Space, Religion, and Communicative Strategies Fabrizio Sinisi: On the Early History of the Image of Mithra in the Indo-Iranian Borderlands…

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Studies on the maritime, economic, and military history of antiquity

Reinard, Patrick, Christian Rollinger, Pascal Warnking, Julian Degen & Mateo González Vázquez (eds.). 2026. Kybernetes. Studien zur Seefahrts-, Wirtschafts- und Militärgeschichte der Antike. Festschrift für Christoph Schäfer zum 65. Geburtstag (Muziris 6). Münster: Zaphon. Among other interesting contributions, the following articles may interest the readers of Bibliographia Iranica: Julian Degen: Some Notes on Ship Types and Maritime Mobility in Strabo's Geography and the Periploi Clemens Steinwender: Überlegungen zur Bedeutung der Schifffahrt im sasanidischen Imperium Robert Rollinger: The Aegean Worlds and the Achaemenid-Persian Empire: Imperial Borderlands and the ‘Persian Wars’

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Contextualizing Imperial Borderlands

Rollinger, Robert & Degen, Julian (eds.). 2026. Contextualizing Imperial Borderlands. 9th Century BCE – 9th Century CE and Beyond (Afro-Eurasian Transformations ‒ Ancient Worlds and Beyond 1). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. The first volume of the new series Afro-Eurasian Transformations ‒ Ancient Worlds and Beyond comprises a collection of papers whose overarching topic pertains to the study of territories situated beyond direct imperial control.

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Governance in Bactrian Documents

Huseini, Said Reza. 2026. Local government reflected in Bactrian documents. Afghanistan 9(1). 85–103. Drawing on an analysis of Bactrian documents produced between the early fourth and the late eighth century, the article shows that local government was the foundation of political structure in Bactria. By focusing on three areas of Guzgan, Rob and Kadagstan, the article demonstrates that these areas had their own rulers who managed them through local administration staffed by local people, who handled social, economic, political and military issues.

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The Pahlavi Codex MK

Hintze, Almut & JamaspAsa, Kaikhusroo Minocher. 2026. The Pahlavi codex MK: Facsimile edition (Iranica 36). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz Verlag. The manuscript MK of the family collection of Dastur Dr Kaikhusroo M. JamaspAsa, is the oldest extant Pahlavi codex. Written in 1322 by the Zoroastrian priest and scribe Mihraban Kayhusraw, it offers 38 texts, most of which form part of the genre of Andarz, or Wisdom, literature, while others, such as the Book of Deeds of King Ardashir, the founder of the Sasanian royal dynasty, belong to Middle Persian court literature.

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Sogdian Christians

Sheridan, Daniel . 2026. Sogdian Christians. Networks, Books, Homilies, and Medicine. Turnhout: Brepols. After centuries of obscurity, the Sogdian people have once again been recognized as the premier long-distance traders of the famed Eurasian trade routes of late antique and early medieval Eurasia, popularly referred to as the “Silk Roads.” Similarily, a previous Christian association with Sogdians and their language had also been all but forgotten until the archeological finds at the turn of the twentieth century.

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Technological Traditions in Late Antiquity Dashtestan Ceramics

Naderi, Sona and Zohreh Zehbari. 2026. Technological Traditions in Late Antiquity Dashtestan Ceramics: A Multiscale Analytical Approach. Primitive Tider (Special Issue 2026: Espens Festskrift): 147-162. This paper presents a multiscale analysis of ceramic technology from the Dashtestan region of southern Iran, focusing on the Late Antique period (approximately 3rd–9th centuries CE). Rather than treating pottery types as fixed cultural markers, the study investigates the organization, transmission, and evolution of ceramic production practices across the period and the regional landscape.

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Reassembling knowledge

Benfey, Thomas. 2026. Reassembling knowledge: Science, medicine, and philosophy in Sasanian and early Islamic Iraq and Iran. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. The scholars of the Sasanian empire—the last antique superpower whose extensive territories encompassed much of Mesopotamia, the Iranian plateau, and the Caucasus—played a pivotal role in world intellectual history. They developed a distinctive synthesis of Indian and Greco-Roman learning, which would have a formative impact on Islamic civilization in the wake of the empire's fall to Arab armies in the 7th century CE.

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Judeans in the Land of the Nile

Ziemba, Kacper & Frederik Poulsen (eds.). 2026. Judeans in the Land of the Nile: Papers on Achaemenid Egypt, Elephantine, and the Hebrew Bible Presented in Copenhagen, August 19–20, 2024 (Ägypten und Altes Testament 136). Münster: Zaphon. The significance of Egypt for the history of the Judeans in the 1st millennium BCE is difficult to overestimate. The geographical proximity of the land of the Nile and Judah meant that their political and cultural fates were intertwined.

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Iran (2025 & 2026)

Among the papers published in the journal Iran over the past two years, the following deal with various aspects of ancient Iran: Mozhgan Jayez & Roghayeh Rahimi Sorkhani: The flaked stone assemblage of Soha Chay Tepe and the chalcolithic chipped stone industries of the Zagros Region Zohreh Zehbari: The men who wrought the metals: On Achaemenid-era metalworkers based on the Persepolis tablets…

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Journal of Iranian Linguistics

The Journal of Iranian Linguistics (JIL) is a platform uniting scholars worldwide to explore Iranian linguistic diversity. With a commitment to interdisciplinary discourse, JIL covers syntax, morphology, phonology, phonetics, semantics, sociolinguistics, language policy, and language acquisition. The user-friendly website, part of Yerevan State University's journal system, ensures easy access to high-quality, diverse research. Join us in propelling Iranian linguistics to new heights!

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The Temple of Ištar-of-Akkad in Babylon from the Neo-Assyrian until the Persian Period

Boivin, Odette. 2026. The Temple of Ištar-of-Akkad in Babylon from the Neo-Assyrian until the Persian Period. The Archival Texts (Abhandlungen der Deutschen Orient-Gesellschaft 33). Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz. The Temple of Ištar-of-Akkad in Babylon from the Neo-Assyrian until the Persian Period is the third volume of the ADOG sub-series named Babil and dedicated to the study of Babylon. It contains the edition of 86 texts uncovered during the excavations directed by Robert Koldewey and carried out between 1899 and 1917 by the Deutsche Orient-Gesellschaft in Babylon.

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Hybrid Kingships in the East from Alexander to the Sasanians

Cefalo, Generoso & Alessandro Magnani (eds.). Le regalità ibride in Oriente da Alessandro ai Sasanidi. Urbino: Uniurb University Press. Il volume propone una riflessione sulle forme della sovranità sviluppatesi nello spazio eurasiatico tra l’età di Alessandro Magno e l’ascesa dell’impero sasanide. Attraverso un approccio interdisciplinare che integra fonti letterarie, epigrafiche, numismatiche, iconografiche e archeologiche, i contributi indagano i processi di interazione, adattamento e rielaborazione che caratterizzarono la costruzione dell’autorità regia in contesti multiculturali.

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Linear Elamite Texts from Susa

François Desset, Kambiz Tabibzadeh, Gian Pietro Basello and Gianni Marchesi with the collaboration of Laurent Colonna d'Istria. 2026. Linear Elamite Inscriptions and Related Cuneiform Texts I: Linear Elamite Texts from Susa (OrientLab Series Maior 10). Bologna: Ante Quem. The present volume is the first of a three-volume series devoted to the publication of the Linear Elamite corpus and related cuneiform texts.

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David Stronach and British Archaeology in the Middle East

Maras, Sabrina. 2026. David Stronach and British Archaeology in the Middle East. London: Bloomsbury Academic. Drawn from interviews conducted between 2007 and 2020, this account of the life of renowned archaeologist and former director of the British Institute of Persian Studies, David Brian Stronach, reveals a lost period in international archaeology within Iran, when BIPS was founded and acted as a unique intellectual hub for archaeologists, expats, scholars and foreigners…

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Ancient West & East 24

The new volume of Ancient West & East (2025) is out and it contains several relevant studies pertaining to ancient Iran: Julian DEGEN: Argead Macedonia in the Western Borderland of the Achaemenid Empire Roberto DAN: The Hişet Fortress in (V)ostan/Gevaş An Urartian, Orontid, Arsacid and Mediaeval Site on the Southern Shore of Lake Van Arvin MAGHSOUDLOU: A Palace Built into a Mountain Exploring the Modes of Audience Interaction and Reception at the Great Ayvan of Taq-e Bustan in Late Antiquity

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Proto-Elamite

Kelley, Kathryn. 2026. Proto-Elamite. Writing and Society in Early Iran. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Proto-Elamite is one of the world's earliest scripts and it remains only very partly deciphered. Excavations have uncovered c. 1,700 clay tablets from Iran, dating c. 3300–2900 BCE. The tablets use a complex system involving hundreds of symbols to count commodities, people, and institutions. Despite holding a privileged place in the history of writing, the study of proto-Elamite falls outside modern disciplinary boundaries and has received very limited scholarly attention since its discovery over a century ago.

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Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan (AMIT): Vol. 50

Archäologische Mitteilungen aus Iran und Turan (AMIT): Vol. 50, 2018 , ed. by German Archaeological Institute (DAI), Tehran Branch of the Eurasia Department, is now pubished. Table of Contents: Articles: Morteza Zamani Dadaneh, Sirvan Mohammadi Ghasrian and Steve Renette: Late Neolithic to Early Chalcolithic Settlements on the Marivan Plain of western Iran Elena Rova, Davit Kvavadze, Flavia Amato, Elisabetta Boaretto, Giovanni Boschian, Giovanni Siracusano and Laura Tonetto: Tsiteli Gorebi 5, a New Early Chalcolithic Site in Eastern Georgia, Results of the 2018-2019 Excavations by the “Georgian-Italian Lagodekhi Archaeological Project”

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Two articles by Mohamad Bayani

Bayani, Mohamad. 2025. Creating is cutting: A conceptual metaphor in Avestan and Pahlavi texts. Bulletin of SOAS 88(2). 243–265. This paper investigates the development of the creation theme in Zoroastrian sources through the lens of the conceptual metaphor “creation is cutting”. It analyses three terms: Avestan taš- and ϑβǝrǝs-, and Middle Persian brēhēnīdan. Each term is examined in non-metaphorical, non-creational metaphorical, and creational metaphorical contexts.

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Insights into the First Kushan Ruler’s Enigmatic Tetradrachms

Taasob, Razieh. 2026. Reassessing the Lifespan of the Heraios Coinage: Insights into the First Kushan Ruler’s Enigmatic Tetradrachms. In: Merle Eisenberg, Lee Mordechai & David Yoon (eds.), Coins and Money in the Middle Ages Studies in Honor of Alan Stahl (Numismatic Studies 50), 123-141. New York: The American Numismatic Society. The attribution and chronology of Heraios coinage, often linked to the early Kushan ruler Kujula Kadphises, have long been points of scholarly debate.

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