In this episode, we are following the trail of Ishtar from Southern Mesopotamia into the ancient Land of Cilicia. In the Mound of Tarsus and the hill-top citadel of Azatiwataya, we will talk about riveting ancient objects which bear traces of Ishtar as well as the illustrious women archaeologists who discovered and worked on them. We will talk about the contributions of Hetty Goldman, Machteld J. Mellink and Halet Çambel, whose lives intersected in these two sites, to the development of archaeology in Turkey. Within an archaeological and cultural landscape through which Ishtar travelled, we hope to narrate stories of women in ancient and contemporary times together.

Aslı Özyar is a professor of Anatolian and Mesopotamian art and archaeology at the Department of History at Boğaziçi University, Istanbul. Professor Özyar’s academic writing and teaching is extensive, comprising but not limited to archaeology of the pre-classical Anatolia and larger Eastern Mediterranean, Hittite studies, writing and imagery in the ancient Near East. Since 2000, she has been the project and excavation director of Boğaziçi University’s archaeological research project in Tarsus-Gözlükule, Turkey; and since 2015 the director of The Halet Çambel and Nail Çakırhan Research Center for Archaeology, Vernacular Architecture and History.

Music:

Maki Makkuk and Sun Glitters

Tracks:

Exodus (Sun Glitters prod)

Spaces

Taken from the self released EP فضاء (Spaces in Arabic), 2014 / © and ℗ Sun Glitters.

Used with arrangement and permission from rights holders. 

Majdal Nijim aka Makimakkuk is a Palestinian artist with versatile musical capabilities and a tact for conveying deep sentiments with her rich voice. Her solo music projects started in 2007, and she released a sublime EP with producer Sun Glitters titled Fada' in 2014. As a singer, she engages multiple styles such as trip-hop, folk, Afrobeat, experimental and hip-hop. She has DJed in various festivals, and performed at her own live Boiler Room set in Ramallah in 2018. She was part of the Goethe Institut Musikraum initiative in which different musicians based in various cities from Tunis to Baghdad transformed their homes into performance spaces. She holds university degrees in journalism and sociology, and her music is influenced by her engagement with topics such as women’s rights, sexuality, freedom of movement and thought and sociopolitical issues in Palestine and elsewhere.  

Sun Glitters is the electronic project of Luxembourg musician Victor Ferreira. With a long list of worldwide collaborations, engulfing visuals that supplement his live performances and a seemingly endless string of acclaimed EPs, self-released tracks and remixes, Sun Glitters has quickly left a mark on the electronic music scene. He combines an ocean of lush melodies, pitch-shifted vocal samples, digi-diva choirs, warm bass pulses, and ambient soundscapes into a blisteringly beautiful sound. His audio/visual projects push the creative boundaries and easily merge the roles of a music producer, video director, and graphic design artist.

Audio post production: Aref Heidar (Ceé)

Image: Ship Relief from Karatepe-Aslantaş. Çambel and Özyar, Karatepe Aslantaş: Azatiwataya: Die Bildwerke. Meinz am Rhein: Philipp von Zabern, 2003. Plates 96-7.