Figurines in Hellenistic Babylonia
Miniaturization and Cultural Hybridity

Using the visual and tactile experience of small-scale figurines, Greeks and Babylonians negotiated a hybrid, cross-cultural society in Hellenistic Mesopotamia.

Stephanie M. Langin-Hooper (Author)

9781108738460, Cambridge University Press

Paperback / softback, published 7 September 2023

332 pages
27 x 18 x 2.2 cm, 0.555 kg

'Intimacy, interaction and play, and social norms as activated and understood through the miniature are but some of the themes that Stephanie M. Langin-Hooper rigorously and playfully explores in this volume on various types of anthropomorphic figurines in Hellenistic Babylonia … invites reader engagement and reflection with themes that are highly relevant to both an understanding of, and negotiations within, our own contemporary multicultural worlds.' Leticia R. Rodriguez, Rhea Classical Reviews

In this volume, Stephanie M. Langin-Hooper investigates the impact of Greek art on the miniature figure sculptures produced in Babylonia after the conquests of Alexander the Great. Figurines in Hellenistic Babylonia were used as agents of social change, by visually expressing and negotiating cultural differences. The scaled-down quality of figurines encouraged both visual and tactile engagement, enabling them to effectively work as non-threatening instruments of cultural blending. Reconstructing the embodied experience of miniaturization in detailed case studies, Langin-Hooper illuminates the dynamic process of combining Greek and Babylonian sculpture forms, social customs, and viewing habits into new, hybrid works of art. Her innovative focus on figurines as instruments of both personal encounter and global cultural shifts has important implications for the study of tiny objects in art history, anthropology, classics, and other disciplines.

1. A question of intimacy: miniaturization and figurines
2. Fascination with the tiny: interacting with figurines
3. Three's a crowd: spectatorship of figurines
4. Images of the self: identifying with figurines
5. The global and the local: making cultural and social choices with figurines
6. Conclusion: life in miniature
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Physical anthropology [JHMP], Social & cultural anthropology, ethnography [JHMC], Sculpture [AFKB], History of art: ancient & classical art,BCE to c 500 CE [ACG]