Why I used sheep entrails to predict the Trump era
Predicting Donald Trump’s presidency via sheep entrails must rank among the most unusual exercises in academic outreach ever undertaken. But it is just one way Dr Selena Wisnom has brought her Assyrian research to the wider world.
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"Wisnom argues that reading the literature is not enough: "There are all kinds of things you can understand better if you try it than if you just read about it,' she says – an assertion that any teacher of ovine anatomy would second. She chose political prediction because in Assyria divination was a vital political tool. 'They would ask things like, "Is there going to be a rebellion in the south? Is the chief eunuch going to take the throne?"
In a collaboration between Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) and the University of Baghdad, an ancient Babylonian hymn dating back over two millennia has been rediscovered and fully deciphered.
The new AI tool “Palaeographicum” is revolutionizing research into the cultures of the Ancient Near East: It identifies individual variations of cuneiform signs—a huge step forward for academia.
The Shamash Gate in ancient Nineveh has revealed rare evidence of two violent chapters separated by more than 2,500 years: the fall of the Assyrian capital in 612 B.C. and the battle to free Mosul from ISIS in 2017.
Assyrian News Broadcasting (ANB) has announced that it has temporarily suspended publishing news on its Facebook page due to an ongoing dispute over the platform's media identity and intellectual property rights.
Swiss-Assyrian artist Shamiran Istifan is receiving widespread acclaim for her latest exhibition at the Aargauer Kunsthaus, where her installations explore themes of beauty, migration, identity and censorship through striking visual symbolism.
In a major policy announcement, Iraqi Prime Minister Ali al-Zaidi declared that facilitating the return of Assyrians who fled the country during two decades of conflict is now a "national and government priority."
Dr Selena Wisnom
