Objectives

• To use provided primary and secondary sources to develop a historical thesis about the Neo-Assyrian period of Mesopotamia.
• To support your historical thesis with evidence in a formal essay assignment.

Topic

Using only the materials available from the course, write a formal (Chicago style) essay that makes an argument about how the Assyrians used violence as an administrative tool. 

You will need to support your argument with evidence, using both primary and secondary source materials. Please assemble the following resources to write your essay:

• History of the Ancient Near East, chapters 11-13
• The chapter Download chapter from Zainab Bahrani's Rituals of War
• Primary Source: Prism of Sennacherib
• Neo-Assyrian Deportation Links to an external site.

Be sure to refer to the *primary source materials* presented in the module, textbook and the Bahrani article when making your arguments (e.g. images from the siege of Lachich, Primary Source: Prism of Sennacherib, etc). In terms of secondary sources, you should refer to HANE Chapters 11-13 as well as the Bharani chapter in your essay.

Length

There are no minimum or maximum length requirements but you must thoroughly address the assignment, which can typically be done in 1000 words.  Write for a purpose-- irrelevant or inefficient writing (aka "fluff") will be detrimental to your grade on this assignment.

Required Formatting and Citation

You must cite all information (facts about the Neo-Assyrian empire etc.) and format your essay appropriately using the Chicago Manual of Style Links to an external site.. Here is an example paper Links to an external site.that shows correct formatting. If you are doing the assignment correctly, most sentences will include a citation (with page number). I have a slight preference for author-date style Links to an external site..  Failure to cite sources (must include page numbers) or the use of unapproved outside sources will result in a zero on this assignment. Chicago style affects the overall formatting of the paper including the presence of a cover page, page number placement etc. 

While you should reference the source of your assertions, you should not overuse direct quotations from the course materials. Typically, historians paraphrase (re-state) secondary literature and only quote primary source material when the exact wording is relevant to an argument that they are making.  Re-stating the texts' arguments in your own words develops your analytical abilities and is the appropriate historical style.

Resources

Please see the assignment rubric, below, for information on how the essays will be evaluated. Please review Rampolla's excellent Guide to Writing for History Download Guide to Writing for History

Please send a message to Dr. Earley-Spadoni with any questions about this assignment no later than 5 pm EST the Friday before the assignment is due.