Literatuurbewaring en biblioteekaktiwiteite in die Ou Nabye Ooste

Ancient Near Eastern libraries and archives are social institutions, therefore needsoriented The description of Ancient Near Eastern literature preservation and library activities is dependent on the community in transition from an oral to a literate culture. Within this frame of reference the emergence of writing as a parallel medium of communication to speech, creates a beneficial environment for the gradual emergence of textual collections as a physical substitute for the so-called oral repository. No integral commonality in the origins and development of individual Ancient Near Eastern collections has been isolated thus far. The 30th Rencontre As.\yriologique Internationale concentrated on specific collections rather than on striving for a comparative study. Information Scientists and Ancient Near Eastern scholars experience difficulties in typifying ancient collections as either libraries and/or archives The viability of the present research lies in the establishment of the cultural-historical setting for the ancient archive or library. Hereby illustrating the textual organisational activities of the community. This does not include a chronological study of the collections, as there seems to be no indication of an evolutionary development of organisational practices The founder- and user community dictated the nature and progress of the collection Three collection types are identified as possible manifestations of the proto-collection, archives, libraries and genizahs. The genizah is distinguished, as no internal organisation and retrieval practices can be perceived Cognisance is taken of the problems involved in discussing the distinctive features of each, as the proto-collection is still in transition and therefore may change it's features The collections found at Ebia, Mari, Kuyunjik and Sippar are used to illustrate literature preservation and library activities Three additional "collections", seals and bullae from a post-exilic Judaic archive, Qumran and Babatha's "family-archive", are used to indicate specific problems in the description of collections. A study of this nature points to the necessity of interdisciplinary co-operation between Ancient Near Eastern Studies and Information Science in the handling of any future discoveries, as well as the implementation of the "archival method" in the organisation and retrieval of ancient collections in modern-day museums.