Maieutics

Giorgio Buccellati – April 2026

Beyond grammar

While archaeological awareness remains tightly bound to grammar, there emerges the need to address the next two levels of awareness. Here more needs to be done to make it posible for a wider audience to become aware of the deeper values of the broken traiditon they are confronting.

To truly become “inheritors.”

The maieutic dimension

Now, heritage is not something we give. It is something that exists but needs to be brought to light.

The Socratic image of the midwife is particularly apt: she does not generate a child, but helps bringing him or her to light. Analogously, the “hermeneute” helps in unlocking meaning and the sense of values as they were perceived by the ancients so that they can be made our own.

It is in this sense that hermeneutics is tightly linked to grammar as the system that articuoates and conveys that knowledge that must then be properly received by the intended audience.

Other linguistic models

The notion of “grammar” originates with linguistics, and we have developed this notion at length in terms of epistemics, i. e., the way in which knowledge is acquired and conveyed.

Another area that is pertinent to hermeneutics is that of conversation analysis and of interactional linguistics. By looking at language as an actual vehicle of communication, they propose a task similar to that of hermeneutics in archaeology: how does language impact on the social confrontation between speakers? The interaction of the inheritors with their “heritage” may be seen as a “conversation,” where we expect the past to be an interlocutor, and not just a dead thing.

The Urkesh experiment

There are two main moments in our approach to hermeneutics.

The excavation phase: conservation and presentation. – It is fundamental to have the ancient built environment protected so that it may be properly visualized, and it is also important that the site be prepared for visitors from the very moment of excavation. We have covered this in the publication chapter, and two separate websites are dedicated to each project (MCV and MPR).
The post-excavation phase: community engagement. - – Another dedicated website, MHR deals in detail with methods and initiatives that may be considered as more specifically hermeneutic in nature: organized visits to the site; direct involvement of school youngsters; lectures in neighboring villagtes; museum exhibits; an eco-archaeological park.

The courage of competence

What we propose, and what we aim to do concretely at the site of ancient Urkesh, is to define heritage in terms that are arguably rooted in the record. “Heritage” is not a vague term that implies a simple acknowledgment of a past more or less romanticized – or even exploited for political reasons. It is rather based on objective data which only the archaeologists can safely bring to the fore.

There is at times, when talking about heritage, a tendency to allow sentiments to prevail over evidence – as a way to attract attention. This requires, as an antidote, that we as archaeologists show the courage of our competence . It is by proposing an objectively restructured and reconfigured record that the ancient perception can properly resonate with us. The record becomes then a diapason that synchronizes our sensitivity with that of the ancients – the proper goal of hermeneutics.

Properly and objectively presented, the site has enough appeal to resonate deeply in the awareness of the “inheritors” – without any need for embellishments. Following are three examples of how the Urkesh comunity engagement project has been received.

The pride of the past

Letters from the young inheritors. – The Letters from kids, Backdirt article
Young visitors in Mozan. – photo on staircase
Identification with the place – music; projecting feelings; MHR

References

Schlegloff