Nicola Laneri, From Ritual to God in the Ancient Near East. Tracing the Origins of Religion, 2024. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, xiv + 251 pp., figures in text.*

Abstract

Identifying the origins of religion has been a goal pursued by countless scholars working in a variety of fields and using many different approaches (philosophers, theologians, historians, etc.), especially in the “heroic” era of religious studies. The Author of this volume has bravely taken up this enormous challenge, starting around 10,000 years ago and drawing on archaeological data from the ancient Near Eastern from the pre-Ceramic Neolithic onwards – sometimes supplemented by textual references – in the geographical area comprised between the eastern shores of the Mediterranean and the Tigris and Euphrates rivers.