Penn Museum

The Penn Museum — or, properly, the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology [official site] — is home to an impressive collection of ancient middle eastern artifacts (stuff from Ur, Babylonia, Mesopotamia, etc.) and much more. Check out my photo album to see some of it, or, if you’re pressed for time, skim the highlights below.

The fact that I chose a tiny cuneiform tablet fragment as the showcased photo, rather than the dramatic sphynx below (and Dramatic Sphynx *was* very dramatic) or one of my many other options goes to show the linguist in me… My love of linguistics began with a love of all kinds of writing systems, and I later developed a deep awe of the ones that started it all.