ABSTRACT
Bodily perception is deeply linked to identity. While scholars of Mesopotamian glyptic frequently treat cylinder seals as carriers of identity through traditional methodologies considering iconographic, functional, and textual evidence, this chapter offers an alternative exploration through haptic inquiry. By incorporating a materials-based approach, the seal stone is considered in various ways as a numinous, affective, and animate object, while clay, particularly as a malleable material, becomes a sensorial-ripe medium. Mesopotamian concepts such as melammu, hepatoscopy, and extispicy, in addition to analogous case studies in Medieval manuscript tradition and Byzantine icon studies, are mined to illustrate how seal users and sealing practices may be understood as a somatic experience. Further, concepts such as object agency, body schema, and Skin Ego provide methodological underpinnings for understanding how seals and clay relate to the biological body and skin and served essential roles in the construction of social memory and the navigation of one’s bodily entanglement between the self and the world.
