"I wanted to be a rocket scientist," says David I. Owen, the Bernard and Jane Schapiro Professor of Ancient Near Eastern and Judaic Studies. "I was secretary of the rocket society and had a job working on missile systems."

But after taking a course on Greco-Roman history at Boston University, he promptly switched from mathematics to a major in classical civilization. In his junior year, as a result of an undergraduate summer of study at Brandeis University, his interest moved to cuneiform languages, Mesopotamian history and archaeology, and he eventually received a Ph.D. from Brandeis in Assyriology and Near Eastern history (1969).

"There's a constant stream of new discoveries in this field," Owen says enthusiastically. "You are challenged to constantly upgrade your ideas and understanding."

Owen joined the Cornell faculty in 1974. By 1977 he was chair -- and the only one left in the Department of Near Eastern Studies; everyone else had either moved on or retired. Due to budget cuts, the department was in danger of being shut down. Owen fought hard to save it, raising money and helping to establish new tenure and lecture lines for the department and, more recently, establishing the third largest university collection of cuneiform tablets in the world. Three decades later, the department is stronger than ever, with expertise covering the ancient Near East through the modern world of the Middle East.

"I've loved it at Cornell from the day I arrived," says Owen, who spent 30 years as director of the Program of Jewish Studies. "Great students, great facilities and for the most part I've had terrific support."

Owen names the three years in the early '90s that he and his family spent as a faculty-in-residence as one of the highlights of his time here. Although he's no longer living on campus, Owen continues to be part of the faculty fellows program, conducting dinner discussion groups every Tuesday. "It's a social hour for the students and a lot of fun," he says. "Faculty and students come to talk about nearly everything dealing with the ancient and modern Near East."

Like most scholars, Owen firmly believes that cuneiform tablets without provenance are worthy of study, as long as looters are not encouraged. This conviction has been behind his creation of the series "Cornell University Studies in Assyriology and Sumerology" (CUSAS), for which he is editor-in-chief.

"The volumes are extraordinary in their quality and importance, and they advance our understanding of the ancient Near Eastern world significantly," says Kim Haines-Eitzen, chair of the department. Owen believes the series will become the basis for much of future scholarship in the field of ancient Near Eastern studies, and his dedication has resulted in the volumes being produced in record time -- eight weeks from final proof to printing; 13 volumes have been published in the last three years.

Symposium on ancient Iraq to honor David Owen

The symposium "Power and Knowledge in Ancient Iraq" to honor the long career of David Owen, is slated for Friday, Oct. 29, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. at the A.D. White House. The event will feature Owen's former students, friends and colleagues.

Topics at the symposium will include "Ubartum: The Earliest Recorded Female Physician," "Nothing so Swift as Calumny: Slander and Justification at the Mari Court," "When Animals Talk" and "You Are Now Informed: Ugaritic Text RS 94.2406 and the Power of Writing at the End of the Bronze Age."

Owen begins phased retirement next year. A reception to celebrate his 70th birthday will be held Oct. 28, 7 to 9:30 p.m., also at the A.D. White House. Both events are open to the public.

Owen began his cuneiform research in graduate school as a Fulbright-Hayes scholar at Ankara University in Turkey, 1966-68. An offer from the University Museum at the University of Pennsylvania to be assistant curator in the Underwater Archaeology Section lured him back to the United States in 1969. He pursued nautical archaeology in Turkey, Cyprus and Italy for 10 years, but eventually could no longer bring his family along so he switched to field archaeology on land, spending a decade of summers in Israel as the epigraphist on Cornell's summer excavations program. The one and only cuneiform tablet he excavated during this period, and which he deciphered and published, turned out to be an extremely important find -- a diplomatic letter which tied together the archaeology and history of Turkey, Syria, Egypt and Canaan. This letter remains the only such text ever excavated in Israel from the 13th century B.C.

Eventually, though, the 12-month demands of teaching, working on a dig and raising money to support the work grew to be too much, and in 1988, Owen gave up field work to concentrate entirely on Assyriology.

In the rare minutes Owen has free between research, travel, teaching and grandchildren, he enjoys cooking Chinese food, gardening and reading detective and historical novels. He's also an aspiring novelist.

"I've been pecking away at writing a historical novel for years," he says. "Maybe someday I'll finish it." The novel, set in the third millennium B.C. Syria and Mesopotamia, will no doubt be full of authentic detail garnered from Owen's long, and fruitful, career.

Linda Glaser is a staff writer for the College of Arts and Sciences.