Speaker: Dr. Rachel Horowitz (WA State University) Title: Ancient Maya Economies: The Role of Small-Scale Craft Producers Abstract: Archaeological research on the Maya has a lengthy history. While much research has focused on Maya political organization, less is known about economic activities, as these were infrequently recorded by the Maya in their written text. This […]
Farming spread from its center of origin in western Asia to southern Europe at the beginning of the Holocene. This phenomenon has prompted many questions. Why did farming spread when it did? Who brought it to southern Europe, and by what means? Migrant farmers from western Asia reached the Aegean before 9,000 cal BP (c. […]
Pick up any book on early Greek history or archaeology, and you will read about Bronze Age people called Minoans and Mycenaeans. Who were the Minoans, and who were the Mycenaeans? It’s become increasingly clear that these questions aren’t as easy to answer as we might think. These classifications aren’t simply empirical ‘facts’ about the […]
An online lecture by Mark Abbe, University of Georgia. Please register beforehand.
In 2017, the Republic of Turkey filed a lawsuit in federal court against auction house Christie’s and billionaire philanthropist Michael Steinhardt for the return of an allegedly looted female figurine dating to the Chalcolithic era. The female idol is distinctive of works produced in the ceramic workshops of Kiliya in Western Anatolia between 3000 and […]
Lecture by Dr. Douglas Bamforth, University of Colorado Boudler Plains farmers settled at the Lynch site in northeastern Nebraska during the latter decades of the 13th century, in the midst of a wave of social change and dislocation across the mid-continent as Cahokia collapsed and drought spread widely over much of North America. In contrast […]
In ancient Greece, as today, insults ranged from playful mockery to serious affronts. This talk explores the various social and cultural roles played by insults in classical Athens, including obscene banter at festivals, satire on the comic stage, invective in the courtroom, forbidden slanderous speech, and violent attacks on other people’s honor.
Tourists are attracted to Crete for the splendours of Minoan Knossos and other Bronze Age sites. The architecture of Roma Crete is as substantial as the earlier periods and the importance of Crete to the Roman Empire rivals the earlier periods. Dr Harrison looks at the key sites but also presents material from sites tourists […]
In the first half, probably the second quarter, of the sixth century B.C.E., a ship sank off the coast of Pabuç Burnu, Turkey, southeast of Bodrum or ancient Halikarnassos. Excavated by the Institute of Nautical Archaeology, the vessel’s preserved cargo and hull remains provide evidence for the development of production and exchange systems in the […]
Dr. Emily Hammer discussed how declassified military imagery from planes and satellites have played an important role in landscape and environmental archaeology. The identification of ancient sites, fortifications, road networks, and irrigation networks in modern satellite images, like those viewable in Google Earth, is limited by the degree to which these features have survived the […]
