TBA (Mississippi/Memphis)
2026-03-18 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (Oxford MS/Memphis TN), United States
Charles Eliot Norton Memorial Lectureship

Horace and Rodolfo construct the Esquiline: examining garbage and graves at Rome and beyond
2026-03-19 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture, 2316 W 1st Ave, Spokane, WA, 99201, United States
Join us for a lecture by Dr. Kevin Dicus, University of Oregon at Eugene, discussing investigations at Rome’s Esquiline Hill.
Abstract:
Archaeologist Rodolfo Lanciani captivated the public with his account of excavations on Rome’s
Esquiline Hill. No doubt influenced by Horace’s Satire 1.8 about the same region, his portrayal
of mass graves (puticuli) embedded within a vast field of municipal waste offered a thrilling,
dystopian vision that continues to resonate nearly 150 years later. Ancient Rome’s reputation has
yet to recover, as his report continues to shape perceptions of the metropolis as filthy and
mismanaged.
This talk revises Lanciani’s portrayal of the Esquiline as a wasteland of rotting corpses and
garbage and offers a new interpretation of Horace’s Satire 1.8. I argue that Horace describes not
mass graves on the hill but rather a modest cemetery where multiple graves shared the same plot
of land that also received the city’s refuse. The misreading that these were instead puticuli
originated with his imperial scholiasts and persisted to directly influence Lanciani.
Archaeological comparanda from across the Roman world demonstrate that individual, modest
graves dug into suburban municipal dumps were a common and legitimate form of burial for the
urban poor. This intersection between the city’s dumps and its dead provides new insight into
Roman attitudes toward waste: although the disposal of refuse beyond the city walls transformed
the suburban landscape, it did little to alter the cultural meaning of the extramural zone. People
continued to use these areas much as they had before their appropriation for refuse, including the
symbolically charged act of burying loved ones.

AIA Special Event: Eric Cline is coming to Emory! (March 19)
2026-03-19 19:00 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Emory University, White Hall, Room 101, 1672 North Decatur Road, Atlanta, GA, 30322, United States
What: Dr. Eric Cline is coming to Emory!
This lecture is NOT to be missed by archaeology enthusiasts or anyone with an interest in ancient Egypt.
This is a special presentation sponsored by the Atlanta Chapter of the Archaeological Institute of America (AIA).
Who: Dr. Cline wrote the single best-selling archaeology book of the last 15+ years: 1177 B.C: The Year Civilization Collapsed. He may well be the American archaeologist best-known to the general public today, while also maintaining his “day job” as professor of archaeology at George Washington University.
Why: Dr. Cline will be sharing a brand-new lecture with us! He just published a new book, which will be the topic of the lecture: Love, War, and Diplomacy: The Discovery of the Amarna Letters and the Bronze Age World They Revealed.
Extra Credit: Includes book signing! The campus bookstore will be selling a selection of Dr. Cline’s books at the event, and he will sign books for anyone who purchases them there.
When: Thursday, March 19, at 7:00pm
(Be on time! Due to Emory’s security policy, the venue doors will be locked at 7:15pm)
Where: Emory University, White Hall, Room 101
Address: 301 Dowman Dr, Atlanta, GA 30322
( see event website for venue details: http://tiny.cc/clineAIA )
How: FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC!
RSVP at http://tiny.cc/clineAIA
To guarantee a seat, you must RSVP by Tuesday, March 17. (RSVP is not required but is appreciated to ensure we plan accordingly.)
Everyone who RSVPs by March 10, will be entered in a raffle to win a signed copy of Dr. Cline’s new book! (Must be present to win.)
Parking :
Fishburne Parking Deck at 1672 North Decatur Road, Atlanta, GA 30322
( see event website for venue details: http://tiny.cc/clineAIA )
Lecture Title: “Speak to the King, my lord and my Sun god”: Love, War, and Diplomacy in Canaan during the Amarna Age”
by Eric H. Cline
Event Website: http://tiny.cc/clineAIA
Synopsis
In 1887, a cache of nearly 400 clay tablets inscribed in cuneiform was discovered at Tell el-Amarna, the capital city of the heretic Pharaoh Akhenaten. Dating to the fourteenth century BCE, it is the only royal archive that has been discovered from New Kingdom Egypt so far. Within the archive are fifty letters exchanged with the other great powers of the day, including the Hittites, Babylonians, and Assyrians. However, there are also nearly three hundred letters sent by vassal Canaanite rulers, such as Biridiya, the king of Megiddo; Abdi-Heba, the king of Jerusalem; and Rib-Hadda, the king of Byblos. The letters offer a glimpse into the vibrant diplomatic world of the Late Bronze Age, revealing royal marriages, elaborate negotiations, and exchanges of luxury gifts between the great kings, as well as political maneuvering and appeals from the vassal kings of Canaan, including Biridiya, who sent six letters to the Egyptian pharaohs. They also, however, provide a window through which we can glimpse the competition among antiquities dealers and museums to acquire the tablets; the scholarly race between British and German teams to decipher them; and the colonial-era context in which they were unearthed.
Speaker’s Bio
Eric H. Cline is Professor of Classics and Anthropology, the former Chair of the Department of Classical and Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and the current Director of the Capitol Archaeological Institute at George Washington University, in Washington DC. A two-time Fulbright Scholar, National Geographic Explorer, NEH Public Scholar, Getty Scholar, and member of the Explorers Club, with degrees from Dartmouth, Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania, he is an active field archaeologist with more than thirty seasons of excavation and survey experience in Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Cyprus, Greece, Crete, and the United States, including ten seasons at Megiddo (1994-2014), where he served as co-director before retiring from the project in 2014, and another ten seasons at Tel Kabri, where he currently serves as Co-Director. He is the author or editor of more than twenty books and nearly one hundred articles; translations of his books have appeared in twenty-three different languages. He is perhaps best known for “1177 BC: The Year Civilization Collapsed”, but also for “Digging Up Armageddon: The Search for the Lost City of Solomon”, which tells the story of the 1925-1939 University of Chicago excavations at Megiddo, a century after they first began.

The Shipwreck at Gnalić—Gagliana Grossa (1569-1583)
2026-03-22 14:00 - 15:30 (America/New_York) | https://www.archaeological.org/event/the-shipwreck-at-gnalic-gagliana-grossa-1569-1583-2/
The George F. Bass Lectures

Landscapes of Time and Memory: Foragers in the Mojave Desert 3
2026-03-24 18:00 - 19:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Tallahassee 1), Tallahassee, FL, United States
Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureship

Beauty, Power, and Presence: The Neo- Assyrian Queens of Nimrud's Northwest Palace, c. 865-705 BCE
2026-03-24 19:00 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | IL
DC Society Annual Louise Davison Lecture, delivered by Professor Amy Rebecca Gansell, St. John’s University.
Reception at 6:15 pm; DC Society Business Meeting at 6:45 pm; Lecture at 7:00 pm. Location and hybrid Zoom registration link TBA.

New Approaches to Roman Urbanism: The Excavations of the Falerii Novi Project (Lazio, Italy) 3
2026-03-25 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Buffalo), Buffalo, NY, United States
Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureship Time TBA

New Archaeological Research in the Republic of North Macedonia.
2026-03-28 14:00 - 15:00 (America/Chicago)
ZOOM Lecture by Prof. Barbara Klesig, Dept. of Anthropology at Cal Poly Humboldt discussing new archaeological discoveries in the Republic of North Macedonia.

Stress, Sex and Death: Health and Survival in the Context of Medieval Famine and Plague
2026-03-29 14:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | 303 Paterson Hall, Carleton University, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada
The Ann Santen Endowed Lecture

TBA (Southwest Texas (San Antonio))
2026-03-31 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (San Antonio 1), San Antonio, TX, United States
Anna Marguerite McCann and Robert D. Taggart Lectureship in Underwater Archaeology Time TBA

Diving the Pyramids: Underwater Tombs and Excavation at the Royal Cemetery of Nuri, Sudan
2026-03-31 17:30 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | TBA (Northern New Jersey), Montclair, NY, United States
The Frederick R. and Margaret B. Matson Lectureship for Near Eastern Archaeology and Archaeological Technology

Justinian’s Tree: Underwater Environmental Histories in Byzantine Harbors 2
2026-04-01 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (Austin), Austin, TX, United States

Exhibiting the Etruscans at UC Berkeley: The Phoebe A. Hearst Collection Unveiled
2026-04-07 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Dwinelle Hall, South Drive, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
A lecture by Dr. Lisa Pieraccini, AIA SF Society president, on her recent work with UC Berkeley students on exhibiting the Etruscan material from the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology. We will begin on Berkeley time at 5:10pm in Dwinelle Hall, Room 3335. Light snacks to follow.

Highly Educated Slaves and Freedmen in Republican Rome
2026-04-08 18:00 - 19:30 (Europe/Rome) | John Cabot University – Aula Magna Regina, Via della Lungara 233, Roma, Roma, 00165, Italy
Slaves and freedmen played an important yet understudied role in the literary culture of the Roman Republic. Though their work went largely uncredited, they fulfilled vital roles as editors, researchers, and collaborators in the service of Rome’s literary and political elite.
During this public lecture, Prof. Flower (Princeton University) — Rome-SPQR Society Choice Lecturer – – will illustrate the stories of these gifted and highly educated young men, from Licinius the flute-player, who shaped the rhetorical style of the orator Gaius Gracchus, to the grammarian and teacher Tyrannio of Amisus, who was brought to Rome as a war captive.
Highlighting the unique social prestige of literary production and intellectual performance in a society pervaded by slave labor, Prof. Flower will show how the exorbitant prices paid for the highly educated encouraged a complex system of training young boys for the marketplace or acquiring educated captives as booty. Enslaved and manumitted intellectuals, far from being menial workers, shared close relationships with leading Romans of the day, and were relied on as coauthors and collaborators in a range of genres, with some gaining fame as authors themselves.
With lively case studies and insightful new interpretations of the ancient sources, this lecture will paint a more nuanced picture of enslaved labor in ancient Rome, revealing how the contributions of enslaved intellectuals were closely linked to the ambitious development of Latin literary culture and the dissemination of knowledge.

Mothers, Wives, Warriors, Slaves
2026-04-14 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (Valparaiso), Valparaiso, IN, United States
Charles Eliot Norton Memorial Lectureship Time TBA

Cities and Politics of Ecology in the Hittite Borderlands: the Fortress and Urban Settlement of Karaköy Kale Tepesi
2026-04-14 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Orlando 2), Orlando, FL, United States

Provincial Coin Portraits of Roman Imperial Women and the Portrait Dissemination System
2026-04-14 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Finger Lakes), Ithaca, NY, United States
William E. Metcalf Lectures in Numismatics

The Vindolanda Coins from a Century of Excavations
2026-04-15 19:00 - 20:30 (America/New_York) | Lean Lecture Room, Wishart Hall on the College of Wooster (to be confirmed), 1189 Beall Avenue, Wooster, OH, United States

Replacing Empires. The Archaeology of Political Transformation and Spatial Dynamics in 1st Millennium BCE Mesopotamia 2
2026-04-16 00:00 - 01:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (Chicago 1), Chicago, IL, United States
Kershaw Lectures in Near East Archaeology Time TBA

Blood in the Villages: Massacres in Early Pre-State Societies
2026-04-16 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Central Indiana), IN, United States

TBA (South Pennsylvania (Carlisle))
2026-04-16 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (South Pennsylvania), Carlisle, PA, United States
William E. Metcalf Lectures in Numismatics Time TBA

TBA (Richmond)
2026-04-16 18:00 - 19:30 (America/New_York) | TBA (Richmond ), Richmond, VA, United States

Crafting and Trade: Stone Tool Production and Ancient Maya Economies
2026-04-16 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture, 2316 W 1st Ave, Spokane, WA, 99201, United States
Join us for a lecture by Dr. Rachel Horowitz, “Crafting and Trade: Stone Tool Production and Ancient Maya Economies “.
Abstract: Today, and in the past, economic activities are important ways of making connections between people. In the Maya area, modern-day Mexico and northern Central America, economies are less studied than other aspects of past Maya lifeways. In this talk, I use recently collected data about stone tool production to provide information about the Classic period Maya economy (600-900 CE). This lecture will use a case-study of stone tool producers western Belize to explore the lives of Classic period Maya stone tool producers, and how stone tools circulated throughout the economy.

TBA (Puget Sound)
2026-04-17 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | TBA (Puget Sound), WA, United States
Time TBA

Dung and Desert Copper: Environmental archaeology at the macro- and microscale
2026-04-18 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | Building 51 (Social Sciences), University of North Florida, 1 UNF Drive, Jacksonville, FL, 32224, United States
Kershaw Lectures in Near East Archaeology

Western Horizons: Phoenician Colonization in the Iron Age Mediterranean
2026-04-19 14:00 - 15:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Steinmetz “Archaeological Center”, 2901 9th St., Manhattan Beach, United States
In the tenth century BCE, the Phoenicians — Iron Age Canaanites of the coastal Levant — sailed west to the Iberian peninsula and through the Strait of Gibraltar into the Atlantic Ocean. They subsequently established colonies in Spain, Portugal, Sardinia, Sicily, and North Africa. In this talk, we will look at the evidence for when and how this happened, and also ask why. What was the situation back home in the Levant that triggered this remarkable venture? And what impact did western exploration and colonization have on the Phoenicians in their homeland, as well as on the places where they settled. Presented by Dr. David Schloen.

Archaeology and the Art Museum
2026-04-22 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Chicago) | TBA (Western Illinois), Monmouth, IL, United States

Social Justice and Archaeology at the Bade Museum
2026-04-23 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Badè Museum of Biblical Archaeology, 1798 Scenic Ave, Berkeley, CA, 94709, United States
Since the recent global pandemic, the Bade Museum has hosted a variety of online talks focused on the ancient Mediterranean and Middle Eastern world on a variety of themes related to modern social justice issues. Together with various partner institutions, but always the Archaeological Research Facility at UC Berkeley, staff has hosted over five and a half years of scholarly talks, all of which are posted on our YouTube channel, https://www.youtube.com/@bademuseum. While limited few can watch the talks through live streaming, most views come later after each zoom video is uploaded to the web. In less than 6 years, these videos have well over 50,000 views, a number that cannot be replicated in person. While topics like new approaches to ancient Nubia, unsilencing the archives, women and gender in the ancient world, Phoenician women and gender in the homeland and diaspora, and Disability in the ancient Middle East and Mediterranean might seem anachronistic; junior scholars and scholars on the margins of their fields have shown that they can study and publish work on antiquity relevant to modern issues while they themselves are breaking barriers in presenting their work to a globalized audience.
A lecture by Dr. Aaron Brody, Robert and Kathryn Riddell Professor of Bible and Archaeology and Director of the Badè Museum of Biblical Archaeology. We will begin at Berkeley time, 5:10pm, at the Badè Museum of Biblical Archaeology – 1798 Scenic Ave, Berkeley, CA.

Landscapes of Time and Memory: Foragers in the Mojave Desert 4
2026-04-23 17:30 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology, 60 George St., Providence, RI, 02912, United States

Digging in Circles: Miami's Prehistoric Legacy 2
2026-04-23 18:30 - 20:00 (America/New_York) | TBA (Rochester), Rochester, NY, United States
