AIA Archaeology Hour September 2025: Beer in Mesopotamia
2025-09-17 20:00 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | https://www.archaeological.org/event/aia-archaeology-hour-2025-26-beer-in-mesopotamia/
Join the AIA for a fascinating evening with Tate Paulette as he kicks off this season of AIA Archaeology Hour with “Beer in Ancient Mesopotamia.”
This presentation will be given at 8pm Eastern/7pm Central/6pm Mountain/5pm Pacific.

Register here!

Community Data Collection Day at Providence’s North Burial Ground
2025-09-18 13:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology, Rhode Island Hall, Brown University, 60 George Street, Providence, RI, 02912, United States
Help preserve Providence history! Join the Joukowsky Institute for Archaeology and the Ancient World and the staff of Providence’s North Burial Ground for a community data collection day within the cemetery’s old Colonial sections. Founded in 1700, North Burial Ground predates the founding of the United States and the charter of the City of Providence. Help document the oldest tombstones at NBG to aid in research about Providence’s history and future preservation decisions. You will also learn about the cemetery’s history and many of the stories within it. Free and open to the public, and all ages are welcome. Please bring a pencil and a writing, though a limited number of clipboards and pencils will be available at the event.
Location: North Burial Ground, Rochambeau Entrance. Free parking on Main Street, or take the R bus line.
Contact: jiaaw@brown.edu or (401) 863-3188.

Archaeology Month Celebration at Battlefield Park
2025-09-20 10:00 - 14:00 (America/New_York) | Tippecanoe Battlefield Park, 200 Battleground Ave, Battleground, IN, 47920, United States
Join the Tippecanoe County Historical Association and Purdue University’s Department of Anthropology to celebrate Indiana Archaeology Month!
This free, all-ages event will feature many hands-on activities, including an Atl Atl dart throw, Artifact Show and Tell and Identification, a mini excavation, and archaeology activity books. The Tippecanoe Battlefield Museum will also have free entry.

The Iconographic and Spatial Role of Gate Guardian Demons in Deir el-Medina Tombs
2025-09-21 15:00 - 16:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | ARCE Egyptology Lectures Room 254 Social Sciences Building, UC Berkeley, Berkeley, California, 94720, United States
The American Research Center in Egypt, Northern California chapter, and the UC Berkeley Department of Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures (MELC) invite you to attend a lecture by Jess Johnson, UC Berkeley
“The Iconographic and Spatial Role of Gate Guardian Demons in Deir el-Medina Tombs”
Sunday September 21, 2025, 3 PM Pacific Daylight Time
MELC Lounge/Rm 254 Social Sciences Building (formerly Barrows Hall), UC Berkeley
Because of nearby construction, please allow extra time to find a place to park.
This is an in-person lecture and is not virtual. No registration is required. The lecture will be recorded for later publication on the chapter’s YouTube channel.
About the Lecture:
Material culture from Deir el-Medina [DeM] contains multiple representations of demons. Yet there exists little study on how demons fit into religion in the settlement. While the broader scholarly definition of demon remains fluid, conceptual ideas include aspects of protection, liminality, and the relationship between location and capability. Gate guardian demons (Book of the Dead [BD] 144-147), in particular, are often cited because of their frequent textual and visual representation in papyri and, notably, Deir el-Medina tombs. These artisans equipped themselves with BD 144-147 in their tombs, including text and wall paintings of the gate guardians, thus prompting questions about the function of the visual representations (wall paintings), the function of gate guardians in the BD, and the location of the scenes within the architectural space of the tomb. This talk uses materiality theory to study the relationship between text, visual representation, and architecture within the burial chambers in seven DeM tombs, and considers how these factors influence DeM artisans’ visual representation and conceptualization of demons. Through this study, we can better understand patterns of artistic production and preference, and how and why texts and scenes were mapped onto tomb walls.
About the Speaker:
Jess Johnson is a Ph.D. Candidate in the Middle Eastern Languages and Cultures department at UC Berkeley. She received her B.A. in Art History from New York University in 2013 and her M.A. in Egyptian Art History and Archaeology and a Graduate Certification in Museum Studies from the University of Memphis in 2016. Her dissertation takes advantage of the commonly overlooked vignettes and tomb wall paintings of the Book of the Dead and the intriguing demonic entities mentioned within it. Jess is also interested in the museological well-being of Egyptian collections. She has over ten years of experience working in museums within university settings, galleries, and auction houses. She hopes to continue both her Egyptological and Museum Studies passions interchangeably through pursuing a career as a Curator.
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Parking is available in UC lots all day on weekends, for a fee. Ticket dispensing machines accept debit or credit cards. Parking is available in lots around the Social Sciences Building, and in lots along Bancroft. A map of the campus is available online at http://www.berkeley.edu/map/ .
About Northern California ARCE:
For more information, please visit https://www.youtube.com/@NorthernCaliforniaARCE, https://www.facebook.com/NorthernCaliforniaARCE, https://arce-nc.org, https://bsky.app/profile/khentiamentiu.bsky.social, and https://khentiamentiu.org. To join the chapter or renew your membership, please go to https://arce.org/membership/ and select “Berkeley, CA” as your chapter when you sign up.

Reports from the Field 2025
2025-09-23 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Los_Angeles) | Dwinelle Hall, South Drive, Berkeley, CA, 94720, United States
We are excited to start the year by hearing UC Berkeley graduate students report on their summer research and excavation experiences at various sites across the globe. Shelby Medina (Anthropology) will discuss her magnetometry work at the site of Tugunbulak in Uzbekistan. Bella Blanton (Ancient History & Mediterranean Archaeology) will speak about the field season of the Notion Archaeological Project, a Michigan-Turkish excavation of Ionian Greek city. Layla Fistos (Ancient History & Mediterranean Archaeology) will present on her work studying amulets from the American University of Beirut Museum in Lebanon.

A Deep Dive into Deep Time: Archaeology, Underwater
2025-09-23 18:30 - 20:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Northwest Museum of Arts & Culture, 2316 W 1st Ave, Spokane, WA, 99201, United States
The phrase “underwater archaeology” conjures up notions of shipwrecks, ships lost at sea, and the dramatic catastrophes that sank them; however, archaeology underwater can also reveal details about ancient landscapes that contain a record of past human occupations. Many of these sites are on the earth’s continental shelves where vast stretches of shallow, coastal land were exposed at the end of the last Ice Age. These once dry landscapes supported life for plants, animals and humans for thousands of years. Learn about these ancient submerged sites, the role they play in the global archaeological record and what unique data they have about the past. The talk will provide a general overview and then focus on 9,000-year-old submerged sites in the North American Great Lakes.
This lecture is graciously supported by an R.J. Webster Lectureship grant.

Student Reports from the Field
2025-09-23 19:30 - 21:00 (America/New_York) | Semans Auditorium (Room 117), Belk Visual Arts Center, Davidson College, 315 N. Main St., Davidson, NC, 28036, United States
Students from Davidson, UNC Charlotte, and Winthrop will report on their summer excavation experiences. A great opportunity for students to hear what going on a dig is like!

New Approaches to Roman Urbanism: The Excavations of the Falerii Novi Project (Lazio, Italy)
2025-09-25 17:00 - 18:00 (America/New_York) | University at Buffalo, Academic Center 320 (Goetz Library), 155 Lee Rd, Buffalo, NY, 14228, United States
Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lecture

Kentucky Society Lecture with Anne Duray
2025-09-25 17:00 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | Transylvania University., Lexington, KY, 40508
Time TBD

Play Again: Combining Archaeological and AI Methods to Study Ancient Games
2025-09-25 18:00 - 19:30 (America/Phoenix) | https://www.archaeological.org/event/play-again-combining-archaeological-and-ai-methods-to-study-ancient-games/
Play Again: Combining Archaeological and AI Methods to Study Ancient Games
with
Walter Crist, PhD
Lecturer
Faculty of Humanities
Centre for the Arts in Society
New Media & Digital Culture
Leiden University
The archaeology of ancient play has recently undergone a renaissance, as researchers have couched previous culture-historical research on ancient games in anthropological and archaeological theory, demonstrating the importance of play in ancient life. Further advances in AI technology allow for new applications of this technology in the study of ancient games, and the possibilities of such methods are only beginning to be explored. This research explores two case studies where AI-simulated play, when combined with traditional archaeological methods, provide new insights about ancient games.
Biography
Walter Crist is a Lecturer at the Faculty of Humanities at Leiden University. His PhD dissertation (Arizona State University, 2016) examined the archaeological context of Bronze Age game boards in Cyprus to explore the intersection between gaming activity and social complexity. He is the lead author on the book Ancient Egyptians at Play, and has researched ancient games in Cyprus, Egypt, Azerbaijan, Greece, Turkey, and the Netherlands. As a postdoctoral researcher on the ERC Digital Ludeme Project, he constructed the Ludii Games Database, which documents the knowledge of the rules for traditional board games globally over the past 5000 years. Recent explorations on the ways that AI can inform archaeological research on games continue through his position as Vice Chair of the COST Action GameTable: Computational Techniques for Tabletop Games Heritage.
Registration is required. Follow this link to register: https://asu.zoom.us/meeting/register/KMQBlfk-TYCqAMr0j6l21w#/registration

Politics of Placement: The Development of the 18th Dynasty Theban Necropolis
2025-09-27 15:30 - 17:00 (America/New_York) | Penn Museum, 3260 South Street, Philadelphia, PA, 19104, United States
Saturday, Sept. 27
3:30 PM EST
Penn Museum, Anthro Classroom 345
In-person; no registration required
Speaker: Dr. JJ Shirley, Managing Editor, Journal of Egyptian History; Director, TT110 Project; ARCE-PA Vice President
Title: Politics of Placement: The Development of the 18th Dynasty Theban Necropolis
Abstract:
In the 18th Dynasty the Theban Necropolis became a preferred location for elite burials, witnessing an explosion of tomb construction. But how did officials decide where to place their tombs? What were the determining factors? Rock quality, location on the mountain, spatial relationship to royal mortuary temples, status, some combination of these?
This talk focuses on the development of Sheikh Abd el-Qurna during the 18th Dynasty to examine the changes and shifts that took place both in tomb location and in which officials were able to build tombs. Certainly, a major purpose of a tomb was to enhance one’s afterlife, and thus having a good view to the royal mortuary temples and access to royal and sacred festival processions would have played a role in where a tomb was placed. However, there are also clear indications that a tomb served as a reflection of one’s place in the living world. As such, a tomb owner’s family and career could help to determine a tomb’s location in the necropolis. By examining the tombs from the perspective of the officials’ lives, it becomes clear that who one was, both in terms of family and career – which after all is how an ancient Egyptian defined himself – seems to have been a dominating factor in tomb placement within Sheikh Abd el-Qurna, but likely carried through into other parts of the necropolis as well.
Speaker Bio:
Dr. JJ Shirley received her PhD from The Johns Hopkins University, and has taught Egyptian Art, Archaeology and Language at the University of Michigan, University of Wales, Swansea, and as a Visiting Assistant Professor at Bryn Mawr College. Since 2007 she has been the Managing Editor for the Journal of Egyptian History, published by Brill. She has been ARCE-PA’s Vice President for many years, and also serves on several ARCE National committees. In 2014 Dr. Shirley founded the TT110 Field School, which focuses on epigraphic, illustration, and research training for Egyptian Ministry officials, and for which she has received three Antiquities Endowment Fund grants from the American Research Center in Egypt.
Dr. Shirley’s research interests include Late Second Intermediate Period and Early New Kingdom socio-political history and administration, power dynamics in the ancient world, manifestations of social status in art and architecture, Theban Tombs, and landscape archaeology. Her published work to date has largely focused on the intersection of prosopography and the socio-political history of Dynasty 18. She is currently working on a full publication of TT110 utilizing the new drawings produced by the field school students.
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Lectures are FREE to ARCE Members, $7 for University of Pennsylvania Museum Members and UPenn Staff and Faculty, $5 for Students with ID, and $10 for the general public.
Light refreshments served starting at 3pm.
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The American Research Center in Egypt (ARCE) is a private, nonprofit organization founded in 1948 by a consortium of educational and cultural institutions to support research on all aspects of Egyptian history and culture, foster broader knowledge among the general public, and strengthen American-Egyptian cultural ties. The ARCE Pennsylvania Chapter (ARCE-PA) is the local branch of the national institution. We host monthly events including scholarly lectures, Egyptian-themed workshops, social events, and guided tours of the Penn Museum’s Egyptian galleries. For more information or to learn about the perks of membership, please send an e-mail to info@arce-pa.org, or visit our website at www.arce-pa.org.

Texas Archeology Month with the Maxey House
2025-10-01 08:00 - 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Sam Bell Maxey House State Historic Site, 812 S Church St, Paris, TX, 75460, United States
Join us all of October for Texas Archeology Month at the Maxey House and Evergreen Cemetery. This event is a perfect opportunity for history enthusiasts and families to learn about the local archeology.
The Maxey House will have two free outdoor exhibits that can be seen by visitors throughout the entire month:
1) The first outdoor exhibit focuses on the historic structures that once stood on the grounds but are no longer there. Visitors can read more information on each of the structures by scanning QR codes placed next to each structure’s outline. The exhibit is located on site, 812 South Church Street in Paris, and can be explored seven days a week from 8:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m.
2) The second exhibit is located at Evergreen Cemetery, 560 Evergreen Street in Paris, where visitors will be able to learn about the meanings behind different symbols on certain gravestones by scanning QR codes. Visitors can explore Evergreen Cemetery seven days a week from dawn until dusk.
For more information, feel free to contact Elana at 903-785-5716 or elana.barton@thc.texas.gov.

Archaeology-Hour Screening: Beer in Mesopotamia
2025-10-02 17:00 - 18:00 (America/Los_Angeles) | Whitman College Maxey Hall 207, 173 Stanton St., Walla Walla, WA, 99362, United States
Please join us for an in-person screening and informal discussion of the Archaeology Hour talk by Tate Paulette (North Carolina State University).
The inhabitants of the “land between rivers” (Mesopotamia) — today known as the Tigris and Euphrates rivers — experimented with many “firsts”… from urbanism to kingship to formalized systems of cuneiform writing. They also built the world’s first great beer culture. They loved their beer: its colors, textures, tastes, and intoxicating effects. They sipped it through long reed straws and praised it in song and story. They drank beer at home, on the job, and in neighborhood taverns––also at feasts, festivals and religious ceremonies. In this talk, Tate Paulette introduces his new book, In the Land of Ninkasi: A History of Beer in Ancient Mesopotamia. This authoritative but light-hearted account explains exactly what we know about the beers, brewers, and drinkers of ancient Mesopotamia, what can be deciphered about it today, and what puzzles still remain to be solved.

Replacing Empires. The Archaeology of Political Transformation and Spatial Dynamics in 1st Millennium BCE Mesopotamia
2025-10-02 17:30 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | Foster Auditorium, Paterno Library, the Pennsylvania State University, 201 Old Main, University Park, PA, 16802, United States
Kershaw Lectures in Near East Archaeology

Mountain Archaeology and Climate Change
2025-10-03 08:00 - 17:00 (America/Chicago) | Thurman J. White Forum Building, 1704 Asp Ave, Norman, OK, 73072, United States
Dr. Aldenderfer will examine how past mountain peoples adapted to shifting climates, asking whether their strategies can inform those living in highland environments today. Drawing on archaeological evidence from regions such as the Alps, Andes, and Himalayas, he will discuss human resilience and vulnerability in the face of glacier retreat, variable precipitation, biodiversity loss, and climate-driven hazards.

Learn at Lunchtime virtual Lectures PHMC The PA State Museum
2025-10-03 12:00 - 13:00, 2025-10-10 12:00 - 13:00 (America/New_York) | The State Museum of Pennsylvania, Harrisburg, PA, United States
Series of 4 Friday virtual lectures on archaeological subjects with four different lecturers.

Spokane Archaeology Day
2025-10-04 10:00 - 15:00 (America/Vancouver) | Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, 2316 West 1st Avenue, Spokane, WA, 99201, United States
The Spokane Society, along with other archaeological organizations, will welcome the public at booths on the grounds of the Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture. Activities will be available for all ages.

2025 Archaeological investigations at Fort Brewerton.
2025-10-04 10:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York) | Fort Brewerton & Oliver Stevens Blockhouse Museum, Box 392 9 US Route 11, Brewerton, NY, 13029, United States
Join us for a day of archaeological investigations at Fort Brewerton.
Following a successful ground penetrating radar and magnetometer survey in the spring, we can now use this new data to give us more confidence in finding the remains of the north wall of blockhouse # 4. Previous excavations in this area over the last 4 years have yielded many interesting artifacts and features, giving us clues and its layout and use. Our first excavation on the 4th will be followed up by our second excavation on the 18th on international archaeology day.
Current Fort Brewerton Historical Society members are welcome to assist in the excavation, members of the public are welcome to observe. Please message us if you plan on volunteering to assist in the excavation. The blockhouse museum will not be open for tours on the 4th.
Additionally, members of the New York State Archaeological Association are welcomed to participate with written permission from their chapter representative. Please contact us for more information.

(Early) International Archaeology Day at the Rochester Museum and Science Center
2025-10-04 11:00 - 15:00 (America/New_York) | Rochester Museum and Science Center, 657 East Avenue, Rochester, NY, 14607, United States
Meet members of the Rochester Society of the Archaeological Institute of America for hands-on family activities including a mini-dig, arts and crafts, and play-doh, and have a chance to check out archaeology books, magazines, and real and reproduction artifacts!

Arkansas ArcheOlympics
2025-10-04 11:00 - 15:00 (America/Chicago) | Arkansas Archeological Survey Research Station, Winthrop Rockefeller Institute, 1 Rockefeller Dr, Morrilton, AR, 72110, United States
The ArcheOlympics is an annual competition that brings together teams of archeology students, Arkansas Archeological Society members, middle school students, and anyone else interested in archeology and having fun. The games consist of 3 events in which teams compete to show off their skills and knowledge in archeology-based games. The first is throwing a spear with an atlatl. This takes some skill, so most teams get together and practice before the event. Archeoletes throw for both distance and accuracy during the competition. The second event is the trivia contest. This event changes slightly each year based on the gameshow format that we choose, but archeoletes answer questions about archeology, important archeological sites, archeological ethics, and other topics related to the theme. This event directly pits teams against each other in answering the questions. The third event is the Excavation to Curation Obstacle course. The course changes slightly each year, but teams work together to make their way through the simulated stages of archeological research. They must lay out a 1m x 1m unit, “excavate” the unit, collect artifacts and interpret them, curate the artifacts, write the report, and get it accepted for publication.

Archaeology and the Art Museum: How To Be an Archaeologically Informed Curator
2025-10-05 15:00 - 16:00 (America/New_York) | Brock University, St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada
Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureships

The Missing Link: A Wari-Related Burial in Huanchaco, North Coast of Peru
2025-10-08 17:00 - 19:00 (America/New_York) | University of Florida, Library West, Room 212, 400 SW 13th Street, Gainesville, FL, 32601, United States
Despite more than 100 years of archaeological research on the North Coast of Peru, very little is known about the transition from the so-called Moche society into the Chimu empire.
This timeframe, CIRCA A.D. 850-1000/1050, is poorly understood not only in the North Coast of Peru, but more broadly all over the Central Andean Region. Current models explain this period of time as a moment of political, economic, and militaristic control of the Wari Society.
This southern highland group has expanded as a well-organized state-like formation. Indeed, some scholars suggest that it may be the first Andean empire, and current models also suggest alternative scenarios. The recent burial in Huanchaco provides insight into the behavior of lower elites following the collapse of the Moche society and its transition into the Chimu Empire, highlighting the persistence of religious and artistic traditions from earlier times, as well as the innovations introduced from the highlands to the coast.

Out of Anatolia: Hittites, Homer and the Trojan War
2025-10-08 17:30 - 18:30 (America/New_York) | Yale University, Phelps Hall, Room 401, New Haven, CT
Homer A. and Dorothy B. Thompson Lectureship

Buried in Enemy territory: A Spartan tomb in Athens
2025-10-09 16:00 - 17:00 (America/Edmonton) | Business Building 2-09, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada
Oscar Broneer Memorial Lecture

The Kingdom of Philoktetes: Northern Greece in the Age of Homer
2025-10-09 16:30 - 18:00 (America/New_York) | Ontario

Mothers, Wives, Warriors, Slaves: Violence and Women in the Ancient World
2025-10-09 17:00 - 18:30 (America/Phoenix) | Ontario
Charles Eliot Norton Memorial Lectureship

Young archaeologists
2025-10-10 00:00 - 13:00, 2025-10-10 08:00 - 17:00 (Europe/Tirane) | Museum of Peja, Haxhi Zeka Square, Peja, Kosova, 38000
We will conduct (simulated) archaeological excavations with primary school students, dividing them into five groups: Archaeologist, Restorer, Conservator, Documentarian, and Repository Recorder. The activity will be held in the Archaeological Park near the Museum of Peja and will last one hour from 12:00 to 13:00.
