Lecture, What did you do last summer?

Conference

This research project of the Catholic University of Leuven was created in 1976 by Professor Dr Pierre Vermeersch, who assumed its direction until 2003. The present director is Professor Dr Philip Van Peer.

Did early farmers deliberately use animal manure on their fields?

A Diachronic Perspective on the Aegean

Papers presented at a colloquium, held in honour of Professor Dr. P.J.R. Modderman, Leiden, 3-7 May 1982.

Since the adoption of agriculture people have cultivated fields. The project concerns all kinds of aspects related to raising crops.

This volume of Analecta Praehistorica Leidensia focuses on how local communities in prehistory define themselves in relation to a bigger social world.

Balikh Valley Archaeological Project Monograph 1 - BAR International Series 468

There’s a Stone Age house at Broekpolder, near the city of Vlaardingen. It wasn’t built by prehistoric people but by modern archaeologists from Leiden University and volunteers from a local initiative known as Broekpolder Federation. They used replicas of Stone Age tools, such as stone axes and chisels…

Investigating the emergence of complex societies in Chalcolithic Cyprus.

How do archaeologists test ideas about the evolution of the modern brain? Veni-researcher Geeske Langejans and then Master student Paul Kozowyk (Leiden University) prepared different Prehistoric glue recipes and tested these for strength in modern test machines at the Delft University of Technology.

After 30 days of work, the experimental reconstruction of the iron age canoe of Vlaardingen Vergulde Hand is finished! Its maiden voyage will take place on Friday the 16th of February when it will be paddled for the first time by schoolchildren from Vlaardingen.

On October 7th the Department of Law at the University of Cyprus hosted a conference on company law titled: Cross-borders Mergers Directive: EU Perspectives and National Experiences. Professor Steef Bartman (Institute of Private Law, Department of Company Law) was invited to deliver the keynote address…

Authors: Pierre-Bruno Ruffini and Olga Krasnyak

In 2018, Sorensen’s research into the fire-making habits of the Neanderthals reached the headlines all over the world. Now, a Veni grant will enable him to continue his fire-related investigation, focusing more on our own distant ancestors.

Close contact between women and dogs in prehistoric times Women and dogs were in close contact in the neolithic age of hunters-fishers-gatherers. This has been suggested by Leiden osteoarchaeologist Dr Andrea Waters-Rist and fellow researchers who have studied a tiny biological fossil. The fossil was…

The Dutch TV programme Keuringsdienst van Waarde investigated the origin of BBQ taste. Prehistoric fire expert Andrew Sorensen was invited to explain prehistoric fire making techniques.

For decades, scholars have wondered about the development and dissemination of languages around the world. What are the odds that peoples living thousands of miles apart speak varieties of Indo-European languages that are closely related? This riddle has now partly been solved thanks to an international…

In the largest study of ancient DNA ever conducted, an international team of scientists has revealed the complex story behind one of the defining periods in European prehistory. The study is published this week in the journal Nature.

Archaeologists often use the percentages of heat-affected stone or bone artifacts found at archaeological sites as a way to determine how frequently fire was used by the inhabitants. Andrew Sorensen and Fulco Scherjon have come up with a computer model called 'fiReproxies' to simulate how fires used…

Within the space of a few months, the Heritage Quest citizen science project, whereby volunteers scan elevation maps of the Veluwe area for burial mounds and other prehistoric remains, has already led to groundbreaking new insights. Hundreds of burial mounds have been found, as have a huge number of…

The Faculty of Archaeology has a long research tradition in the municipality of Oss. Since 1974, researchers and students have been carrying out archaeological research here. In Januari 2019, an enormous replica of one of the top local finds was unveiled standing in the middle of a roundabout.

Dean prof. Willem Willems has visited Japan from 8-10 September, at the invitation of the Aomori District Council in northern Honshu. Purpose of the visit was to provide assistance in the nomination process for World Heritage Site of 15 prehistoric Jomon Culture sites in northern Honshu and Hokkaido…

Lecture, Archaeological Forum

Conference

Lecture, Studium Generale

From mandrill teeth to the microstructure of bones: archaeology alumna Simone Lemmers (31) is determined to reveal the past by studying old remains. Her curiosity has led to a very international career, also in the UK, where she witnessed the Brexit referendum.

This dissertation explores how domestic political power struggles in Greece and Turkey during the Cold War engaged with the ongoing conflict in Cyprus and aims to demonstrate how socialist parties in Greece and Turkey struggled with the concept of the “nation” in battling for power and political positioning…

Chrissoula Tzanetea is a PhD student in the ERC granted research project 'An Empire of 2000 Cities: urban networks and economic integration in the Roman empire', directed by Luuk De Ligt and John Bintliff (Archaeology).

Archaeological research of coastal farming communities on the southern North Sea coast, 2000-800 BC

This dissertation investigates the impressive prehistoric cultivated landscape of the eastern part of West Frisia.

The project seeks to come to an understanding of the archaeology of the desert and the ways in which its inhabitants engaged with their constraint, marginal environments through time. It compares and interprets site distribution and community organisation over a long time scale and across several different…

Four studies on its prehistoric occupation and Holocene geology. With a contribution by Agatha S. Knip, Late Neolithic Skeleton Finds from Molenaarsgraaf (Z.H.).

Prehistoric burial mounds are still ubiquitous in the Northwest European landscape, but not much is known on the landscape they were part of, nor on what preceded them.

Case-studies on use-wear analysis of prehistoric flint tools

Built Environment and Domestic Material Culture in the Medieval and Post-Medieval Cyclades, Greece (13th – 20th Centuries AD)

Leiden Journal of Pottery Studies 21, 2005

The Faculty of Archaeology produces several journals

The Faculty of Archaeology offers a dynamic research environment for PhD researchers. Their projects at the Faculty span all fields in archaeological research, from fieldwork to lab work and heritage issues, from prehistoric to modern times, worldwide.

Our research deals with the deep history of Europe and Eurasia, from the inception of farming up until the beginning of the Roman Period. This was a period in which key developments took place that had a profound impact on European landscapes and society until the present day. Our research and teaching…

The project Deconstructing Stability aims to improve reconstructions of late prehistoric landscapes and predictive models for the purpose of archaeological heritage management.