Frontiers of the European Iron Age

CONFERENCE with a regional focus on Central Italy

20th - 22nd September, 2013. Magdalene College and the McDonald Institute, Cambridge.

Frontiers take many forms. Some frontiers are well demarcated, others are "fuzzy", permeable or liminal. Some frontiers have an enduring quality in memory and materiality, others are transitory. Frontiers range in depth and definition, and in their entanglement with topography, culture and politics. This conference will focus on one region (central Italy) and one phase (from the Iron Age to Romanisation), in order to understand the distinctive regional development of central Italy (e.g. Etruscans, Latins and Umbrians), but the organizers warmly encourage discourse with, and contributions on, other periods and regions. We particularly welcome the continued engagement with scholars who have attended the previous conferences in the series. A comparative approach is particularly encouraged, notably with Scotland, Wales, Northern Ireland, England and Central Europe

The main goals of the conference are:

• To facilitate dialogue between European scholars working on frontiers and disseminate the latest thinking;
• To explore the diversity and durability of early frontiers in the mind and materiality;
• To focus on new interpretations of frontiers that go beyond modernist treatment, taking into account anthropological reasoning;
• To consider European Iron Age archaeology as a pre-Roman European archaeology overcoming the Mediterranean/non-Mediterranean divide;
• To analyze the emergence of new frontier concepts with the emergence of the Roman World;
• To focus on Central Italy within a much broader geographical context;
• To relate tuder, toderor totcor, Fines Finium, and other corresponding boundary concepts outside ancient Italy, to material realities

Contributors are invited to present papers on the construction and development of early frontiers by presenting both new data and innovative views on theoretical approaches to frontiers. Suggested materials for frontier construction include, but are not limited to:

• topography and landscape
• settlement and place
• monumentality (including religious and defensive)
• material culture
• burial and the body
• the entangled discourses of written, oral and material sources
• the relationship of concepts to material realities

The following are amongst those expected to give papers, act as discussants or give posters at the conference (alphabetical order by surname):

Valeria Acconcia (Chieti); Craig Alexander (Cambridge); Laura Ambrosini (Roma); Angelo Amoroso (Rome); Marco Arizza (Rome); Peter Attema (Groningen); Gilda Bartoloni (Rome); Hilary Becker (Mississippi); Enrico Benelli (Rome); Eleanor Betts (Open University); Paola Bianchi (Parma); Cristina Biella (Southampton); Laura Bonomi (Perugia); Chiara Boggio (Parma); Marcella Boglione (Bologna); Guy Bradley (Cardiff); Ivan Cangemi (Ann Arbor); Letizia Ceccarelli (Cambridge); Luana Cenciaioli (Perugia); Christopher Chippindale (Cambridge); Gabriele Cifani (Rome); Francesco Cifarelli (Rome); Maureen Cohen (Edinburgh); Fabio Colivicchi (Kingston, Ontario); Anna De Lucia (Roma); Anna Depalmas (Sassari); Luca Desibio (Rome); Massimiliano Di Fazio (Pavia);Francesco di Gennaro (Rome); Giorgia di Paola (Foggia); Ingrid Edlund-Berry (Austin); Jerry Evans (Birmingham); Julia Farley (Leicester); Amalia Faustoferri (Chieti); Nicoletta Frapiccini (Ancona); Francesca Fulminante (Cambridge); Sandra Gatti (Rome); Antonio Gomez Rincon (Madrid); Margarita Gleba (London); Marijke Gnade (Amsterdam); Alessandro Guidi (Rome); Susanna Harris (London); Theresa Huntsman (St. Louis, Missouri); Cristiano Iaia (Napoli); Elena Isayev (Exeter); Olivia Kelley (Sydney); Daniella Locatelli (Parma); Kathryn Lomas (London); Simonetta Lupi (Florence); Adrian Maldonado (Glasgow); Laura Matacchioni (Perugia); Luca Mattei (Rome); Marina Micozzi (Viterbo); Giovanni Millemaci (Florence); Phil Mills (Leicester); Oliver Nakoinz (Kiel); Camilla Norman (Sydney); Eoin O'Donoghue (Galway); Marco Pacciarelli (Napoli); Mark Pearce (Nottingham); Elisa Perego (London); Phil Perkins (Open University); Alessandra Piergrossi (Rome); Spencer Pope (Hamilton, Ontario); Ulla Rajala (Cambridge); Daniela Rossi (Rome); Hamdi Sahin (Istanbul); Figen Sahin (Istanbul); Eduardo Sanchez Moreno (Madrid); Sueva Savelli (Bologna); Michele Scalici (Bologna); Rafael Scopacasa (Exeter); Lucy Shipley (Southampton); Christopher Smith (Rome); Tesse Stek (Leiden); Alfonso Stiglitz (Cagliari); Simon Stoddart (Cambridge); Marlene Suano (Sao Paolo); Nella Sudano (Lecce); Jacopo Tabolli (Rome); Cristina Taddei (Florence); Frederik Tobin (Uppsala); Mario Torelli (Perugia); Angela Trentacoste (Sheffield); Elisabetta Viggiani (London); Gregory Warden (Lugano); Peter Wells (Minnesota); Andrea Zifferero (Siena)

Timetable and locations:

• Titles of contributions and declaration of interest (only poster space now available): here
• Paper Abstract Deadline: 1 May 2013 (now closed)
• Posters - Deadline for booking of wall space and accompanying abstract 1 July: here
• Please download the poster template: here
• Current programme is here:
• Current abstracts are here:
• Early Registration deadline (conference fee only 40 sterling): 15 August 2013. Please download Registration form (word format) here: and automated form (pdf format) here:
• Accommodation deadline: 15 August 2013. Please download Registration form (word format) here: and automated form (pdf format) here:
• Late Registration deadline (increased conference fee of 50 sterling): 14 September 2013
• The last date for any meal bookings is Friday 13th September 2013
• Publication details are here
• Student bursaries (supported by the the ACE Foundation and the Cambridge Italian Research Network). You are asked to apply directly and briefly to Simon Stoddart giving your age, status, need and intellectual interests.
• The main venue for the conference is the Cripps Building of Magdalene College which can be seen on a map here. The entrance is by foot or bicycle from Chesterton Lane. You will be asked to check in just inside this entrance to the left opposite the Porters Lodge. This is also the location of accommodation within Magdalene (although if you have booked accommodation for Thurday evening, you are asked to go to the Porters Lodge in the main body of the college - see next bullet point for the location).
• The (pre-booked) conference dinner at 7.30 on Saturday evening will be in the main body of the college here, where there is a 24 hour Porters Lodge, indicated by the black bowler hat. This is the place to check in if you arrive on the Thursday evening. Messages will be relayed to the conference organisers during the conference on 01223 332100 from this Porters Lodge.
• A reception will be held on the Friday evening at 7.00 pm to view the posters presented at the conference
• An exhibition on Ancient Umbria in the Fitzwilliam Museum will be open during the conference and a special viewing will take place at 4.00 pm on Sunday 22 September. The catalogue can be downloaded here
• Further details from Letizia Ceccarelli and from Simon Stoddart.