Research Projects in the Department of Archaeology

The 10th-5th centuries BCE (the first centuries of the Iron Age) witnessed significant societal transformations across the Mediterranean. Populations grew in many regions, the first genuine economic integration of the basin occurred through maritime interaction and overseas settlement, and, for the first time, communities characterisable as urban and state-like are identifiable from the sea’s eastern littoral (where they had a deeper Bronze Age history) through to its Atlantic border.

EHSCAN is a Horizon-MSCA-2022-PF scheme Fellowship Funded by UKRI and hosted by the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge. 

The Mapping Africa’s Endangered Archaeological Sites and Monuments (MAEASaM) project, funded by Arcadia charitable foundation, is documenting and compiling a trans-national inventory of Africa’s rich archaeological heritage, including many previously unidentified sites and monuments. Particular emphasis is being given to mapping and recording sites under threat, whether from urban growth, conflict, sea-level change or infrastructure development, among other adverse impacts.

PersianTRAIL is a research project using Geographic Information Systems (GIS), Remote Sensing (RS), and historical-archaeological data to reconstruct the Persian Royal Road (PRR), a key infrastructure of the Achaemenid Empire (6th–4th century BCE). The project examines factors like topography, resource distribution, economy, military logistics, and environmental constraints to understand the empire’s strategic planning.

The transition from Oldowan to Acheulean technologies are hypothesised to be concomitant with advances in cognition and behaviour. However, the nature of these shifts, and their cultural and evolutionary implications are poorly defined and understood. While extensive literature exists on these technologies, significant differences in research methods and traditions make comparative and comprehensive analyses problematic.