ArchaeoSciences Seminar

The ArchaeoScience#RO Platform of the Research Institute of the University of Bucharest (ICUB) is pleased to announce the fourth ArchaeoSciences Seminars.

This seminars are a new initiative of our platform that has the goal of providing a setting for professionals in the Archaeological Sciences field from different parts of the world to share knowledge, and transmit meaningful information about the latest issues regarding the current methods and approaches used to study the past. It is also a chance for Romanian students to learn more about the various interdisciplinary aspects of archaeology.

The fourth seminar will take place on 24-27 September 2019 at the University of Bucharest, and our guest speakers are Professor John Chapman and Dr. Bisserka Gaydarska from Durham University, UK.

Emeritus Professor John Chapman has recently retired from Durham University after working there since 1996, first as Reader, then as Professor. He worked in the University of Newcastle upon Tyne from 1980 after working for four years in British provincial museums. He has written on a wide range of themes relating to the social archaeology of the Balkan Mesolithic – Neolithic – Copper Age, making a global contribution to the understanding of social structure and practices in later Balkan prehistory. John has co-directed three fully published international inter-disciplinary regional survey and excavation projects – the Neothermal Dalmatia Project (1982 – 86), the Upper Tisza Project (1991 – 1999) and the Trypillia megasites Project– each defining the future research agenda for the regions in question and making major contributions to their understanding. In collaboration with Bisserka, John has also created a new sub-field of archaeology through fragmentation analysis, now recognized as having major significance from the Early Palaeolithic onwards and in many parts of the world.

Dr. Bisserka Gaydarska is a Research Fellow at the Department of Archaeology in Durham University. After graduating from Sofia University, she received her PhD in Durham University, which has been fostering most of her research activities. Apart from her homeland, Bulgaria, Bisserka has been involved in various field projects and museum studies in Romania, Greece, Turkey and recently Ukraine. Her research interests are in archaeological methods and theory, GIS application in archaeology, AMS dating, landscape archaeology and interdisciplinary studies. Together with John Chapman she is a leading specialist in fragmentation studies in archaeology and the interpretative link between fragments and enchainment that is one of her principal research themes has recently been adjudged as an 'essential constitutive condition of archaeology' (Jones 2012, 19). Bisserka has pioneered many current approaches in Bulgarian prehistory, such as  bio-archaeology (AMS dating and dietary studies of the Varna and Durankulak cemeteries), social archaeology (hoarding, deliberate house burning and structured deposition in Maritsa Iztok, Omurtag and Kosharna), landscape archaeology (GIS applications in Maritsa Iztok, megalithic investigations in Gorno Novo selo and Bozhurka), material culture studies (the chaîne opératoire and the artefact biography approach to Spondylus ornaments from Varna and Orlovo), as well as trade and exchange studies (exploitation and production of salt). Her current involvement with the largest 4th millennium sites in Europe - the Nebelivka mega-site in Ukraine focuses on evaluating the global phenomena of urban development, that in addition to bridging the best of both traditions - the Western and ex-Soviet, is also developing a critical assessment of the current concept of urbanism. Last but not least , Bisserka has been involved with Caridff University in the ERC Project 'The times of their lives'.

They will take part in several events at the University of Bucharest, grouped under the title “Contemporary Issues and Debates in Neolithic Archaeology. Talks, Debates & Lectures".

For further details, please check the event program.