UCL Institute of Archaeology

• Magister, PhD
• Marie Curie Research Fellow

Research Interests

• Glass production in ancient Egypt
• Egyptian Late Period sacred architecture
• Late Antique glass from the Eastern Mediterranean

Current Research

Glass in Late Antiquity: Science and Society (GLASS)

Since its discovery, glass has always been an important and very significant material, reflecting a certain social status. The earliest glass finds derive from contexts in Egypt and Mesopotamia and date back to the 16th century BC. Early glass was mainly core-formed and at that time exclusively produced for the highest elite. Glass production faced a dramatic upturn with the introduction of glass blowing in the late 1st century BC. This technique allowed a much greater variety of shapes and a higher speed of manufacture, thus leading to a rapid evolution and expansion of styles and types. At the same time the cost of production was reduced and glass became available for a much wider section of the society; by the middle of the 1st century AD glass vessels had moved from valuable, high-status objects to a material commonly available.

Glass from post-dynastic sites in Egypt has rarely been afforded proper attention, often being presented as an afterthought to ceramic studies. In recent years an increasing interest in the scientific investigation of ancient glass production, trade, exchange and technological developments has arisen, seeking to integrate new technological achievements into traditional Egyptological/Classical/Near Eastern archaeological research. Scientific glass studies are able to elucidate changes in production, supply and trade patterns, reflecting important political, historical, social and economic developments. Thus scientific glass studies are currently one of the most dynamic and promising fields of research. While work in regions such as Roman Britain or the Levant has already shown the immense potential of applying natural sciences in an archaeological context, Late Antique glass from Egypt has almost exclusively been studied by using traditional typological methods.

The GLASS project seeks to address the lack of research about Late Antique to Early Islamic glass from Egypt and its trade by combining archaeological, chemical, and historical methods. It builds upon excavations at Tell Basta/Bubastis (Egypt) where a large amount of Late Antique glass has recently been excavated. Using this glass corpus as a case study, research questions such as the glass supply and consumption in Bubastis, but also more general questions about glass trade pattern, recycling issues, the status of glass objects and glass imitation, will be addressed. It will integrate these results into a larger discussion and draw conclusions concerning various economic, cultural, social and historical aspects of Egypt's glass use and consumption in the context of the Mediterranean glass trade throughout the Late Antique and Early Islamic periods.

Research Projects

• 2009 -  Principal investigator of Late Ptolemaic – Early Islamic glass finds at Tell Basta/Bubastis
• 2008 -  Deputy director of the Tell Basta-Project, Joint Mission (University of Göttingen (Germany)/Surpreme Council of Antiquities (Egypt)/Egypt Exploration Society (UK)
• 2001-2006 Principal Investigator of the archaeological remains of the Late Period at Bubastis

Educational Background

• 2008: PhD in Archaeolgy and Cultural History of North Eastern Africa (Egypt),Department of Archaeology and Cultural History of North Eastern Africa, Humboldt University Berlin (Germany).
  Thesis title: "The Temple-house of the Great Temple of Bastet at Bubastis"
• 2003: Magister Artium in Egyptology and Classical Archaeology, Richard Lepsius Institut for Egyptology and Winckelmann Institute for Classical Archaeology, Humboldt-University Berlin (Germany).

Monographs

• Rosenow, D. 2011. The Temple-house of the Great Temple of Bastet at Bubastis, BUBASTICA 1, Marburg.

Edited volumes

• Rosenow, D., Gander, M., Lange, E., Loth, M., Vaelske, V. 2006. Egypt – A Temple for Animals, Achet Verlag Berlin.

Journal articles and conference proceedings

• Rosenow, D. In prep 2012. Glass and the City – Glass in Late Antique Bubastis.   Archaeometry 
• Rosenow, D. In prep 2012. Glass Vessels from Tell Basta/Bubastis (Egypt), in: Neighbours and successors of Rome. Traditions of glass production and use in Europe and the Middle East in the later first millennium AD, Proceedings of the Conference held at York May 19th – 20th, 2011
• Rosenow, D., Spencer, N. In prep 2012. A Naos of Nekhthorheb – Addendum, in: British Museum Studies of Ancient Egypt and Sudan
• Rosenow, D. 2011. Der Nektanebos-Tempel, in: Christian Tietze (ed.), Tell Basta XX, Vorläufiger Grabungsbericht der 20. Kampagne, Potsdam
• Rosenow, D. 2010. Revealing new landscape features at Tell Basta, in: Egyptian Archaeology 37, London, 17-18
• Rosenow, D. 2009. The Tell Basta-Project: Spring Season 2009 Fieldwork at Tell Basta (Nile Currents), in: KMT 20, No. 3, 5
• Rosenow, D. 2008. Bubastis –City of the Cat Goddess Bastet, in: Ancient Egyptian Magazine 9, Volume 9, No. 1, Issue 49, London, 27-33
• Rosenow, D. 2008. The Naos of ‘Bastet, Lady of the Shrine’from Bubastis, in: Journal of Egyptian Archaeology 94, 247-66
• Rosenow, D. 2008. The Great Temple of Bastet at Bubastis, in: Egyptian Archaeology 32, London, 11-13
• Rosenow, D. 2008. Es stinkt -Hygiene im Alten Ägypten, in: Rainer Hannig/ Petra Vomberg/ Orell Witthuhn (eds), Marburger Treffen zur altägyptischen Medizin. Vorträge und Ergebnisse 2002–2007, Beihefte der Göttinger Miszellen, 35-47
• Rosenow, D. 2006. Es spukt –Magische Praktiken in der altägyptischen Frauenheilkunde, in: Rainer Hannig/ Petra Vomberg/ Orell Witthuhn (eds), Altägyptische Heilkunde. Beiträge der Marburger Treffen zur altägyptischen Medizin, Philippika, Marburger Altertumskundliche Abhandlungen, Marburg, (in press)
• Rosenow, D. 2006. Zwischen Faszination und Entsetzen –Tiernekropolen und Tiermumien im Alten Ägypten, in: Veit Vaelske/ Daniela Rosenow et. al. (eds), Ägypten. Ein Tempel der Tiere, exhibition catalogue for homonymous exhibition at the Zoological Garden Berlin (15thof July –17thof September), Berlin, 92-96
• Rosenow, D. 2006. Kultzentrum der Katzengöttin: Bubastis, in: KEMET, volume 15, no. 3, Berlin, 11-18
• Rosenow, D. 2006. Le sanctuaire de Nectanébo II. à Bubastis: état présent, interprétation et reconstruction d´un temple de Basse Époche au Delta, in: Egypte, Afrique et Orient 42, Centre vauclusien d´égyptologie, Avignon, March, 29-40
• Rosenow, D., Spencer, N. 2006. The Nekhthorheb Temple. A Naos of Nekhthorheb from Bubastis, Religious Iconography and Temple Building in the 30th Dynasty, British Museum Research Publication 156, London, 43-47
• Rosenow, D. 2002. Der Nektanebos-Tempel, in: Christian Tietze (ed.), Tell Basta XIV, Vorläufiger Grabungsbericht der 14. Kampagne, Potsdam, 115-133
• Rosenow, D. 2001. Der Nektanebos-Tempel, in: Christian Tietze (ed.), Tell Basta XIII, Vorläufiger Grabungsbericht der 13. Kampagne, Potsdam, 39-71
  Reviews