UCL Institute of Archaeology

Archaeobotany

Archaeobotany is the study of plant remains from archaeological sites to better understand the environmental context of past societies and how the environment was exploited and modified. Particular research emphases include diet and food procurement, whether through gathering or cultivation, and the transformation of plants and landscapes through domestication. The types of plant remains studied here include macro-remains (from seeds, wood, and parenchyma tissues) and micro-remains (especially phytoliths and starch grains). The Institute has a large reference collection with an Old World emphasis. The archaeobotany laboratory is among the oldest in the U.K., with teaching and research in this subject continuously since 1963.

Research

Projects

• Cultivating Societies
• Cultural Evolution of Neolithic Europe (EUROEVOL)
• Early Farming in Dalmatia
• Early Rice Project
• Origins and Spread of Stock-keeping in the Near East and Europe
• Pleistocene Hunter-Gatherer subsistence in Sri Lanka
• Pre-Pottery Neolithic and Chalcolithic settlements and subsistence economy
• SEALINKS

Networks

• Modelling domestication (external network)
• Out of Africa, Into Asia (external network)

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People

• Cristina Castillo
  
• Sue Colledge
• Dorian Fuller
• Alison Weisskopf

Degrees

• MA in Urban Archaeology
• MSc in Environmental Archaeology

Courses

undergraduate

• Plants and Archaeology

graduate

• Archaeobotanical analysis in practice

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