UCL Institute of Archaeology

Middle East

The Institute of Archaeology is a global leader in the study of the prehistoric and ancient Middle East, pursuing research in all parts of the region, and making regular contributions to core debates on a wide variety of current topics. In-house expertise range from art history to environmental analysis; materials analysis; GIS applications; critical approaches to cultural heritage, and the history of archaeology, while current research and teaching spans the Palaeolithic through to the Iron Age. The Institute's facilities, which include extensive object collections, complement those of other major London-based institutions such as the British Museum, SOAS, and UCL's Ancient History Department.

Research

Projects

• The Ancient Levant
• Azraq Project, Jordan
• Building Solomon's Temple
• Collections in Exile, Persons in Exile
• Commensality, Cooking, Dining and the Politics of Gastronomy in the Near East
• Documentation of Iraqi Archaeological Sites
• Egyptian Periodisation - Object Categories as Historical Signatures (EPOCHS)
• The Emergence of Craft Specialisation in the Near East
• Examination and Conservation of the 'Ain Ghazal plaster cache
• Experimental Archaeometallurgy
• Gender and the Emergence of Villages, Cities and States in the Ancient Near East
• Ivories from Nimrud VI
• Ivories from Nimrud VII
• Keys of the Past: Keys to the Future
• Kharaneh IV: Epipalaeolithic Hunter-Gatherers in the Jordanian Steppe
• The natron-based glass industries
• Personal Ornaments in the Ancient Near East
• Petrie Palestinian Project
• Qadisha Valley Project, Lebanon
• Redox conditions in early glass making
• Salinisation in Mesopotamia
• SEALINKS
• Shahrizor Research Project
• Understanding Heritage Wellbeing

Networks

• History of Archaeology (IoA network)
  
• Hunters and Herders - Global Perspectives (IoA network)
  
• Neanderthals and Modern Humans in the Palaeolithic of Europe and Western Asia (IoA network)
• Out of Africa, Into Asia (external network)

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People

• Mark Altaweel
• Andrew Bevan
• Beverley Butler
• Sue Colledge
• Paolo Del Vesco
• Ian Freestone
• Dorian Fuller
• Andrew Garrard
• David Kertai
• Louise Martin
• Dominic Perring
• Rachael Sparks
• David Wengrow
• Tim Williams
• Katherine Wright

Degrees

• BA in Egyptian Archaeology
• MA in Archaeology
• MA in the Archaeology of the Middle East
• MA in Egyptian Archaeology
• MA in Mediterranean Archaeology
• MA in Urban Archaeology
• MSc in Environmental Archaeology
• MSc in Palaeoanthropology and Palaeolithic Archaeology

Courses

undergraduate

• Archaeology of the Near East from 2000 to 300 BC
• The Archaeology of Mesopotamia
• The Archaeology of the Levant
• The Early Prehistory of the Near East
• Understanding complex societies: Egypt and Mesopotamia in 3rd millennium BC

graduate

• Themes and issues in the archaeology of the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East
• Evolution of Palaeolithic and Neolithic Societies in the Near East
• Near Eastern Material Cultures I: Neolithic and Early Bronze Age
• Near Eastern Material Cultures II: Middle Bronze Age through the Iron Age
• Archaeology of the Middle East: Pattern and Process
  
• Mediterranean Dynamics
• Mediterranean Prehistory

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