Category Archives: News

Lecture: “22 Years of the Ango-Bahraini Early Islamic Bahrain Project”, T. Insoll

The IASA annual Beatrice de Cardi Lecture is taking place on the 21st September at 17.45 BST at the Society of Antiquaries, Burlington House, Piccadilly, London WIJ 0BE and via Zoom. If any members of the Bahrain Society would like to attend in person please send an email to: contact@theiasa.com by 15 September.

To Register via Zoom: https://us02web.zoom.us/…/tZMkc-ioqz4sHtXXpicRc5JBh_Aq…

For full details of the lecture please see the IASA website: https://iasarabia.org/lectures/

FOURTH ḤAJAR ONLINE WORKSHOP, 28 APRIL 2023

Playing in the Islamic World: Games and Toys in Archaeological Contexts

15:45 -19:00 (CET time)
Chairs: Valentina Vezzoli (University of Udine) and Hagit Nol (Goethe University)

15:45 Case studies

Anna Contadini, SOAS University of London

Chess and other gaming pieces of the Middle East: history and diffusion

Natalia Khamaiko, National Academy of Sciences of Ukraine

Walrus bone or oriental glass: board games as a sign of elitism in Early Rus’

Marie-Odile Rousset, CNRS – Archéorient, Lyon

Games and toys in the Early Islamic Near East and Egypt: from “Coptic idols” to Islamic dolls

17:15 Break

17:30 Discussion

Discussant: Daniel Burt, University of Oxford

Discussant: Krisztina Ilko, University of Oxford

General debate and questions

For registration (and zoom link), please write us to hajararchaeology@gmail.com until April 26th.

5th International Seminar on the Archaeology of the Arabian Peninsula

The 5th International Seminar on the Archaeology of the Arabian Peninsula, organized by the National Council for Culture, Arts, & Letters (NCCAL) and the Centre français de recherche de la péninsule Arabique (CEFREPA) is untitled Material Culture in the Arabian Peninsula and the Gulf during the late Antiquity and the early Islamic Period and will take place from March 12 to 14, 2023 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Kuwait City

Material culture within the Arabian Peninsula is still a growing field of research, particularly regarding the study of the artefacts dated within the end of the Sassanian empire to the Abbasid area. Since the 1960s and 1970s, archaeologists have proposed numerous hypotheses for a better understanding of the exchange networks, typologies of objects and their dating. Beyond the typological works, new research focused on chemical characterisation and function with a developing interest for their context location in domestic habitats or other types of occupations. The accumulation of recent data, pooled by the numerous archaeological missions, on the fields or in laboratories, allows us to a further comprehension of material culture in Arabian Peninsula, for the Late Antiquity until the beginning of the Medieval period.

This International Seminar represents an opportunity for researchers, working in and around the Peninsula, to present or answer many pending issues. Whether related to matters of typology, dating and provenance of artefacts or comparisons between the uses of materials in different archaeological sites. This gathering will allow the discussion between specialists of the different types of objects (pottery, glass, stoneware, metalwork, stucco) but also to propose a global synthesis on the material culture.

12 March – 14 March, 2023
CROWNE PLAZA HOTEL, KUWAIT CITY

Download the full programm

Organizing board:

Mohammad Bin Redha (NCCAL)

Dr. Julie Bonnéric (Ifpo / Cefrepa / Ciham)

Rémi Perrogon (Cefrepa / Aix Marseille University)

Islamic Archaeology Day 2023 (11/03/2023)

The seventh annual Islamic Archaeology day hosted by SOAS and UCL will be held in at the UCL Institute of Archaeology on Saturday 11th March 2020, 11-6pm. The workshop presents papers on the latest archaeological research across the Islamic world and is followed by a drinks reception.

**For reduced early-bird tickets, please register by Sunday February 26th 2023**.

Organisers: Corisande Fenwick (UCL), Tom Fitton (UCL), Hugh Kennedy (SOAS/UCL), Scott Redford (SOAS), Aila Santi (SOAS), Paul Wordsworth (UCL)

Programme

Session 1

11:00 Welcome & Introduction

11:15 Formation of the Early Islamic Port of Sohar on the Batinah

Seth Priestman (Durham), Nasser Al-Jahwari (Sultan Qaboos), Eve MacDonald (Cardiff) and Derek Kennet (Durham)

11:40 Everyday life at early medieval Volubilis, Morocco

Corisande Fenwick (UCL), Elizabeth Fentress (UCL) and Hassan Limane (INSAP)

12:05 The Caliphal Palace of Samarra and its Riverside Garden: New Perspectives

Safa Mahmoudian (Oxford)

12:30 Material Identities at the Frontier: Perspectives from Al-Andalus

Aleks Pluskowski (Reading)

 

1:00 Lunch in SCR (6th Floor)

 

Session 2

2:00 Microstratigraphic perspectives on the development of Islamic castlescapes in Iberia

Rowena Banerjea (Reading)

2:25 Chinese Ceramic Consumption in Mediaeval Ethiopia: An Archaeological Perspective

Hannah Parsons-Morgan (Exeter)

2:50 Urban and rural dynamics in Andalusi and Mudejar subsistence practices in Gandia, Valencia: new results from stable isotope analysis

Michelle Alexander (York), Malite García Collado (UVP/EHU, York), Marcos García García (Alicante), Joan Negre (Museu Arqueològic de Gandia)

3:15 Modelling the medieval landscapes of Unguja Ukuu, Zanzibar

Tom Fitton (UCL) and Stephanie Wynne-Jones (York)

 

3:45 Tea break

Session 3

4:15 From Madīnat Ṣiqilliya/Balarm (Palermo) to Qurliyūn (Corleone): current archaeological research between suburbium and countryside during the Islamic period (9th-11th c. CE)

Angelo Castrorao Barba (Polish Academy of Sciences)

4:40 The Cosmopolitan Caspian: Nomadic Islamization and Trade in the Lower Volga (10th century CE)

Irina Shingiray (Oxford)

5:05 Decorating a Seljuk House in the Sultan Kala, Merv: an archaeological reconstruction

Richard McClary (York) and Tim Williams (UCL)

5:30 The Chinili Hamam in Zeyrek: An excavation in Istanbul and the V&A’s collection

Tim Stanley (V&A)

 

6-7pm Reception in SCR (6th Floor)

 

7 :15pm Dinner (for those who have pre-booked) at the Life Goddess, Store Street (£45 per head).

Registration online: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/islamic-archaeology-day-2023-tickets-539224654457?aff=esfb&utm-campaign=social&utm-content=attendeeshare&utm-medium=discovery&utm-source=fb&utm-term=listing&fbclid=IwAR3949jxdGw1CW9Z6Sivuf_GPHK0J4BSmaBHQI1py07u-j0Zju1ZkD-dYis

For more information on the Islamic Archaeology Network and its events: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/archaeology/research/directory/islamic-archaeology-network

Archaeology of the Middle East and North Africa from Late Antiquity to the Ottoman period

Second series: Iraq & Arabian Peninsula

As part of the webinar series Archaeology of the Middle East and North Africa from Late Antiquity to the Ottoman period, the Ifpo, the CEFREPA and Udine University are pleased to announce the second series of meetings that will focus on Iraq and Arabian Peninsula and will take place from November, 2022, to July, 2023.

The goal of this series of conferences is to bring together specialists working on a broad region extending from North Africa to the Middle East and focusing on the period from Late Antiquity to Modern era. The first series focused on archaeology and material culture of Lebanon and Jordan. The webinar is open as widely as possible and aims to gather together archaeologists working on this large area as well as students. The second series, focusing on Iraq and Arabian Peninsula, will present, on the one hand, ongoing projects and, on the other hand, comparative data and synthesis studies, which will allow to frame this region into a broader historical and geographical context.

Organisers
Julie Bonnéric (Ifpo)
Valentina Vezzoli (Udine University)

Registration

via this link

Program

Next Sessions

January 25th, 2pm Rome | 4pm Riyad

« New Archaeological perspectives on Islamic period settlement and landscape use in Khaybar, Saudi Arabia »

Stephen McPhillips and Guillaume Chung-To

CNRS, Orient et Méditerranée, UMR 8167, Paris.

The Khaybar oasis, in northwestern Arabia, is renowned in Islamic history for the battle that took place there in 7 AH/ 628 AD, an important early victory for the prophet Muhammad’s armies in Arabia over the local Jewish tribes, and for being the first recorded instance of the waqf, the Islamic religious endowment. In subsequent centuries Khaybar went less remarked, then, in 2020, the Khaybar Longue Durée Archaeological Project began revealing new faces of Khaybar’s Islamic history. Financed by the Royal Commission for AlUla and the Agence française pour le développement d’AlUla, extensive survey over a 56 km2 area, as well as targeted soundings at key sites, began to reveal not only continuity of occupation from the pre-Islamic period into the Early Islamic era, but also from the Abbasid period, which, potentially, represents a major reorganisation and expansion in settlement and agricultural lands. Significant hydro-agricultural developments are likely to date from this time, along with the creation of two new settlements — in the oasis core and on its periphery — and a change in defence strategy. This season (autumn 2022) two test trenches were opened in the congregational mosque of Bishr, revealing an Early Islamic foundation with multiple later phases of use: this may correlate to the Mosque of the Prophet, referred to by medieval sources. Medieval occupation in Khaybar is represented principally by surface ceramics, including imported pottery from Egypt and Syria, and the identification of fortified village sites. The Ottoman period sees major shifts, notably the presence of large enclosure systems used by the ‘Anaza Bedouin for processing dates into a portable commodity, the marabid, and in the late nineteenth through mid-twentieth centuries, the building of new fortified sites in the oasis core. This led to more de-nucleated settlement distribution which culminated in the foundation of modern Khaybar, to the south of the oasis, in 1979.

Guillaume Chung-To is a PhD candidate at the University of Paris 1 with a scholarship from the Khaybar project, working on the archaeology of the transition between late pre-Islamic and Early Islamic period Arabia and has excavated at several sites in Saudi Arabia (Thāj, al-Badʿ, ʿAsham, Khaybar).

Stephen McPhillips is a researcher responsible for the Islamic periods in the CNRS Khaybar Longue Durée Archaeological Project. He previously worked with the Honor Frost Foundation in Lebanon as a landscape archaeologist, and prior to that at the University of Copenhagen as a researcher and teacher.

Aerial view of Bishr and the Citadel of Qamus, Khaybar. ©Khaybar LDAP


February, 22

An Islamic period settlement in Southern Kurdistan: Girdi Qala

Marie-Odile Rousset (CNRS)

March, 22

Christian landscapes in the Umayyad-period Northern Iraq

Karel Nováček (Palacký University Olomouc)

April, 26

The Crowded Desert project and the emergence of nomads in Qatar in the early Islamic period

José C. Carvajal López (University of Leicester)

May, 17

Watermills in the ‘Land Behind Mosul’ (7th-20th c.)

Cristina Tonghini (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia)

The Center for Islamic Archaeology series : “Medieval Archaeology in Egypt” (Webinar)

The CfIA seminar series are back for the winter term 2023, this time focusing on “Medieval Archaeology in Egypt”.

Wednesdays 16:00 to 17:00 GM on Zoom.

Programme

January 18: Prof. Alaa Habashi

February 01: Wolfang Müller

February 15: Allison L. Gascoigne

March 01: Ahmed Alshoky

The first seminar is this Wednesday, 18th Jan. Alaa Habashi, Prof. of Architecture and Heritage Conservation. Title: ‘Urban archaeology, selected cases from Historic Cairo’.

The presentation assesses historic Cairo’s historic layers and morphologies through selected cases, specifically residential contexts. Residential components are always ignored in the determining values of historic cities, whereas it is usually the soul of revitalizing the contemporary context. Interpreting urban archaeological remains is a tool for the prospective revitalization.” 

More information in this document.

 Please register at 

https://universityofexeter.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYocOCgqjsqHNb0U3mKoAyw9oXr7k0Vmqil

Webinar: Archaeology of the Middle East and North Africa from Late Antiquity to the Ottoman period. Second series: Iraq & Arabian Peninsula

As part of the webinar series Archaeology of the Middle East and North Africa from Late Antiquity to the Ottoman period, the Ifpo, the CEFREPA and Udine University are pleased to announce the second series of meetings that will focus on Iraq and Arabian Peninsula and will take place from November, 2022, to July, 2023. The goal of this series of conferences is to bring together specialists working on a broad region extending from North Africa to the Middle East and focusing on the period from Late Antiquity to Modern era. The first series focused on archaeology and material culture of Lebanon and Jordan. The webinar is open as widely as possible and aims to gather together archaeologists working on this large area as well as students. The second series, focusing on Iraq and Arabian Peninsula, will present, on the one hand, ongoing projects and, on the other hand, comparative data and synthesis studies, which will allow to frame this region into a broader historical and geographical context.

Organisers
Julie Bonnéric (Ifpo)
Valentina Vezzoli (Udine University)

Registration

via this link

Program

November, 9 –  5pm
Basra- Iraq’s Southern Metropoli Andrew Petersen (University of Wales Trinity Saint David),

The remaining corner tower of the Great Mosque of Basra, Andrew Petersen

Although the significance of Basra to early Islamic civilization is well known the physical remains of the site and its location are poorly understood despite extensive historical information and considerable archaeological fieldwork carried out at the site. There are many reasons for this situation including in recent times the conflicts surrounding the Iran-Iraq war, the 1990 Gulf War and the 2003 invasion of Iraq all of which had a significant impact on Basra. Other reasons for the limited understanding of the site include the relatively small number of historical standing buildings and the complex topography of the site. Despite these problems there is now a considerable amount of data which can provide the basis for understanding the origin and development of this remarkable city. This talk will review the results of three seasons of fieldwork in Basra using archival research, aerial photogrammetry, surface survey and geo-archaeological investigations. The research provides a number of valuable insights into the development of the early Islamic city although it also highlights dangers to the city through rapid development over the site of the early Islamic city.

Prof. Andrew Petersen is Director of Research in Islamic Archaeology at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David. He studied medieval history and archaeology at St.Andrews followed by an MPhil in Islamic Architecture at Oxford. His PhD at Cardiff University concentrated on the development of urban centres in medieval and Ottoman Palestine. He has worked in and carried out research in a number of countries of the Middle East and Africa including, Jordan, Iraq, Palestine, Turkmenistan, the UAE, Oman, Syria, Qatar, Kenya and Tanzania. He has also worked in British archaeology with a speciality in recording standing buildings. He is a Member of the Institute for Archaeologists and a Fellow of the Royal historical Society. He has published a number of books on different aspects of the architecture and archaeology of the Islamic world including most recently an edited volume on Ramla in collaboration with Denys Pringle.

November, 23 The site of Al-Qurainiyah: Topography and pottery assemblage of an early-Islamic coastal settlement on Failaka Island (Kuwait) Andrea di Miceli (University of Perugia) and Elisia Laschi (Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn)

December, 14 New Archaeological Insights into the Early Islamic Period in Qatar Robert Carter and Ferhan Sakal (Qatar Museums),

January, 11 Islamic Archaeology in context: Occupation, Territories, and Material Culture in the piedmont of Zagros mountains in Northern Iraq (Sulaymaniyah province as an example) Mustafa Ahmad (German Archaeological Institute, Orient-Department, Berlin)

January, 25 New Archaeological perspectives on Islamic period settlement and landscape use in Khaybar, Saudi Arabia Guillaume Chung-To et Stephen McPhilipps (CNRS)

February, 22 An Islamic period settlement in Southern Kurdistan: Girdi Qala Marie-Odile Rousset (CNRS)

March, 22 Christian landscapes in the Umayyad-period Northern Iraq Karel Nováček (Palacký University Olomouc)

April, 26 The Crowded Desert project and the emergence of nomads in Qatar in the early Islamic period José C. Carvajal López (University of Leicester)

May, 24 Watermills in the ‘Land Behind Mosul’ (7th-20th c.) Cristina Tonghini (Università Ca’ Foscari Venezia)

Third Ḥajar Online Workshop, 28 OCTOBER 2022

People of the Desert: Nomadic Networks and the Spread and Practice of Islam

15:45 -19:00 (CET time)
Chairs: Irina Shingiray (University of Oxford) and José C. Carvajal López (University of Leicester)


15:45 Case studies

José C. Carvajal López (University of Leicester)

Nomads of Qatar? The emergence of Bedouin communities in the Persian-Arabian Gulf

ShadiaTaha (University of Cambridge)

Beja nomads in Sudan: neglected history and bleak future

Jorge de Torres Rodríguez (Incipit -Institute of Heritage Sciences, Spain)

Islamic archaeology of the nomads in the Horn of Africa

17:15 Break

17:30 Discussion

Discussant: Greg Fisher

Discussant: Benjamin A. Saidel, East Carolina University

General debate and questions

For registration (and zoom link), please write us to hajararchaeology@gmail.com until October 26th.

AQUEDUCTS, CANALS, QANATS workshop on June 23rd-24th in Nijmegen

AQUEDUCTS, CANALS, QANATS: 

CONSTRUCTION AND MANAGEMENT OF WATER CONDUITS

IN THE LATE ANTIQUE AND MEDIEVAL MEDITERRANEAN AND MIDDLE EAST

This workshop will explore topics connected to the hydraulic infrastructure and its management that allowed water to be transported to, and distributed within, cities in the medieval world (c. 600–1500 CE). Many medieval cities depended on the transportation of water across long distances, requiring the construction of significant infrastructure—or, in some cases, the maintenance and extension of pre-existing structures from earlier periods—to supply urban populations. Conduits of various varieties—such as canals, qanats and aqueducts—were huge investments in terms of labour and financial resources and their construction, through sometimes difficult and unforgiving landscapes, often presented considerable engineering challenges that had to be overcome. Once built, these structures required frequent maintenance to remain effective and the distribution of water had to be actively managed to ensure an equitable supply of water regularly reached urban users. Rulers often took a personal interest in the construction, extension or repair of these conduit systems while local authorities and other institutions played key roles in their management and regulation. The material evidence for many of these conduits is well preserved and its analysis often illuminates how, when and why these structures were built as well as episodes of maintenance, repair and abandonment. Textual evidence, on the other hand, provides an equally valuable strand of evidence which often contains more ephemeral details relating to their management, the social obligations that related to their upkeep and the users that depended on the water they conveyed.

In this workshop, we aim to gain an insight into these processes—construction and upkeep, management, (dis)repair, etc.—as well as the relationships between the many people and groups involved in these processes and/or who made use of the water transported and distributed via these conduits. Therefore, contributions explore various aspects of conduit systems that brought water to, and distributed water within, medieval cities—e.g. their construction, repair, management, materiality, symbolism or abandonment. Our focus is the medieval Middle East but contributions also consider evidence from neighbouring cultural and geographic zones (including, but not limited to, the Byzantine Empire, Al-Andalus and Central Asia) as well as earlier periods (such as the Roman and Sasanian empires).

The preliminary programme can be download here.

We would be delighted if colleagues could join us in person, but there will also be a live zoom link to follow discussions online.

To register please send an email to edmund.hayes@ru.nl, indicating IN-PERSON or ONLINE attendance, specifying which days you will attend.

The zoom link will be send to registered participants on the eve of the conference.

Samarra workshop Durham/online 27th June

Department of Archaeology, Durham University

Landscapes of Complex Society Research Group/ Durham Centre for Cultural Heritage Protection

The Abbasid capital at Samarra: the current situation and its research potential

Monday 27th June 13:00-16:00 (BST)

Samarra, located 100 km north of Baghdad, was the Abbasid capital between its foundation in 836 AD/CE until about 892 AD/CE. At 5,800 hectares extending 40km along the Tigris, and with the plans of around 6,400 separate buildings recorded, it is one the largest archaeological sites in the world and without doubt the most important evidence available for the nature of Abbasid urban layout. The site also holds the answers to many important questions about the nature of Abbasid society and power. Yet the extensive remains are steadily being destroyed through development and agriculture.

Following the publication of the Historical Topography of Samarra (Northedge 2005) and the Archaeological Atlas of Samarra (Northedge and Kennet 2015) this workshop is intended to take a look at the current condition of the site and to discuss plans for future research.

13:00 Derek Kennet Introduction; An Outline of Samarra and its development

13:30 Alastair Northedge The Samarra Archaeological Survey, potential, evolving technology, and achievements in context

14:00 William Deadman The Samarra Atlas GIS archive: assessing damage and threats to the site using remote sensing

14:25 Tea/coffee

14:50 Peter Brown Water supply and water-use at Samarra: exploring the evidence and potential for future research

15:10 Tim Power Samarra – Horizons, Near and Far

15:30 Discussion

16:00 Close

The workshop will be held in person in room D210 in the Dawson Building, Durham University and also online at the following Zoom link:

Click on this Zoom link to register:

https://durhamuniversity.zoom.us/j/98001434828?pwd=ZHNaQzJJbGs2WGlvRUtNK043QnJKdz09

Attendance in both formats is free and all are welcome to come along to listen and to contribute to the discussion.