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Charlottesville Society of the Archaeological Institute of AmericaThe AIA promotes archaeological inquiry and public understanding of the material record of the human past to foster an appreciation of diverse cultures and our shared humanity. The AIA supports archaeologists, their research and its dissemination, and the ethical practice of archaeology. The AIA educates people of all ages about the significance of archaeological discovery and advocates for the preservation of the world’s archaeological heritage.
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Lecture Series
Upcoming LecturesMarch 2nd, 2023 | Metcalf Lecture
5:30 PM | Campbell 160 Frédérique Duyrat, Bibliothèque nationale de France “Treasure Troves. How to Study a Greek Coin Hoard” Coin hoards are deeply embedded in human imagination. They carry images of limitless wealth, gold and good fortune. For the historian, they bring important data on wealth but also on the communities that created these coins and used them. This lecture will focus on coin hoards in the Eastern part of the Greek world, from Greece to Iran, during the Classical and Hellenistic periods. The analysis of their spatial and temporal evolution, compared with written and archaeological sources tell a lot about centers of power, places and practices of commerce, historical occurrences, such as wars, which influence monetary production, and the habits of users. Previous LecturesApril 28th, 2022
5:30 PM | Zoom Melissa Baltus, University of Toledo AIA Hanfmann Lecture: “Rituals of the Everyday: Neighborhood Diversity in the Urbanization of Cahokia”The neighborhoods of ancient Cahokia tell its stories. Their similarities and differences provide invaluable insight into the processes of urbanization, as well as the ways in which lived lives shaped the urban landscape. Much of what we know about Cahokia’s neighborhoods derives from salvage excavations in or near the core of “downtown”. These excavations demonstrate planned site organization, dynamic neighborhood uses, and varying relationships between politico-religious practices, landscape features, and domestic spaces. Describing the development and depopulation of Cahokia through its neighborhoods, I will contextualize the findings of a recent multi-year project at one area of Cahokia and what we have learned about the city from this newly explored neighborhood. March 25th, 2021
Asa Eger, University of North Carolina at Greensboro George M. A. Hanfmann Memorial Lecture "The Islamic-Byzantine Frontier: Interaction and Exchange among Muslim and Christian Communities." The retreat of the Byzantine army from Syria in around 650 CE, in advance of the approaching Arab armies, is one that has resounded emphatically in the works of both Islamic and Christian writers, and created an enduring motif: that of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier. For centuries, Byzantine and Islamic scholars have evocatively sketched a contested border: the annual raids between the two, the line of fortified fortresses defending Islamic lands, the no-man's land in between and the birth of jihad. In their early representations of a Muslim-Christian encounter, accounts of the Islamic-Byzantine frontier are charged with significance for a future 'clash of civilizations' that often envisions a polarized world. I examine the two aspects of this frontier: its physical and ideological ones. By highlighting the archaeological study of the real and material frontier, as well as acknowledging its ideological military and religious implications, he offers a more complex vision of this dividing line than has been traditionally disseminated. With analysis grounded in archaeological evidence as well the relevant historical texts, Eger brings together a nuanced exploration of this vital element of medieval history. George M. A. Hanfmann was Professor of Fine Arts at Harvard University, Curator of Classical Art at the Fogg Art Museum, and Field Director of the Sardis Excavations in Turkey. The Hanfmann Lectureship was established in 1988 by the students and friends of Professor Hanfmann to honor him and his outstanding contributions to classical, especially Anatolian, archaeology and Greek and Roman art. Scholars who hold the Hanfmann Lectureship specialize in one or more of the varied subjects to which Prof. Hanfmann made contributions, e.g. Etruscan sculpture, Roman sarcophagi, Anatolian city planning, Hellenistic survivals in Byzantine art, Near Eastern narrative, and ancient technology (especially metallurgy). The Hanfmann Lecturer is chosen by the Hanfmann Lectureship Subcommittee of the Lecture Program Committee. The Hanfmann Lecturer annually visits one local society. November 12th, 2020 Prof. Julie Hruby, Dartmouth College AIA Joukowsky Lecture "Using Ugly Pottery to Understand Elite Mycenaean Cuisine" For generations, Greek archaeologists interested in ceramics have mostly focused on the “pretty” kind, usually painted vessels that have been assumed to have changed quickly over time, making them good chronological indicators. Cooking pots and other plainer vessels have received much less attention. More recently, however, as we have started to focus on questions about how people in ancient cultures used objects and activities to build their own identities and shape their lives, we have started to realize that the “ugly” pottery is far more important than it traditionally has been considered to be. One of the main ways that has happened is that we now recognize that feasting and food consumption practices were critically important in antiquity. Both hosts and attendees used food as a means to practice and display their economic, political, ritual, and social personas. For the prehistoric period, we have limited textual evidence for cuisine and for feasts, but we have vast quantities of the kinds of pottery used to cook, serve, and consume food. By examining the types of pots used at different sites, we can reconstruct what was cooked, how it was cooked, how it was served, and how each of these issues varied based on the socioeconomic class of the people consuming the food. Short bibliography and/or website on lecture topic (for lay reader): Hruby, Julie. 2017. Finding haute cuisine: Identifying shifts in food styles from cooking vessels. From Cooking Vessels to Cultural Practices in the Late Bronze Age Aegean, Hruby, Julie and Debra Trusty, eds. Oxford and Philadelphia: Oxbow Books. ISBN 978-1-78570-632-5 (print) and 978-1-78570-633-2 (epub). p. 15-26. (References, pp. 151-168). https://www.academia.edu/38114544/ Finding_Haute_Cuisine_Identifying_Shifts_in_Food_Styles_from_Cooking_Vessels Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureships In 1989, an anonymous donor established the President's Lectures Fund to yearly support a special speaker, whose lectureship would be seen as a an adjunct to the AIA’s prestigious Norton Lectureship. In 1993 the President's Lectureship became the Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lectureship, in honor of Martha Sharp Joukowsky, past President of the AIA and Professor of Old World Archaeology at Brown University. Professor Joukowsky has conducted archaeological research in Greece, Italy, Turkey and Jordan, mostly recently at the Southern Temple in Petra (Jordan). The Martha Sharp Joukowsky Lecturers are distinguished archaeologists and may be of any nationality and work in any field of our discipline. The Joukowsky Lecturers are selected by the Lecture Program Committee and together lecture to twenty-four local societies annually. |
Society Officers
President
Fotini Kondyli 
Vice President
Tyler Jo Smith 
Treasurer
Ismini Miliaresis 
Society Outreach
Anastasia Dakouri-Hild 
Student Vice President
Caroline Carter 
Program Coordinator/Contact
Dan Weiss |