Fellowship Report Archives - Page 2 of 18 - American Society of Overseas Research (ASOR)

Fieldwork Report: Atakan Atabas

Posted on April 1, 2026 by Audrey Nell

Once Upon a Time in Anatolia

Atakan Atabas, 2025 Shirlee Meyers/G. Ernest Wright Fellowship Recipient听

When I left my hometown in central Anatolia to attend university, I never imagined that my path would eventually bring me back to the same region鈥攏ot as a student of technology, but as a researcher of the ancient past. My undergraduate years were spent studying computer science at one of T眉rkiye鈥檚 most prestigious universities, followed by professional work in the technology sector in Istanbul. Despite these achievements, I felt a growing distance from the land of my childhood. Archaeology offered me the chance to reconnect: to engage with the cultural heritage of Anatolia and, in doing so, to give something meaningful back to my community and my country.

One of the works that has always stayed with me is Nuri Bilge Ceylan鈥檚 Once Upon a Time in Anatolia. In one scene, a driver tells a doctor, 鈥淲hen you have a family, you鈥檒l have a story to tell. You can say, once upon a time in Anatolia, when I was working out in the sticks, I remember this one night, which began like this. You can tell it like a fairytale, Doctor.鈥�听 Whenever I am in the field, I think of this dialogue. To me, research is not only about data or analysis; it is also about collecting stories. Some call them academic findings, but I see them as connections-bridges between the past, present, and future of the Anatolian landscape. In that sense, I consider myself a mediator, one who helps bring different times and perspectives into conversation.

In the summer of 2025, I joined the Kerkenes Project in Yozgat, central Anatolia. For many international scholars, fieldwork in Turkey means collecting evidence, expanding networks, publishing papers, and advancing knowledge of the ancient world. For me, however, it is also deeply personal. Fieldwork is a return home: talking with workers from the village, walking the landscapes of my childhood, breathing the scent of native flowers, and tasting familiar foods that I ate growing up. At Kerkenes, I feel responsible not only for contributing to the project but also for representing the local community whose generosity sustains our work. This dual sense of responsibility reminds me that archaeology is not just scientific inquiry; it is also an ongoing dialogue between researchers and the people who live near the site today. I believe that understanding this relationship is key to understanding how academia can engage more meaningfully with society.

My own path鈥攆rom computer science to archaeology鈥攈as taught me the importance of interdisciplinary approaches. To restrict archaeology to narrow disciplinary boundaries is to diminish its potential. Often, archaeological questions require the mind of a sociologist, the skills of an engineer, the vision of an architect, the insights of a politician, or even the calculations of an economist. At Kerkenes, I have seen how archaeology draws together these diverse ways of thinking. Fieldwork also demands practical versatility: negotiating with local bureaucrats, collaborating with villagers, and adapting to shifting roles and responsibilities. In such a dynamic environment, effective communication is essential. Each season teaches me how to engage with people of different backgrounds, perspectives, and priorities. Thus, the Kerkenes Project is not only an academic training ground but also a place of intercultural exchange, collaboration, and personal growth.

For me, archaeology is not only about answering research questions but also about building relationships鈥攁cross cultures, disciplines, and generations. An excavation site is a meeting point where individuals from different nationalities, ethnicities, genders, socioeconomic classes, and educational backgrounds come together. It is also a meeting point across time, where modern researchers walk through the same landscapes that ancient inhabitants once knew. In this sense, we are not outside observers of history but participants in its unfolding narrative. We are part of the same story, shaped by the same land, only at different moments in time. Once upon a time in Anatolia鈥� there is always a story to tell.

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ECS Poster and Student Paper Preparation Session

Cultural Heritage Committee Seeks New Members

Fieldwork Report: David Rhys Sharpe

FOA Webinar Panel: From Tunis to Tataouine

Fieldwork Report: Talia Neelis

Posted on March 9, 2026 by Audrey Nell

Sherds of my Labor: Supervising with Pottery Plethoras at Kalavasos-Ayios Dhimitrios

Talia Neelis, 2025 P.E. MacAllister Fieldwork Scholarship Recipient

In the five minutes it takes to wind along the back road from Kalavasos Village to the site of Kalavasos-Ayios Dhimitrios, a cool purple light illuminating the foothills of the Troodos mountains morphs to a familiar hot orange. By the time we arrive to site, the blaze of the early morning Cypriot air signals that there鈥檚 no time to waste鈥� onwards from the toolshed to the trench!

My enthusiasm to spend the rest of my days in a deep squat caked in sweat and dirt began here two years ago, nestled in the Vasilikos Valley about 3 km from the southern coast of Cyprus. After excavating at other Greek and Cypriot sites in between, coming back to K-AD with enough experience to take on a leadership role really cemented my long-term aspiration to work in the field of Cypriot archaeology.

I felt right at home supervising the new trench defining 鈥楻oom 3,鈥� laid just east of the space I had excavated in 2023. That鈥檚 not to say that it wasn鈥檛 daunting to lead a group of my peers through the processes and techniques of excavation, to organize various materials and extensive notes, and to make decisions for the good of the trench and the people.

As our team made our way through topsoil and into less contaminated contexts, we uncovered an extraordinary concentration of characteristic Late Cypriot (1650 鈥� 1050 BCE) pottery wares: we couldn鈥檛 trowel but two centimetres without revealing caches of White Slip, Base Ring, and pithoi sherds, and sometimes even complete vessels. The team had to be extra careful traversing our small ~7m x 4.5m trench, tip-toeing around the obstacle course made up of sherds that jutted out of the soil. When we weren鈥檛 articulating pottery scatters, we had the privilege of finding several nearly-intact wall brackets, a handful of bronze fragments, countless slag chunks, some specially marked vessels, and a couple remarkable triton shells.

While our fruitful trench could be a little overwhelming as a first-time supervisor, I was grateful that I could study such a wealth of material. Since my own research examines regional and diachronic fluctuations in ceramic production on prehistoric Cyprus, I came to the site every morning excited to explore the pottery wilderness that was Room 3.

Supervising for the first time made me realize how lucky I鈥檝e been to work under talented and dedicated excavators in the past. I borrowed leadership skills and pep-talking abilities (so much so that I was awarded 鈥榤orning motivator鈥� at our end-of-season superlatives!) from each and every one of my previous supervisors and directors to try to create the best experience for my team.

I鈥檓 incredibly grateful to project director Dr. Kevin Fisher and field director Sheri Pak for having me back and enduring my incessant questions, and to our team for their endurance, enthusiasm, and support during my meeker supervisory moments. My deepest gratitude to the American Society of Overseas Research for supporting me with the financial resources to participate in this community of knowledge; a community I endeavor to contribute to and draw on for years to come.

Talia Neelis is currently pursuing the doctoral track at the University of California, Los Angeles in the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology鈥檚 Interdepartmental Program. She graduated from the University of British Columbia in the spring of 2025 with honors in Ancient Mediterranean and Near Eastern Studies and Art History, where she completed her undergraduate thesis on anthropomorphic figurines and osteological records of the Late Cypriot period. She looks forward to going 鈥榖ack to the Bronze Age鈥� (tagline credit to the Kissonerga-Skalia marketing team) in trenches across Cyprus and beyond.

Want to help more students and early career archaeologists get into the field? Donate to the cause today by selecting 鈥淔ieldwork Scholarships鈥� as your gift purpose!

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ECS Poster and Student Paper Preparation Session

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FOA Webinar Panel: From Tunis to Tataouine

Fieldwork Report: Anna Taibi

Posted on February 16, 2026 by Audrey Nell

Growing through the Dust: Skills, Challenges, and Community in the Mosul Dam Reservoir

Anna Taibi, 2025 Strange/Midkiff Families Fellowship Recipient

The season that just concluded has definitely been one of the most intense of my (still short) fieldwork experience! In October and November 2025, thanks to ASOR鈥檚 scholarship for fieldwork participation, I took part in ReLand鈥檚 2025 campaign in the Mosul Dam Reservoir, KRI. The project鈥檚 goal is twofold: monitoring threatened sites located on Mosul Lake鈥檚 shore and, during cyclical phases of re-emergence, conducting emergency excavations to document settlements and their interaction with the surrounding landscape.

This year, due to an exceptional drought, hundreds of sites have emerged from the lake鈥檚 water, and, sadly, as a remote survey had already highlighted, these millennia-old features have immediately been targeted by looters. As a project member, during the first three weeks of the campaign, I helped record evidence of this kind of damage during the field survey, documenting different types of looting traces.

In the second part of the campaign, I worked at the site of Tell Gombass, a small Late Chalcolithic village, once located on a spur of a wadi, not far from the Tigris itself. Here, for the second year, emergency excavations were carried out. In particular, I was appointed as trench supervisor to excavate an ovoidal mud-brick (pottery?) kiln that just re-emerged. On this occasion, I had to challenge myself to lead a small team, ensuring a good quality of the documentation. But that鈥檚 not all: through the patient and expert guidance of our topographer, I managed to develop new skills in the topographical field and refine methodologies tailored to the diverse needs of the archaeological mission.

Previous skills have helped me through this international campaign: I鈥檓 getting better, but I still haven鈥檛 learnt Arabic nor Kurdish very well, so never has my Deutsches Sprachdiplom der Kultursministerkonferenz (DSD) been so helpful as to interact with Tarek, our chief worker from Syria, who spent 20 years excavating with German teams in Western Asia. His long field experience and knowledge had been one of the precious elements of the excavation campaign: although we worked in two different areas, we always kept up with each other鈥檚 work, and I鈥檝e taken his generous advice to heart. This experience has definitely allowed me to work closely with Kurdish team members, fostering mutual learning and shared expertise while contributing to more inclusive and sustainable heritage practices.

In the afternoons, I took care of the small finds documentation, getting the chance to measure, photograph, and document different types of artefacts, architectural elements, and ornaments that humans have produced in the Duhok region through millennia.

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Last but not least, during my last week in KRI, I helped organise a tour of the excavation for Gombass鈥� elementary school pupils and students from the University of Duhok. It has been a precious moment to raise awareness among local populations about the cultural and historical significance of their landscape, and for my education as an archaeologist who wants to put ethical and post-colonial theories in practice: I believe that our work means nothing if not immediately given back to the people this heritagescape directly belongs to. This outreach experience has been particularly meaningful for me, as I have a strong interest in community organization, equitable governance, and cultural heritage preservation. After all, it is one of the main objectives of this project to preserve the memory of those communities that lived along the riverbanks, and the millennia-old settlements they inhabited, ensuring that their histories are acknowledged and valued.

I feel that participating in this long campaign of ReLand鈥檚 project has had a significant impact on my development as an archaeologist and as a future researcher. From survey skills to new and exciting responsibilities as a field supervisor, up until the possibility of developing and practicing non-colonial approaches to field archaeology, this campaign has given me far beyond the expertise luggage I expected to get back home with. I鈥檓 grateful for having built new tools and learnt methodologies, and I can鈥檛 wait for upcoming chances of professional and personal growth.

Anna Taibi is a native of Palermo, Sicily, where she is working on her Master鈥檚 degree in Mediterranean and West Asian archaeology. She completed a BA in Cultural Heritage at the University of Palermo in 2023 with a cum laude dissertation on post- and decolonial approaches in archaeology. She is now delving into her commitment to community-based fieldwork while approaching new interests, such as the archaeology of production. She has participated in surveys and excavations in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq (ReLand project) and in Sicily, where she鈥檚 serving as a trench supervisor at the Phoenician-Punic site of Motya since 2024.

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Fieldwork Report: Hannah Borotsik

Posted on February 3, 2026 by Audrey Nell

Just a Girl and Her Whiteboard

Hannah Borotsik, 2025 P. E. MacAllister Fellowship Recipient

Athens holds a very special place in my heart, and it has become one of my favourite cities in the world. I have met some of my best friends and have had some of the coolest experiences of my life here. I was so excited to be able to return to Greece for a fourth summer and for my third summer working at the Athenian Agora excavations with the American School of Classical Studies at Athens. I started in 2023 as a volunteer, and then in 2024, I returned as an assistant supervisor assigned to work in the apotheke. This past summer, I had the privilege of moving up to the role of apotheke supervisor. I never thought I would get the chance to say that I was a supervisor at the Athenian Agora Excavations, but this was the summer when I got the opportunity of a lifetime.

My position involved managing the material coming into the apotheke and supervising all the volunteers who were assigned to flotation and pottery/bone/shell/tile wash. At the beginning of the season, my main goal was to make the processing of material coming to the apotheke as smooth as possible for everyone involved. I established different organizational systems, including having a large whiteboard, inboxes, labels, and designated spaces for different workflows. Since I worked with many different areas and members of the project on a daily basis, I thought a brief example of a 鈥渄ay in the life鈥� for me at the Athenian Agora would be the best way to share how I spent my summer:

At the beginning of each day, I would start in the basement of the Stoa of Attalos, which serves as the apotheke for the Agora excavations. I would review the unwashed material and update my whiteboard with the information about the material that came up from the site at the end of the previous day. The whiteboard contained information for closed baskets from each trench in order to track the progress of washing, sorting, and reading by our wonderful pottery, bone, and shell specialists. Since the Agora is a total collection excavation, there is a lot of material coming up, and being able to communicate where all the material was at any given moment was extremely important. This was a method that I established in the 2024 season, and it became a staple of the basement鈥檚 organization (as well as a staple of my identity on the project).

Next, I would decide on which basket, or more often than not, baskets of pottery would be washed for the day. This depended on many different factors, including the number of volunteers assigned to wash, the number of available trays, and the number of buckets of pottery and tile belonging to a basket. The largest number of buckets in one basket from this season was three full buckets of pottery and thirteen tile buckets (this one took a while to wash). At this point, the volunteers assigned to the pottery wash area would arrive from the site for the day, and after bringing everything outside, I would divide the group into flotation and pottery wash.

Besides training and helping volunteers wash material, I had many responsibilities that I took care of during our work hours. I had to make sure that the dried ceramics, including the tile, were ready for our pottery specialists to analyse and count, weigh, and photograph. In some cases, I assisted with these procedures (for example, choosing the tile samples). I bagged and weighed dried bone and shell, after which I recorded the information into our iDig system. I made sure that any material that was ready for the trench supervisors to pack or things that needed to be made a special finds were in their respective inboxes. I wrote tags for trays inside and outside. I organized the baskets that were in queue to be washed. I strategized the best way to tackle the large backlog of tile, once larger baskets began to appear. At the end of the day, I facilitated the clean-up and organization of the apotheke, which mostly consisted of me giving the volunteers directions on what order I wanted each tray to go in and where I wanted them to go in the basement (and they did a great job every day!). These are just a few of my daily responsibilities, since every day came with new opportunities to improve workflows. After work, I sometimes stayed later to finish organizing and prepare for the following day or I worked on the procedural manual for the apotheke. At the end of most days, I went home and took a nap. One of the most important aspects of my job was to be the point of communication between our three open trenches and those working in the apotheke. As a result, my job consisted of many moving parts and more often than not, learning something new every day.

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I was grateful to return to the Agora for my third summer and, although I was nervous to hold a supervisor position at such a well-known dig with only a few years of experience, my fellow supervisors, field director, and director were wonderful role models and helped me to become confident in my position. I learned so much more about being a leader and finding my leadership style, and I got more in-depth training on the many procedures that take place on excavation after the material comes out of the ground. All of these lessons have made me a better archaeologist. I am so thankful for the trust that was placed in me, and I will never forget my first-ever summer as a supervisor.

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ECS Poster and Student Paper Preparation Session

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2025 Geraty Grant Report: Tall Hisban

Posted on January 19, 2026 by Marta Ostovich

Giving Back: Community Archaeology and Education at Tall Hisban: 2025 Update on the Lawrence T. Geraty Community Archaeology Endowment

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The 17吃瓜Lawrence T. Geraty Community Archaeology Endowment was established to honor Dr. Lawrence T. Geraty鈥檚 pioneering commitment to community engagement in Near Eastern archaeology. The endowment supports initiatives that strengthen relationships between archaeological projects and local communities, including participatory research, heritage festivals, youth training programs, and digital heritage initiatives.

At Tall Hisban, support from the Geraty Endowment has helped make possible the Hisban Heritage Festival, student-led community history projects, and the Madaba Region Heritage Internship. Its impact is visible in renewed partnerships, expanded educational opportunities, and a deepened sense of shared stewardship between archaeologists and the people of Hisban.

On a warm June afternoon in 2025, the courtyard of the Hisban Women鈥檚 Association overflowed with song, laughter, and the aroma of traditional Jordanian sweets. Villagers, students, and dignitaries gathered to celebrate the Hisban Heritage Festival, marking more than five decades of partnership between the people of Hisban and the Madaba Plains Project (MPP). The festival opened with greetings from the Department of Antiquities, the Hisban Women鈥檚 Association, and Andrews University.

In his keynote remarks, 脴ystein S. LaBianca, Senior Research Professor of Anthropology, reflected on the evolution of archaeology at Hisban鈥攆rom excavation to collaboration: 鈥淎rchaeology here is no longer about extraction. It鈥檚 about relationships, about listening, and about telling stories together鈥攕tories that include shepherds and schoolteachers, potters and farmers, grandmothers and grandchildren.鈥�

A highlight of the festival was the public display of archival photographs from the original Heshbon Expedition (1968鈥�1976). For many families, these were the only surviving photographs of fathers and grandfathers. This 鈥渧isual repatriation鈥� returned history, dignity, and memory to the community whose labor shaped the early excavations.

Stacie Hatfield, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, emphasized that 鈥渢he next generation of archaeologists must be facilitators鈥攃onnecting academic rigor with community engagement.鈥� This participatory model is now central to the MPP approach.

The Madaba Region Heritage Internship, coordinated by Al Raqeem for Services and Training, Sela for Training and Protection of Heritage, Andrews University, and the University of Liverpool, extends this commitment regionally. The Pottery Internship trains young Jordanians in ceramic analysis and conservation, while the Archaeotrail Internship prepares them to create bilingual (Arabic鈥揈nglish) content for the Madaba Archaeotrail app. Interns graduate with certification and a professional portfolio, contributing to a new generation of Jordanian heritage leaders.

Together, these initiatives demonstrate what 17吃瓜has long championed: that archaeology is most meaningful when it builds bridges between past and present, research and renewal, local voices and global audiences. As one participant at the festival remarked, 鈥淲e used to think archaeology was about the foreigners who came to dig. Now we know鈥攊t is about us, our stories, and our future.鈥�

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ECS Poster and Student Paper Preparation Session

Cultural Heritage Committee Seeks New Members

Fieldwork Report: David Rhys Sharpe

FOA Webinar Panel: From Tunis to Tataouine

Fieldwork Report: Helen Wong

Posted on January 14, 2026 by Moni Islam

Mapping Motya in a Day: Urbanism, Identity, and Geophysical Survey

Helen Wong, 2025 Katherine Barton Platt Fellowship Recipient

This summer, I joined the excavation team at Motya, a small island off the coast of western Sicily near Marsala, as a digital archaeology specialist with the 鈥淪pace and Identity in Ancient Motya鈥� project co-directed by Dr. Paola Sconzo and Dr. Jason Herrmann. I was responsible for helping to carry out the ongoing geophysical survey which aims to map the entire layout of the ancient city. Motya was a Phoenician/Punic foundation dating to the 8th century BCE with close ties to Carthage and constant contact with indigenous Italic cultures, creating diverse ethnic and cultural conditions. It is one of the rare examples of a Punic city which was largely not built over in later periods. The aim of the geophysical survey, which has almost mapped the entirety of the city over the last ten years, is to approach the question of cultural diversity and experience at Motya through examining its urban layout and architectural forms, which are distinct from that of native cities in the Sicilian tradition on the island. In this report, I will describe what an average day of work at Motya looked like for me.

At 5:30am, I would drag myself out of bed. Ideally, we left for the island by 6am鈥搒ometimes it was a little later, but that could be made up for by a bit of careful speeding on the road, which was very scenic. The ride down to the dock where we would take a ferry to the island closely followed the coast, so even though we were only half-awake at best, we could still take in the gorgeous scenes of still water reflecting the dawn light. We would drive past the fishermen in their boats, the gulls and little birds diving into the water, and the famous salt flats of Marsala, each one delineated with careful lines of stones. Many of these salt flats are very old, even ancient. Marsala鈥檚 high-quality salt is famous, as is the sulphur scent which comes off the flats in the mornings and evenings. I came to associate it with waking up and looking forward to the start of the day.

The ferry to the island took about twenty minutes. The passing scenery on the water was very beautiful, and I often found it almost meditative. Once we arrived on the island, the day truly began. We trekked up from the dock to the dig house and before starting anything else, made sure to brew dark, strong coffee. Then we would each go off and sort out our own responsibilities. For me, that meant getting out the magnetometer. We used a Bartington Grad601, a compact instrument with two sensor rods, one on each end of a rigid carrying bar. The instrument is held in front of the user and has a harness which is usually hooked onto a backpack. It is relatively light and easy to carry. The hardest part of its usage is actually very straightforward: in order for the data to be taken correctly, the user has to step in a specific beat, like band marching. When you use the Bartington enough times, it begins to have an effect on your everyday walking. At the end of the day, I would often find that I was walking in the same regulated beat even when I was no longer carrying the instrument.

The survey area I was focusing on this season was an olive grove to the northeast of the island. I walked the magnetometer between the rows of trees and occasionally ran straight into low-hanging branches. I walked into one hard enough once that it knocked me on my back. Such are the hazards of keeping your head down to make sure you鈥檙e stepping in time.

The data, once processed, made the many times I banged myself into a tree or two worth it. The magnetometry revealed major roads in line with those in other parts of the city, as well as some walls which suggest building foundations. Larger scholarly understanding of Punic urban architecture is actually fairly limited, so this kind of data makes a significant contribution to the subject. At the end of the day, I and my teammates would pack everything up: the ropes used to delineate where I would walk, the magnetometer going back in its case, my water bottle and sunscreen dropped unceremoniously in my bag. We would take the ferry back at 6pm, be back at our accommodations by 7pm, and then have a hearty, much looked-forward-to dinner. And then we鈥檇 do it all again tomorrow.

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2026 Fieldwork Opportunities

Posted on January 6, 2026 by Marta Ostovich

2026 Fieldwork Opportunities

Team members at 脟ad谋r H枚y眉k, Turkey.

Are you a student or volunteer looking to join an ASOR-affiliated project for fieldwork? The projects below all have fieldwork planned for 2026. Check out the project websites to find the one that is right for you.

Once you鈥檝e found a project, we encourage you to apply for a These scholarships are $2,000 and support your travel and participation on an ASOR-afilliated project.

If you鈥檙e a project director or specialist on an ASOR-affiliated project, you are invited to apply for . Project grants vary from $2,500 to $5,000. If you鈥檇 like your project listed below, please email programs@asor.org.

The deadline for both Fieldwork Scholarships and Project Grants is February 23, 2026.

Note: while some projects may be conducting fieldwork in 2026, not all of them are taking students or new team members. Please check with the project director and staff. The full list of ASOR-affiliated projects can be found here.听

Gabrielle Puckett excavating with the Makounta-Voules Project in 2025.

Cyprus

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Lorenzo Guardiano and the 2024 Egyptian Italian Mission at West Aswan team.

Egypt

Wadi el-Hudi Expedition

Syeda Sukena Zehra working with the Gadachrili Gora Regional Archaeological Project Expedition in Georgia.

Georgia

Hannah Borotsik laying out tile from the Athenian Agora excavations. Photo by James Razumoff.

Greece

Anna Taibi recording a looting pit with the ReLand Project in 2025.

Iraq

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Juan Camilo Bonilla Hurtado working with the Selz Foundation Hazor Excavations.

Israel

Italy

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Megan Nishida working with the Kites in Context team in Jordan.

Jordan

The team during our Open Doors Day for the public. Photo credit A. Smith

Menorca Archaeological Project team at Torre d’en Galmes in 2024. Photo credit A. Smith

Spain

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Lauren Cook and Zeynep T眉rker, holding a cuneiform tablet at Alalakh/Tell Atchana.

Turkey

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Want to help more students and early career archaeologists get into the field? Donate to the cause today by selecting 鈥淔ieldwork Scholarships鈥� as your gift purpose!

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Fieldwork Report: Don’Neka Hayslett

Posted on December 19, 2025 by Marta Ostovich

Looking Beyond: Finding the New in the Old

Don鈥橬eka Hayslett, 2025 17吃瓜Fieldwork Scholarship Recipient

On my first few days at the Cadir H枚y眉k 2025 project, I was introduced to a tool I had never used before: the dumpy level. At its core, it is a simple instrument for measuring horizontal levels鈥攁 tripod, a level head, and a staff marked with precise centimeters. But the challenge wasn鈥檛 in the setup; it was in the seeing. When I first looked through the lens, I kept getting lost in the landscape. My eyes drifted toward the mound, the hills, even the horizon, when all I really needed to find was a tiny line on the staff. It was only after practicing that I realized the trick: I had to look beyond the distractions in order to focus on what mattered. The dumpy level trained me to see not just what was directly before me but the exact measurement that would help piece together the excavation.

That realization became a metaphor for both archaeology and life. Archaeology is the art of connecting fragments鈥攕mall sherds, soil layers, or architectural features鈥攊nto a larger story of how people once lived. Like the dumpy level, it requires looking beyond what you can immediately see to uncover the bigger picture. Each tiny detail is meaningful, but only when joined with others does the whole emerge.

This idea also echoed a sermon I once heard about John in the book of Revelation. Exiled to Patmos, John could have focused only on his suffering or the power of Rome around him. But instead, he looked beyond his circumstances to receive visions of Christ and the churches. In doing so, he pieced together a larger truth: that God鈥檚 kingdom stood above earthly kingdoms, and that the faithful were called to live not by what was seen but by what was true.

My pastor also preached a sermon about a woman, described in Revelation as 鈥淛ezebel,鈥� who lured people into sin. Many in that Roman city depended on her approval鈥攐r on society鈥檚 approval, to keep their businesses and livelihoods. Because the city was steeped in pagan worship with many gods, Christians were pressured into compromise. Their choice was stark: pursue wealth by following her influence, or trust God to provide. It鈥檚 unlikely that the woman鈥檚 actual name was Jezebel; rather, Jesus used the name to highlight her behavior, much like the Old Testament Jezebel who led Israel astray, claiming her words were from God. In the same way, false teaching must always be tested against Scripture. Every message should be weighed carefully, studied, and confirmed by the Word. It reminds me of using a dumpy level. You can either glance at the staff and guess your alignment, or you can use the notches to measure precisely. One way looks convincing, but the other ensures accuracy. Likewise, we must align every teaching with God鈥檚 Word rather than relying on appearances.

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Fieldwork Report: Yishu Deng

Posted on December 18, 2025 by Marta Ostovich

How Archaeology Bridges the Past and Present

Yishu Deng, 2025 Eric and Carol Meyers Fieldwork Participation Scholarship Recipient听

After completing my MPhil in Archaeology degree at the University of Cambridge, I had the privilege of joining the excavation team at Kani Shaie in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq for the second consecutive year. The project is directed by my MPhil supervisor, Dr. Steve Renette, and offers a great opportunity to engage directly with ongoing archaeological research in the Near East. Fieldwork abroad is financially challenging. I was deeply honored to receive the generous support of and Eric and Carol Meyers Fieldwork Participation Scholarships through ASOR, which enabled me to continue pursuing my passion and advancing my career in archaeology.

The Kani Shaie Archaeological Project is a unique chance for my academic development. My primary research interest lies in metal production at military sites, and although Kani Shaie is modest in size, it has yielded consistent evidence of metallurgical activity across multiple seasons. A notable quantity of metal slag was found, as well as an assortment of iron artifacts, including arrowheads, blades, and other tools. This season was particularly exciting: in the Lower Town trench, we found a small crucible in situ, embedded in the middle of a firepit. Looking at it in its place of function and imagining its ancient use was profoundly inspiring.

Another remarkable object excavated this year was a complete iron hook found inside a tanoor (traditional clay oven), which further ignited my curiosity. It is exceptionally well preserved and was also found in the place where it was used to stoke the fire or remove ashes. These simple yet powerful finds vividly evoked scenes of daily life from thousands of years ago.

In addition to metal objects, Kani Shaie has revealed a wide range of artifacts: all types of pottery, seals, sealings, figurines, spindle whorls, etc., suggesting that the site possibly served administrative, domestic, and military functions. Mapping the distribution of metal working features in relation to other potential activity areas across the site may help us understand where and how metal production occurred, and how this industrial activity related to the broader organization of the settlement. Scientific analysis of the metal artifacts may provide further insight into production techniques and the provenance of raw materials. All such studies can be interesting future research projects.

Another compelling aspect of Kani Shaie is its long history of human activities, spanning from around 6000 BCE to the Ottoman period. This long temporal sequence offers a unique opportunity to study how a site evolves through time鈥攈ow it was used, reused, and transformed, as well as how excavation can be best carried out to uncover this entangled history. It is our responsibility as archaeologists to discern both the changes and the continuities in these long-lived spaces. This season, I learned a great deal not only about excavation methodology but also about how the present-day lives of people in the region can inform us in archaeological studies.

One particularly memorable discovery came from the potentially late Parthian to early Sassanian level in the Lower Town trench, where we uncovered five tanoors, including the one where the hook was found. The place was likely a communal cooking area. The tanoor that contained the hook was connected at the back to a raised platform made of large stones. Steve suggested that the platform may have been supporting the tanoor. Under his guidance, we left the stones in situ and carefully excavated and sectioned the exposed half of the tanoor. What followed was an unexpected revelation: the tanoor contained a remarkably well-preserved stratigraphy. The upper layers consisted of ash in varying colors, while the lower layers comprised medium-sized stones. Beneath these stones, we found the complete iron hook. Finally, there was a grey layer of ash on the bottom of the tanoor, under the iron hook.

What made this find even more meaningful was the connection to present-day practices. Local team members told me that they still have similar tanoors in their homes for baking bread. After my fervent request, Mr. Zana Abdulkareem Qader kindly took me to see one at our neighbor鈥檚 house. It was strikingly similar to the ones we had excavated. There was even a similar iron hook hanging on the wall. Moreover, the tanoor was installed inside a stone-cement platform, which supported the tanoor just like the stones that we found. This type of installation is called sart-tanoor, as Zana explained. The next day at the site, I sat on the stone platform beside the excavated structure and imitated the motions of making bread using the tanoor. The height and layout felt just right.

For someone like me鈥攔aised in a modern city in a different country鈥攊t had always been difficult to visualize how such installations functioned in the past. Seeing these traditions alive in the present helped me connect the dots. It was a powerful reminder of how cultural practices endure over time, and how archaeology can bridge the past and present.

The precious experience at Kani Shaie this season would not have been possible for me without the generous support of 17吃瓜and Profs. Eric and Carol Meyers. Their scholarship significantly alleviated the financial burden of travel and living expenses, for which I would like to express my gratitude once more. I am also grateful to my supervisor Dr. Steve Renette and the project鈥檚 co-directors Andr茅 Tom茅 and Dr. Michael Lewis. Special thanks to Mr. Zana Abdulkareem Qader for his kindness and generosity, and to other local colleagues for their hard work and friendliness. I also learned so much from other students. This season has been invaluable, and I go forward with both knowledge and gratitude.

My name is Yishu Deng, and I鈥檓 originally from Beijing, China. My current research focuses on metallurgy and military fortifications in the Ancient Near East, with a particular emphasis on the Sasanian period.

The Kani Shaie Archaeological Project Instagram page: @kani_shaie_arch_project

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Fieldwork Report: Kearyn Hall

Posted on December 9, 2025 by Marta Ostovich

Disturbance and Discovery: Learning from Looting at Humayma

Kearyn Hall, 2025 Harva L. Sheeler Fieldwork Scholarship Recipient

The 2025 field school began in Amman, the capital of Jordan, where our first week was devoted to lab-based training. Under the guidance of our instructors, we handled ceramics, practiced drawing profiles, reconstructed fragments, and grew accustomed to the meticulous process of cataloging. This initial week was invaluable; it allowed us to encounter the material record in a controlled environment before confronting its fragmentary and often damaged reality in the field. By the time we left Amman, I carried with me not only a set of practical skills but also a growing awareness of how even small sherds and fragments could speak volumes when studied carefully.

Travelling south to Humayma shifted our focus dramatically. The site itself lies in an austere yet striking landscape of desert plains framed by sandstone ridges. At first glance, it appears modest compared to monumental Nabataean or Roman centers, yet its significance lies precisely in its layered history. Established as a Nabataean settlement, later transformed by the presence of a Roman fort, and subsequently home to Byzantine churches and early Islamic occupation, Humayma presents a unique cross-section of centuries of cultural, religious, and social change. Standing within its ruins, one could trace how different communities shaped the same terrain, leaving behind traces that are at once fragile and enduring.

Life at Humayma quickly settled into a rhythm. Early mornings were spent in the field, where small teams divided their efforts among photogrammetry, architectural recording, survey, and midden documentation. Some days were devoted to tracing architectural features with RTK mapping, others to carefully noting the distribution of ceramics within middens. Afternoons were often spent reviewing notes, comparing interpretations, and discussing questions raised by the day鈥檚 work. Evenings, though quieter, were filled with writing, preparation, and the informal but equally important conversations that come with living and learning in close quarters.

Among the many tasks we undertook, the reality of looting stood out most starkly. It was impossible to ignore; it was everywhere. Some disturbances were recent, the scars from metal detectors fresh in the soil. Graves had been torn open, leaving human remains displaced, stripped of the context that would have allowed us to understand their original placement and significance. In another area, a marble platform had been ripped apart, apparently under the assumption that it concealed valuables. In truth, it was nothing more than a built surface, its destruction a senseless erasure of evidence. These episodes made clear how devastating looting is, not only for material culture but for the fragile stories of lives once lived.

Looting also shaped our daily practice. It was evident that looters were aware of our presence, and we were advised not to linger in any single area for too long. This necessity forced us to adapt; recording and documentation were carried out with a heightened sense of urgency, trying to get everything done at once so we didn鈥檛 have to worry about it still being there tomorrow to document. It was a sobering reminder that the work of archaeology does not unfold in isolation, but in a living landscape where the past and present are in constant negotiation.

For me, the most difficult moments were those involving disturbed human remains. Confronting looted graves was unsettling; faced with the incivility of leaving someone once buried to wither away on the surface, at first, I questioned whether I was truly suited to pursue bioarchaeology. Yet when I was able to contribute to the documentation of these remains, I realized how meaningful it was simply to approach them with care and respect. That experience did not erase the destruction I witnessed, but it gave me a sense of purpose in responding to it. It reminded me that archaeology is not only about recovering knowledge, but also about honouring the people and cultures whose traces we encounter.

I am deeply grateful to 17吃瓜and to the Sheelers for supporting my participation in this project. This opportunity not only allowed me to gain invaluable field experience, but also helped me realize that I have found something I truly love to do. Thank you for supporting my dream and helping me take these first steps toward a career in archaeology.

Kearyn is in her final year of her Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology and Classics at the University of Alberta. She is currently applying to Master鈥檚 programs with a focus on Osteoarchaeology.

Want to help more students and early career archaeologists get into the field? Donate to the cause today by selecting 鈥淔ieldwork Scholarships鈥� as your gift purpose!