Professor Susan Sherratt
MA, DPhil, FSA
School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities
Emeritus Professor of East Mediterranean Archaeology
+44 114 222 0183
Full contact details
School of History, Philosophy and Digital Humanities
Room D09
Minalloy House
10-16 Regent Street
Sheffield
S1 3NJ
- Profile
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I read Classics as an undergraduate at New Hall, Cambridge, and completed a DPhil on 12th century BC Mycenaean pottery at Somerville College, Oxford in 1982. I researched and taught in Oxford, based latterly in the Department of Antiquities, Ashmolean Museum, for many years before coming to Sheffield in 2005.
- Research interests
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My research interests are in the Bronze and Early Iron Ages of the Aegean, Cyprus and the wider eastern Mediterranean, particularly in all aspects of trade and interaction within and beyond these regions.
I am also interested in exploring the ways in which the Homeric epics and the archaeological record can most usefully be combined.
Current research projects/collaborations
Silver before coinage: a history of silver from the fifth millennium to the mid-first millennium BC
This project traces the history of silver from its beginnings in the 4th millennium BC in western Asia (roughly contemporary with the appearance of the Uruk urban centres) to the mid-1st millennium BC (shortly after the introduction of coinage), by which time silver resources were being exploited over a very wide area of the western Old World. Among other things, this history investigates and seeks to explain the social, cultural and economic processes by which silver became the elite metal of choice in southern Mesopotamia during the 4th millennium BC, and subsequently for ceremonial drinking equipment, as a standard and medium of exchange and eventually for coinage over a much wider area.
ArchAtlas
The web-based ArchAtlas project was founded by the late Andrew Sherratt in 2003, and transferred to the Department of Archaeology in 2005. Since his death I have acted as academic director, along with Debi Harlan and Toby Wilkinson exploring ways in which it can continue to develop as a useful tool for research and teaching. The project aims to provide a visual summary of spatial processes in prehistoric and early historic times, such as the spread of farming, the formation of trade contacts, and the growth of urban systems, and to illustrate the development of settlement history at a variety of scales. In partnership with other projects and groups, it also aims to create a scholarly digital atlas (eventually including sites, environments, cultures and chronologies). Visual essays which explore a range of archaeological problems and themes are published in the ArchAtlas Journal.
Sinop Regional Archaeological Project
A collaborative, interdisciplinary archaeological research project, directed by Professor Owen Doonan of California State University-Northridge and Dr Alex Bauer of Queens College, City University of New York. Its aim is to investigate long-term patterns of land use and settlement and communication networks in the Black Sea coastal region of Sinop, Turkey, from the inland valleys and mountains to the sea, by employing both extensive reconnaissance of its numerous ecological zones and intensive techniques of systematic survey and excavation in selected zones.
Palaepaphos Urban Landscape Project
This project, directed by Professor Maria Iacovou of the University of Cyprus, aims to trace the long-term development and topography of the urban centre of Palaepaphos in south-west Cyprus in the 2nd -1st millennia BC. It is also concerned with the development of a framework of principles in which modern development and the preservation of archaeological landscapes can co-exist.
- Publications
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Edited books
- Circuits of Metal Value. Changing Roles of Metals in the Early Aegean and Nearby Lands. Oxford & Havertown PA: Oxbow.
- Archaeology and Homeric Epic. Oxford: Oxbow Books.
Journal articles
- THE TROJAN WAR: HISTORY OR BRICOLAGE?. Bulletin of the Institute of Classical Studies, 53(2), 1-18.
- REPRESENTATIONS OF KNOSSOS AND MINOAN CRETE
IN THE BRITISH, AMERICAN AND CONTINENTAL PRESS
1900- c.1930*. Creta Antica, 10(11), 619-649.
- Diversity in diversification: a Cretan caseload. ANTIQUITY, 80(310), 996-999.
- Feasting in Homeric Epic. Hesperia, 73(2), 301-337.
- Visible writing: questions of script and identity in Early Iron Age Greece and Cyprus. Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 22(3), 225-242.
- Bronze Age and early Iron Age Crete. Antiquity, 77(298), 858-860.
- Daidalic inventions: the hellenization of art and the art of hellenization. Antiquity, 67(257), 915-918.
- The growth of the Mediterranean economy in the early first millennium BC. World Archaeology, 24(3), 361-378.
- Fallout from the Aegean big bang. Antiquity, 65(249), 998-1001.
- From khronos to khronologia: Warren & Hankey's Aegean Bronze Age timetable. Antiquity, 64(243), 414-415.
- The archaeology of Indo-European: an alternative view. Antiquity, 62(236), 584-595.
- ELIZABETH (LISA) BAYARD FRENCH (1931–2021). The Annual of the British School at Athens, 1-7.
- Comment on Ora Negbi, The "Libyan landscape" from Thera: a review of Aegean enterprises overseas in the late Minoan IA period. Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology, 7(2), 237-240.
- THE PALAEPAPHOS URBAN LANDSCAPE PROJECT: BRONZE AGE POTTERY FROM MARCHELLO 2006-2008. Report of the Department of Antiquities, Cyprus, New Series 1, not yet known-not yet known. View this article in WRRO
Chapters
- Circuits of metal value: introduction In Wilkinson T & Sherratt ES (Ed.), Circuits of Metal Value Changing Roles of Metals in the Early Aegean and Nearby Lands (pp. 1-13). Oxford: Oxbow Books.
- Greek silver before coinage: medium of exchange, means of wealth accumulation, or commodity? In Wilkinson T & Sherratt E (Ed.), Circuits of Metal Value. Changing roles of metals in the early Aegean and nearby lands (pp. 54-76). Oxford: Oxbow.
- The Mediterranean and the Black Sea in the Early First Millennium BCE: Greeks, Phoenicians, Phrygians, and Lydians In Hall JM & Osborne JF (Ed.), The Connected Iron Age Interregional Networks in the Eastern Mediterranean, 900-600 BCE (pp. 124-141). Chicago and London: University of Chicago Press.
- Early Cycladic? lead model boats in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford In Sekunda N (Ed.), Wonders Lost and Found. A Celebration of the Archaeological Work of Professor Michael Vickers (pp. 1-7). Oxford: Archaeopress.
- Phoenicians and Corinth In Gilboa A & Yasur-Landau A (Ed.), Nomads of the Mediterranean: Trade and Contact in the Bronze and Iron Ages. Studies in Honor of Michal Artzy (pp. 262-277). Leiden/Boston: Brill.
- From the Near East to the Far West In Lemos I & Kotsonas A (Ed.), A Companion to the Archaeology of Early Greece and the Mediterranean (pp. 187-214). Wiley-Blackwell
- Phoenicians in the Aegean and Aegean silver, 11th-9th centuries BC In Luisa Bonadies, Iva Chirpanlieva et Élodie Guillon , Bonadies L, Chirpanlieva I & Guillon É (Ed.), LES PHÉNICIENS, LES PUNIQUES ET LES AUTRES. Échanges et identités en Méditerranée ancienne (pp. 129-158). Paris: Éditions de Boccard.
- Why was (and is) silver sexy? Silver during the 4th-3rd millennia in the Near East and Mesopotamia In Armada X-L, Murillo-Barroso M & Charlton M (Ed.), Metals, Minds and Mobility. Integrating Scientific Data with Archaeological Theory (pp. 97-106). Oxford: Oxbow Books. View this article in WRRO
- Homeric Epic and Contexts of Bardic Creation In Sherratt S & Bennet J (Ed.), Archaeology and Homeric Epic (pp. 35-52). Oxford and Philadelphia: Oxbow Books. View this article in WRRO
- A globalising Bronze and Iron Age Mediterranean In Hodos T (Ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Archaeology and Globalization (pp. 602-617). London/New York: Routledge.
- From 'institutional' to 'private': traders, routes and commerce from the Late Bronze to the Iron Age In Moreno Garcia JC (Ed.), Dynamics of Production in the Ancient Near East (pp. 289-301). Oxford and Philadelphia: Oxbow Books. View this article in WRRO
- Cyprus and the Near East: cultural contacts (1200-750 BC) In Babbi A, Bubenheimer-Erhart F, Marin-Aguilera B & Mühl S (Ed.), The Mediterranean Mirror: Cultural Contacts in the Mediterranean Sea Between 1200 and 750 BC (pp. 71-83). Mainz: Romisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum.
- Sinop Regional Archaeological Project: report on the 2010-2012 field seasons In Steadman S & McMahon G (Ed.), The Archaeology of Anatolia: Current Work (pp. 298-327). Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Press.
- High Precision Dating and Archaeological Chronologies: Revisiting an old problem, The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating (pp. 126-138). Routledge
- The intercultural trnasformative capacities of irregularly appropriated goods. In Maran J & Stockhammer PW (Ed.), Materiality and Social Practice: Trasformative Capacities of Intercultural Encounters (pp. 152-172). Oxbow Books Limited
- Learning to learn from bronze age pots: A perspective on forty years of aegean ceramic studies in the work of J.B. Rutter, Our Cups Are Full: Pottery and Society in the Aegean Bronze Age. Papers Presented to Jeremy B. Rutter on the Occasion of his 65th Birthday (pp. 257-266).
- The Aegean and the Wider World: Some Thoughts on a World-Systems Perspective In Parkinson WA & Galaty ML (Ed.), Archaic State Interaction: The Eastern Mediterranean in the Bronze Age (pp. 81-106). School for Advanced Research on the
- Greeks and Phoenicians: perceptions of trade and traders in the early 1st millennium BC In Bauer AA & Agbe-Davies AS (Ed.), Social Archaeologies of Trade and Exchange: Exploring Relationships among People, Places and Things (pp. 119-142). Left Coast Press
- Vitreous materials in the Bronze and Early Iron Ages: Some Questions of Values In Jackson CM & Wager EC (Ed.), Vitreous materials in the late Bronze Age Aegean (pp. 209-232). Oxbow Books Ltd
- High precision dating and archaeological chronologies: Revisiting an old problem, The Bible and Radiocarbon Dating: Archaeology, Text and Science (pp. 114-126).
- Late Cypriot writing in context, Syllabic Writing on Cyprus and its Context (pp. 77-106). Cambridge University Press
- Archaeological Contexts, A Companion to Ancient Epic (pp. 119-141). Blackwell Publishing Ltd
- Late Cypriot writing in context In Steele P (Ed.), Syllabic Writing on Cyprus and its context (pp. 94-132).
Website content
- Sinope Ancient Kale Excavations 2015.
- Circuits of Metal Value. Changing Roles of Metals in the Early Aegean and Nearby Lands. Oxford & Havertown PA: Oxbow.
- Research group
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Current Research Students
- Stavroula Fouriki- "Materiality and social practice in Late Bronze Age Chania, Crete: Detecting socio-political change in ceramics of the Late Minoan IΒ-IIIB period"
- Nicholas Groat- "Reconstructing, charting, and exploring the development of early alcohol distillation through experiment"
- Martina Monaco- "A critical examination of social stratification in prehistoric Cyprus using skeletal and funerary data"
- Dora Olah- "Marble figurines of the 3rd Millennium BC Aegean and south-west Anatolia"
- Lamia Sassine- "Elusive Phoenicians: perceptions of Phoenician identity and material culture as reflected in museum records and displays"
- Professional activities and memberships
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- Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries
- Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland