The acronym ODYSSEIA stands for: Organic Data Yields in Aegean Bronze Age material culture. Scientific, Sensory, Ethnographic, Experimental, and Iconographic Approaches to human-environment interactions through crafting. In this project, we aim to revise our understanding of how Aegean people in the 2nd millennium BCE related to their physical environment. For this, we will investigate the socio-economic roles of their organic materials in a world known for its elite conspicuous consumption of durable materials and richly decorated palaces. We will achieve this via a multidisciplinary survey of a wide range of organic materials and objects of faunal and floral origins. In order to reconstruct the workflows of how these organic objects have been produced but also used, our holistic and novel methodology combines Aegean and Egyptian iconography, Bronze Age and later texts, ethnographic and experimental studies, 3D modelling, and scientific analyses of archaeological remains. Based on the workflows and how these intersect, their labour cost rates will be calculated. These calculations, based on optimal socio-economic work patterns, and on pre-industrial agricultural subsistence activities, will redress the socio-economic and political imbalances in the power between elites and others in the 2nd millennium BCE. It will complement existing labour data on Late Bronze Age Aegean inorganic workflows. These new data will render visible both organics and a fuller range of Bronze Age people interacting with them, and it will result in a comprehensive, gendered taskscape narrative.
Key tasks and responsibilities
As a member of a larger team, the advertised Post-Doctoral Researcher (PDR) position is embedded within the ODYSSEIA programme, funded by an FWO ODYSSEUS Type I Grant, and supervised by Prof. Dr. Ann Brysbaert. As PDR scholar, you carry out research in the framework of this project and according to a set of tasks linked to this project. You will also have the possibilities to take part in Faculty of Arts training programmes and university-wide ones, developed for scholars at this stage of their career. The Faculty of Arts is a large vibrant research community of PhD students and PDRs from all corners of the world, and they often come together in social and professional activities which are open to all.
Health-and-wellbeing materials and technologies are being covered in ongoing research for present-day usage, but increasingly so also for past populations. These technologies crossed over with aromatic oils, colorants, faunal and floral technologies, religious practices, food and inorganic materials. Extracting medicinal products from plants and animals to remedy ailments has been studied and analysed, and medicinal plants were collected, but in limited ways for the Aegean's 2nd millennium. The Amarna tablets tell of physicians being sent between royal courts in the 2nd millennium East Mediterranean.
Connective technologies received very little attention even though they criss-cross all organic and inorganic raw sources: wood joints, treads and cordage, keratin/collagen-based adhesives. These were also essential in daily life: in building activities, to extract from mines and wells, to string up and connect materials. Tiryns’s torch holders contained resin, and terebinth was found on the Ulu Burun shipwreck. Water, needed for many crafts, is a connective material, so fresh or salty water requirements will be reported on in their respective production processes.
This PDR project will thus collect, document, and analyse evidence for connective technologies and technologies relating to health and well-being. Data on oils, aromatics, and herbs, next to wax, ropes, thread, hinges, glues, and mortars, will enhance insights in many chaînes opératoires worked on by different other team members. Residue analyses literature and collaboration with the team members carrying out experimental work will be crucial and joint experimental work is encouraged. Research on connective technologies has so far not been conducted in Egypt, but ancient medicinal research is well known and can be usefully compared with the Aegean. The expected deliveries will be: OA database, 4 papers in a peer-reviewed journal and/or conference papers, 1 Handbook chapter.
You will carry out the following:
- Write the papers jointly and/or as single author
- Take part in PDR training offered by the KU Leuven and through external partners where relevant
- Participate in meetings-workshops organised by the ODYSSEIA team to share and discuss data among the group members and the PI towards the common goals.
- Present papers at inter/national conferences and workshops, together with other team members and collaborators, as required by the project (co-authored and individual)
- Submit research results for publication, together with other team members and collaborators, in peer-reviewed journals, synthetic publications, and conference proceedings (co-authored and individual)
- Undertake/participate in limited teaching during your appointment (practicals, classes, exam invigilation, field school, etc.), and minor project administration tasks, as is the case for all PDR scholars at KU Leuven.
