Knowra History of archaeology History of archaeology The history of archaeology traces how people investigated material remains of the past and how those investigations became a scholarly discipline with changing methods, institutions, and interpretations.
Antiquarianism : The study and collecting of ancient objects, monuments, and texts, especially before archaeology became a systematic discipline. Antiquarian interests supplied archaeology’s early subjects and collections, while often lacking its later methods.
Stratigraphy (archaeology) : The study of layered deposits at archaeological sites to establish the sequence in which they formed. Stratigraphic recording replaced the extraction of objects alone with evidence about their archaeological contexts.
William Flinders Petrie : A British archaeologist known for systematic excavation, ceramic seriation, and extensive work in Egypt and Palestine. His recording practices and attention to ordinary finds helped professionalize field archaeology.
Archaeological museum : A museum that collects, preserves, studies, or exhibits material remains of past societies. Museum collections helped turn archaeological discoveries into public history and scholarly resources.
Grand Tour : An extended educational journey through continental Europe, especially popular among British elites from the seventeenth to nineteenth centuries. Travelers’ encounters with ancient sites and artifacts helped fuel European antiquarian collecting.
Seriation : A method that orders artifacts or assemblages by patterned changes in their forms or frequencies. Seriation helped establish relative chronologies before precise scientific dating was widely available.
Heinrich Schliemann : A German businessman and excavator whose nineteenth-century work at Troy and Mycenae drew wide attention to Aegean prehistory. His celebrated, destructive excavations illustrate both archaeology’s public appeal and its early methodological costs.
Antiquities trade : The commercial buying and selling of ancient artifacts, both legally and illicitly. Demand for antiquities has shaped excavation incentives and disputes over archaeological ownership.
Herculaneum : An ancient Roman town buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 CE and excavated from the eighteenth century onward. Its early excavations exposed the possibilities and limitations of uncovering buried cities.
Radiocarbon dating : A method for estimating the age of once-living material by measuring its radioactive carbon-14 content. Its adoption gave archaeologists a way to date many sites independently of artifact typologies.
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