Tuesday, October 21, 2008
Archeological Fieldwork Information Session

Learn about fieldwork opportunities in England, Italy, Iceland, and the U.S.!

Join Susan Allen of the Program in Archaeology and the students and alumnae of ARC 211 to hear how you can get involved on a dig!

Time: 4:30 pm, Location: Campus Center 102
Pizza and drinks provided.

Monday, September 22, 2008
19th Annual Phyllis Williams Lehmann Lecture

Godsbodies: Imagining and Representing
the Divine in Ancient Greece

Robin Osborne
Professor of Ancient History
University of Cambridge

This talk will explore the problems of presenting anthropomorphic gods and the various approaches to the problems adopted by classical artists. The Greeks thought of their gods as having the same form as humans, but just how like humans the gods were became a major issue. Plato and others criticized the notion that the gods should be presented as no more moral and no more impervious to passions than men and women were. But this issue of how properly to represent the gods was difficult for the visual arts, too. On the one hand the statues of the gods needed to make the gods like humans if human viewers were to be able to see in them a real personality; on the other hand the images needed to set themselves apart from and superior to men. Professor Osborne read Classics at Cambridge and did his doctoral research there under Anthony Snodgrass. He taught Ancient History at Oxford University (Magdalen College and Corpus Christi College) prior to taking up a Chair in Ancient History at Cambridge in 2001. He has published widely on topics in Greek History, Greek Art, and Greek Archaeology. He has served as President of the Society for the Promotion of Hellenic Studies (2002-2006) and is currently Chairman of the Council of University Classical Departments. He was elected a Fellow of the British Academy in 2006. This lecture is presented by the Archaeological Institute of America - Western Massachusetts Society and honors the late Haydenville resident Phyllis Williams Lehmann, died in 2004. Lehmann taught at Smith from 1946 until her retirement in 1978. Get the poster.

Time: 7:30 pm, Location: Carroll Room, Campus Center, Smith College.

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Stones of the Butterfly: An Archaeological Investigation
of Yapese Stone Money Quarries in Palau, Micronesia
Scott M. Fitzpatrick, Assistant Professor of Archaeology
North Carolina State University

For centuries, peoples from the island of Yap in the western Pacific voyaged southward to the Palauan archipelago to quarry their famous stone money in limestone caves. The carving and transport of stone money by Yapese Islanders, however, remains one of the most archaeologically dramatic, but least understood instances of 'portable' artifact exchange in the Pacific. These limestone disks (also referred to as rai or fei) up to 4.5 m in diameter and weighing over eight metric tons, were carved almost exclusively in the 'Rock Islands' of Palau and then transported by ocean-going canoes or European trading ships sailing back to Yap Island almost 400 km away. The production of these exotic valuables is known, in part, from European explorers who participated in the transport of these disks back to Yap in the 1800s as well as a rich collection of ethnographic data and oral traditions. Recent archaeological research in Palau adds a new dimension to the understanding of how these megaliths were quarried and moved over jagged karst terrain and across the sea, highlighting the importance that stone money had in Micronesian inter-island exchange systems.

Dr. Scott M. Fitzpatrick is an Assistant Professor of Archaeology at NC State University. His research interests include island archaeology, colonization strategies, maritime adaptations, exchange systems, and historical ecology. He has conducted research throughout islands in the Pacific and Caribbean and is founder and co-editor of the Journal of Island & Coastal Archaeology.

Time: 5:15 pm, Location: McConnell Hall Auditorium, Smith College. This lecture is sponsored by the Program in Archaeology, Department of Geology and the Lecture Committee at Smith College, Get the poster.