Two PhD students from the University of Exeter (UK) have recently been awarded grants for archaeological experiments and analysis related to their PhD topics! Both these students have taken part in staff exchanges within the Openarch programme. These experiences have directly benefited the details of their proposals and quality of their grant applications.

Alice La Porta, one of the AHRC SWW DTP PhD students under the supervision of Linda Hurcombe (University of Exeter) and Rob Hosfield (University of Reading), has been awarded two grants. The first grant will fund Alice’s experiments into the uses of Middle Palaeolithic (i.e. Neanderthal) stone tools, with an emphasis on their performance and subsequent use-traces, for which Alice will be spending time at open-air museums in Germany, Denmark and Finland. The second grant will enable Alice to make a study visit to the Institut Català de Paleoecologia Humana i Evolució Social in Tarragona, to examine a Middle Palaeolithic archaeological collection, with a particular emphasis on use-wear analysis.

Matthew Knight, another AHRC SWW DTP PhD student, supervised by Linda Hurcombe (University of Exeter) and Joanna Brück (University of Bristol), has also been awarded a grant for experimental activities. Matt will be conducting experiments with a variety of Bronze Age metal objects that have never been undertaken before. He will be utilising replica daggers, swords, socketed axes and barbed spearheads in a variety of use experiments, before subjecting them to a series of destructive practices to reproduce criteria and conditions seen on prehistoric artefacts. These experiments will result in the first ever reference collection for studying destruction of Bronze Age metalwork.

We can’t wait to see the results of the experiments!

News source: Blog University of Exeter Archaeology