The Iberian Peninsula has been under intense scrutiny at least since the 5th century BCE. Herodotus named and described the Iber (Ebro) River flowing through this rich landscape, which would become critical to human prehistory and history. Spanish Neanderthals created the first known cave paintings in La Pasiega around 65,000 years ago, followed by Homo sapiens and their beautiful art at Altamira (circa 35,000 BCE). From the Neolithic to the Bronze and Iron ages, Spain has produced some of the world’s best archaeological remains: the astronomical megalithic dolmens of Menga; the copper and silver mines of Tartessus; and the Celtiberian iron mines that led to Spain’s silver and iron weapons becoming instrumental in Hannibal’s endeavors.

Rome continued these exploitations. The height of the Roman Empire saw two Iberian-born emperors—Trajan and Hadrian—from Italica (near Seville). Roman aqueducts at Segovia and Tarragona and the remains of cities like Mérida testify to the empire’s greatness. Subsequently, the Moors established Al-Andalus in the 8th century CE, leaving an incredible Islamic archaeological legacy and imposing fortresses along with the Alhambra of Granada. When Christian monarchs reconquered Spain in 1492, many new castles and cathedrals emerged, including Segovia’s Alcazar Castle and the largest Gothic cathedral in the world at Seville. This amply illustrated course explores these vast archaeological treasures of Spain, which remain today as vital hallmarks of civilization.

Archaeology should be quantitative as well as qualitative. If we are capable of listening carefully, artifacts can tell us surprisingly detailed stories about their age, where they’re from, the precise material of their composition, the technology behind them, and at times even how they were transported or buried based on traces they carry. Scientific analyses can greatly enhance the process of solving the kind of problems encountered along the way in piecing together these often fascinating stories. Chemistry, physics, geology, biology and botany along with material science are only a few scientific disciplines applied to archaeological research using analytical methods. For example, knowing the underlying geology and soil chemistry of a site could reveal much about the state of preservation of buried objects along with the general climate and susceptibility of objects to weathering, oxidation, deterioration and other vulnerabilities in diverse scenarios. Knowing which analytical tools are applicable to different situations is also relevant. This ten week course explores some of the current processes in scientific archaeology with real case examples offered from the instructor’s Ph.D. in archaeological science and subsequent three decades of research experience.

In recent years, many leading museums have found themselves at the center of controversies focusing on whether they have developed their antiquities collections unethically. This course focuses on the ethics of art collecting and offers historic examples of plundering from Nebuchadnezzar to the Nazis and beyond. The theft of art is hardly a modern phenomenon. Verres, a greedy Roman governor of Sicily, illegally amassed astonishing stolen civic treasures. The Roman Emperor Nero robbed Pergamon of its most famous sculpture of the Hellenistic world, the Laocoon group, and installed it in his notorious Golden House. The Venetian Sack of Constantinople in 1204, the Conquistadores' sack of Mexico and Peru in the 16th century, French and British expeditions in Egypt and Mesopotamia all provide examples of a trend that lives on today. This can be seen in such examples as the pillaging of the Iraqi Museum in Baghdad as well as other sacred Iraqi sites and whether the U.S. is somehow complicit. The Pol Pot regime in Cambodia also Our cultural odyssey following plundered art will be global in nature and will cover millennia of purloined treasures.

Viticulture has traditionally been closely connected with the development of Western culture. Archaeological evidence shows that wine became a social force in the Celtic world when chiefs gained greater status by offering imported wine to their warriors. We also know that Plato’s Symposium connected wine to philosophizing, and the cultural work of bards, poets, dancers, and musicians was often accompanied by wine rituals. Archaeology now also confirms the locus of wine origins around the Caucasus and Armenia, as hinted in The Epic of Gilgamesh and the biblical story of Noah.

The Story of Wine from the Paleolithic and Neolithic Eras to the cultures of the Hittites, Ancient Persia, Crete, Greece, Rome and Sicily through the Medieval World of Charlemagne and the Franks as well as Bordeaux, Burgundy, Alsace, Germany, Italy, Switzerland, and California with the Judgment of Paris 1976 and 2006. Wine Mythology includes Near Eastern culture and the Greek and Roman cults of Dionysus and Bacchus.

How long have our human ancestors been gazing up to the night sky and made observations and calculations about time and created calendars? How did technology evolve from tools and weapons of the Paleolithic into pyrotechnology with metallurgy and ceramics, among other practical inventions? From the beginning of numeracy and incipient science, humans have been involved in countless engineering tasks. Archaeoastronomy, Egyptian pyramid building, three millennia of Persian qanats, the genius of Ctesibius, Archimedes and other engineers and mathematicians, the lost treasures of the Library of Alexandria, wonders such as the Antikythera Mechanism, the practicality and durability of Roman roads, aqueducts and bridges, Aztec and Inca hydrology and stone working are some of the topics covered.

Mythology has been a magnet for artists, especially mythology in Classical texts like Ovid and Homer. When the Renaissance rediscovered Classical texts, art and mythology became so richly entwined that religious art diminished and mythological art replaced much of it. Prometheus, Pandora, the Judgment of Paris, Troy, the Olympian gods, heroes like Herakles, Odysseus, and Aeneas, and monsters like Gorgons, centaurs, and sphinxes are just a few of the mythical personae painted and sculpted in Western art. Distinguishing myth and history as Herodotus did, we can ask such questions as these: who and what were the Bronze Age models of Athena and Demeter? How did Aphrodite change from her archaeological antecedent, the Mesopotamian goddess Ishtar? What meanings has the caduceus of Hermes possessed through time? Before most people could read, images and their iconographic symbolism were known and spread.

Greek vase paintings and sculpture as well as Medieval and Renaissance art along with Romantic and Symbolist art have depicted countless myth narratives in idiosyncratic ways while preserving the codified language of iconology and iconography. Even without words, visual literacy repeats the symbols and attributes of recognizable stories preserved for millennia.

What is the relationship between archaeology and the biblical stories and places? While the nature of biblical texts is debated as literature or history or both, certainly many places existed that are mentioned in biblical texts, although  people known only from biblical texts are more problematic.  Archaeology should not be used to attempt “proving” the biblical texts, but it can greatly illuminate the overall contexts in which literary texts offer broad cultural information.

Some of the apropos questions asked in this course include: were Abraham and Sarah biblical legends, or were they plausible representations of people from the Bronze Age period? What was the city of Jerusalem like in biblical times? Did Kings David and Solomon exist and what is the evidence? New archaeological explorations continue to fill in the historical record on the cities and the larger-than-life figures of biblical history.