Whose Past? Managing Endangered Cultural Heritage

Partner universities:

• Sapienza Università di Roma (Italia)
• Universidad Autónoma de Madrid (Spain)
• Université Libre de Bruxelles (Belgium)
• Université de Lausanne (Switzerland)

Professors: 

Lucia Mori is Associate professor of History of the ancient Near East at Sapienza University in Rome. She is member of the PhD school in Pholology and history of the ancient world at sapienza University. She has collaborated to several archeological expeditions in Syria and Libya and she is currently in charge of the the research on the Hittite and post-Hittite phase at Arslantepe, Türkiye. She is currently coordinating a Prin PNRR project on "Planning the future of a Unesco site: setting a model for the protection of a World Heritage site as a node of multidisciplinary scientific research and laboratory for social integration, international cooperation, landscape preservation and cultural dissemination".

Patrick Maxime Michel studied classical archaeology, ancient history and is specialised in Assyriology in Geneva and Rome as a member of the Swiss Institute; DAS in cultural property law (2021); several excavation campaigns in Syria with the American University of Beirut. He is also a member of the scientific committee of the ALIPH foundation. He is a Senior lecturer in ancient history and heads the Collart-Palmyra project at the University of Lausanne, dealing with the Baalshamîn sanctuary in Palmyra, now destroyed. He is also the director of the NUCLEUS faculty centre, a centre of expertise active in Digital Studies.

Laurent Tholbecq is Professor of Classical Archaeology (Roman Provinces) at the Université libre de Bruxelles. He has worked in the Near East since 1992 and headed the French archaeological mission in Petra (Jordan) since 2013. His expertise is in Hellenistic and Roman architecture in the Near East; he has a particular interest in Nabataean studies, Provincia Arabia, and Cultural Heritage Studies.

Fernando Escribano Martín is associate professor of Ancient Near Eastern history at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, and is also specialised in the study of the origins of this part of history. He has worked on issues of heritage and transfer, and is very interested in how and when the legacy of Mesopotamian culture has been produced in Classical and Muslim history. Sharing these holistic views, with researchers and students, is the cause and motive of this research, and is part of what will be worked on in this course.

Francesca Balossi Restelli is Full Professor of Pre- and Protohistory of Western Asia at Sapienza University of Rome. A specialist in Neolithic and Chalcolithic Anatolia and Northern Mesopotamia, she directs research at Arslantepe (UNESCO WH site), where she coordinates an international team. Her research focuses on food, pottery technology, and social complexity, as well as on management of archaeological sites, protection and conservation. A former Humboldt Fellow, she has excavated across Europe, Central America, and the Near East. She is associate editor of Origini and serves on several scientific boards. She has published over 100 scholarly works.

Lorenzo Verderame is an associate professor in Assyriology, he is the coordinator of the Oriental curriculum of the PhD school in Philology and History of the Ancient World and teaches Sumerian, Akkadian and Eblaite languages, Mesopotamian Literatures and Introduction to Mesopotamian Cultures. He is the author of a dozen monographs and over a hundred articles on the administrative documents of 3rd millennium Mesopotamia, material culture and various aspects of religion and literature as well as the history of studies. He is also the epigrapher for the Italian archaeological mission at Nina/Niĝin (Tell Surghul, Iraq) and at Ebla (Tell Mardikh, Syria

Davide Nadali is an Associate Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at Sapienza University of Rome. He serves as the director of the Italian archaeological excavation at Tell Zurghul/Nigin in Iraq. In 2019, he was appointed Vice-Director of the Ebla Expedition and Principal Investigator of the Ebla Project for the study and publication of Ebla materials and excavation reports. Since 2020, he has been the director of the Italian section of the joint Syro-Italian archaeological expedition at Tell Ferzat in Damascus, Syria. His primary interests include the art, architecture, and urbanism of ancient Assyria; the emergence of urbanism in Syria and Mesopotamia; ancient warfare; and landscape archaeology, with a particular focus on ancient waterscapes.

Nicolas Nikis is an archaeologist, specialist of central Africa. He holds a PhD in History, Art History and Archaeology (Université libre de Bruxelles Belgium, 2018) with a thesis entitled “Archeology of ancient copper metallurgy in the Niari basin, Republic of the Congo”. He held various positions, including at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research, University of Cambridge (2019-2021). Since 2021 he works at ULB (CReA-Patrimoine; Centre d'Anthropologie culturelle) and at the Royal Museum of Central Africa as a FED-tWIN researcher. He coordinates or participates in several research and academic training projects in Central Africa.

Marina Gallinaro is an Associate Professor of Prehistory and Protohistory at the Sapienza University of Rome, where she teaches Endangered Archaeology Management, Prehistory of Art, and African Prehistory. Her research centers on the relationship between humans and the environment in drylands - with a focus on the emergence and practice of pastoralism in Africa, including symbolic and rock art studies -, as well as on cultural heritage management and sustainable development projects -focusing on cultural landscapes and African rock art sites. A former fellow at UCLA and ICCROM, she has excavated in northern (Libya and Egypt) and eastern Africa (Sudan, Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, Kenia) and Oman. She directs research in the Borana zone (southern Ethiopia), in the Singida region (Tanzania) and in Italy (Ranaldi Rock Shelter).