School Students Arriving
The School Students for the academic year 2020-21 arrived at the BSA this week. Dr Rossana Valente (Richard Bradford McConnell Studentship holder) and Matteo Randazzo (Macmillan-Rodewald Studentship holder) both have a background from the University of Edinburgh, and both have an interest in Early Medieval ceramics studies. During their year here, they will work on post-doctoral research projects. With ongoing involvement in BSA and other Greek-British fieldwork projects, and with established connections with the Fitch Lab and the Knossos Research Centre, Rossana and Matteo fit right into the BSA community.
Rossana uses ceramics to study technological and economic patterns, social identity and cultural practices on a local and a regional scale. She is currently focusing her research on the history of the post-antique phases of the theatre of Sparta with material from the BSA excavations directed by Professor Catherine Morgan. Since 2012 she has been conducting her research on Byzantine and Medieval ceramics in the Peloponnese, with major focus on Ancient Corinth (ASCSA), where she also acted as field director of the excavations of Late Roman, Byzantine and Frankish complexes. In 2019, she was awarded a grant to investigate funerary practices from Medieval grave contexts excavated in the so-called ‘Frankish Area’ in Ancient Corinth. Rossana is part of the team analysing the ceramics for the Greek-British-Norwegian Apalirou Environs Project on Naxos, and is acting as ceramic specialist for the excavations of the Byzantine basilica at the Eastern harbour of Hephaestia, Lemnos, conducted by the Italian Archaeological School at Athens. She is also a Visiting Research Fellow at Newcastle University.
Matteo Randazzo has just completed his PhD in Archaeology at the University of Edinburgh. His research has focused on the transitional period between Byzantium and the Dar al-Islam in Sicily and Crete (ca. late 7th – mid-10th century AD), with a primarily attention to changing patterns of material culture, settlements patterns, and economic and administrative interactions between pre-existing Christian and incoming Muslim communities. While at the BSA, Matteo’s goal is to further expand on his research into Crete by conducting additional fieldwork, archive studies, and petrographic analyses through the School’s Fitch Laboratory. His ultimate aim is to turn his research on Crete into a monograph, which he hopes to publish through a BSA’s publication series, and which will constitute the first work of this kind focusing on the archaeology of the Byzantine-Islamic transition of the island.