Archaeology

Click. The screen that brings you last night’s Instagrams and celebrity gossip also flashes glimpses of melting icecaps and burning rubble. These are complex times for human beings, both exciting and unsettling. This course introduces anthropology as a way of reflecting on the challenges of contemporary life around the globe, focusing on themes such as migration, warfare, ecology, inequality, and addiction.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Writing Intensive

This course will grapple with the social and cultural dimensions of contemporary ecological problems through a local, project-based approach. Coursework will be organized on a studio basis in partnership with a local environmental organization, Friends of Stony Run. Continuing a collaborative project initiated in the fall of 2019, we will work together to develop interpretive materials for the Stony Run stream and urban watershed adjoining our campus.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Anthropology is an endeavor to think with the empirical richness of the world at hand, a field science with both literary and philosophical pretensions. This course grapples with the nature of anthropological inquiry, reading classic works in the discipline as well as contemporary efforts to reimagine its foundations. Required for anthropology majors.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Writing Intensive

This course examines the origins of human structure, function and behavior from an evolutionary perspective. It includes study of the evolution, behavior and behavioral ecology of nonhuman primates, hominid evolution (including the paleontological and archaeological records), and the origins of human cognition, social behavior and culture.

Area: Natural Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences

This course will provide a basic understanding of human skeletal biology, including bone composition and bone growth, recognition of skeletal elements, functional anatomy of different skeletal systems, comparative anatomy, and forensic anthropology (sexing and aging, body size reconstruction, bone pathology). Lectures will be combined with hands-on experience with bone models and real bone specimens.

Area: Natural Sciences

This course takes a broad look at the impact of natural selection and other evolutionary forces on evolution. Emphasis is placed on what we can learn from genome sequences about the history of life, as well as current evolutionary pressures.Recommended Course Background: AS.020.306, AS.020.330, or permission required

Area: Natural Sciences

The course will introduce students to major aspects of the ancient Greek civilization, with special emphasis placed upon culture, society, archaeology, literature, and philosophy.

Area: Humanities

This seminar investigates the Eastern Mediterranean as a space of intense cultural interaction in the Late Bronze Age, exploring how people, ideas, and things not only came into contact but deeply influenced one another through maritime trade, art, politics, etc. In addition to class discussion, we will work hands-on with artifacts from the JHU Archaeological Museum, focusing on material from Cyprus.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

In this course we will explore evidence and interpretations of gender and sexuality in the region of the Aegean and eastern Mediterranean during the third and second millennia BCE. Material investigated will include the “snake goddess” figures from Minoan Crete, anthropomorphic figurines from the Cyclades and Cyprus, wall paintings, etc. In each case we will consider the history of interpretation as well as investigate the objects’ archaeological and sociocultural contexts. Discussion topics will include representational ambiguity, the specific materialities of objects, and their possible roles in activities construing gender. The course will incorporate material from the JHU Archaeological Museum.

Area: Humanities

Surviving imagery suggests that persons in Minoan and Mycenaean societies engaged in various celebratory performances, including processions, feasts, and ecstatic dance. This course explores archaeological evidence of such celebrations, focusing on sociocultural roles, bodily experience, and interpretive challenges.

Area: Humanities

Through texts, art, and archaeological remains, this course examines the various worlds of Homer--those recalled in the Iliad and Odyssey, those within which the epics were composed, and those born of the poet's unique creative work. Class will make museum visits. Ancient texts read in translation..

Area: Humanities

This course explores the visual and material worlds of ancient Cyprus from the earliest human evidence through the Iron Age. Course topics will include the island's unique position between the Aegean and Near East and how this has impacted both Cyprus' ancient past and the way in which it has been conceived in the modern world. Class involves regular analysis of artifacts based in the Archaeological Museum.

Area: Humanities

We will examine visual expressions of propaganda in the city of Rome, considering how emperors used public art to promote their political agendas and their ideological vision of power.Dean's Teaching Fellowship course

Area: Humanities

This course explores the visual and material worlds of ancient Cyprus from the earliest human evidence through the Iron Age. Class involves regular analysis of artifacts based in the Archaeological Museum.

Area: Humanities

Ecology is the study of organisms and their environment. This course focuses on the patterns of distribution and abundance of organisms. Topics include population dynamics and regulation, competition, predation, host-parasite interactions, patterns of species diversity, community succession, the flow of energy and matter through ecosystems. We will also discuss the role of natural and human disturbances in shaping communities.

Prerequisite(s): AS.270.103 OR AS.020.151

The course provides a broad introduction to the principles and practice of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and related tools of Geospatial Analysis. Topics will include history of GIS, GIS data structures, data acquisition and merging, database management, spatial analysis, and GIS applications. In addition, students will get hands-on experience working with GIS software.

Area: Engineering, Natural Sciences

Environmental history explores the interactions between social change and environmental transformation, or the ways in which societies modify landscapes and are themselves affected by geological, climatological and changing ecological conditions. Topics include the relationship between climate change and human evolution, the environmental impacts of market-based commodity production and regional economic specialization; the relationship between urbanization and environmental change; how warfare affects and is affected by environmental conditions.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Writing Intensive

Specifics of gender and sexuality are not universal norms, but rather are the product of particular cultural formations. Works of art are especially critical in shaping and conveying these particularities. This seminar examines how artistic products expressed and constructed gender identities and notions of sexuality in ancient Mesopotamia from the 4th millennium to the Hellenistic period. As a group, we will explore a variety of case studies, through which students will be introduced to ancient Mesopotamian culture and will develop skills in specific research skills such as critical reading, analysis, and interpretation.

Area: Humanities

This course provides a basis for the study of ancient Americas art and architecture and a broad exposure to the issues relevant to its study. Select visual arts within the primary regions of Mexico and Central America will be emphasized. In conjunction with the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) and the JHU Archaeological Museum (JHAM), students will participate in on-site study of the collections. Students who have taken AS.010.105 are not eligible to register. This course duplicates AS.010.105.

Area: Humanities

Mesopotamia, the “land between the rivers,” is considered the cradle of civilization. Its earliest urban centers appeared by 3500 BCE in the region of modern-day Iraq, Iran, and Syria. Along with urbanism came the emergence of temples and palaces as large-scale elite institutions (along with written records). Their arts manifest some of the earliest complex representations and follow a vibrant course for several millennia. The first empires marshaled large armies and amassed fabulous riches. Complex religious and ritual ideologies were expressed in the art and architecture. And all has been revealed by the archaeologist’s spade. This class explores the art and architecture of Mesopotamia (ancient Sumer, Babylonia and Assyria) from 3500 to 330 BCE. Emphasis is placed on the relationship between the arts and ancient society in order to enable students to acquire the skills for accessing and appreciating ancient civilizations.

Area: Humanities

The visual arts played an important role in the foundations of medicine often traced to the ancient Mediterranean. Drawing on a range of objects from representational art to surgical tools and magic spells, this seminar will explore the ways in which the visual arts crafted a different narrative of ancient medicine from that of the texts of the Hippocratic canon. Of particular focus will be the relationship between the doctor Hippocrates and the healing god Asclepius, the representation and subsequent excision of the goddess Hygeia, anatomical votives dedicated in sanctuaries, depictions of medical practices, surgical tools, as well as curse and healing spells. Participation will include visits to local museums and collections.

Area: Humanities

The development of archaeology in the Middle East – its history of explorers, diplomats, missionaries and gentlemen-scholars – profoundly shaped the modern world, from the creation of new museums and the antiquities market to international relations and terrorism.

Area: Humanities

From 900 to 609 BCE, the Assyrian Empire dominated the ancient Near Eastern world, stretching from western Iran to the Mediterranean and Egypt. In concert with imperial expansion came an explosion of artistic production ranging from palace wall reliefs to small-scale luxury objects. This course provides an integrated picture of the imperial arts of this first world empire, situating it within the broader social and political contexts of the first millennium BCE. In its conquest of foreign lands, this powerful state came in contact with and appropriated a diversity of cultures, such as Phoenicia, Egypt, and Greece, which we will also study.

Area: Humanities

This seminar (which meets twice weekly) introduces students to the art of the Aztec Empire (1428-1521 CE) through the lens of the production of art from valued materials. The issue of value—how it is constructed, conceptualized, and deployed—provides key insights into the political, religious, economic, and conceptual life of a society. Throughout this course, we will examine these questions by focusing on the major themes of art’s social functions, materiality and artistic process, historicity, and cross-cultural exchange. Special emphasis will be placed on in-person examination of objects in local museum collections and the study of writings by indigenous authors.

Area: Humanities

Babylon – the name resonates even today, from the biblical whore of Revelation to sci-fi. It evokes exotic places and time long past. But what do we really know about the ancient city and the civilization that flourished there thousands of years ago? The first part of this course examines the archaeological city of Babylon, located in the modern state of Iraq, and considers its artistic and architectural achievements in the context of Mesopotamian history. The second part of the class explores the ongoing impact of Babylon in the cultural imagination of later periods, from the Classical and biblical authors, to European artists, Hollywood movies, science fiction, and contemporary political movements.

Area: Humanities

The ancient visual arts of Andean South America and their respective cultural contexts form the basis of this course. In conjunction with the Baltimore Museum of Art and the Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum students will have access to collections for study.

Area: Humanities

The works of Native American artists are examined and discussed in their respective social and historical contexts. Such works include Hopewell stone sculpture, Mimbres pictorial painting, and Tlingit guardian figures. We examine the concept of sacred landscape through analysis of monumental earthworks and effigy mounds, Anasazi architecture, and rock art. In conjunction with the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA), and Johns Hopkins Special Collections, students will have access to collections for study.

Area: Humanities

Advanced inquiry into imperial Inka architecture and fiber arts.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

Analysis of ancient Americas collection held in the Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum.

Prerequisite(s): AS.010.105 OR AS.010.407 OR AS.010.398 OR AS.010.365 OR AS.010.389 OR AS.010.366 OR AS.010.214 or in consultation with professor prior to registration.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

This course addresses the technology, aesthetics, and social significance of metals. Case studies are drawn from North America, Mesoamerica, and the Andes. Collections study in museums.

Area: Humanities

What makes a space sacred? How is it different from other spaces? This seminar explores the various means - visual, artifactual, architectural, and performative - of creating sacred space in the ancient and medieval worlds of the Near East and Mediterranean. Possible cases for study include early Sumerian temples, state-sponsored Assyrian temples, votive deposits, Greek sanctuaries, sanctuaries and landscape, early medieval Jewish, Christian, and Islamic cult buildings, cave sanctuaries, pilgrim sites, icons and sacred space.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

Antioch Recovery Project investigates mosaics from the ancient city of Antioch (modern Antakya, Turkey, near the border with Syria) now in the collection of the Baltimore Museum of Art. Excavated by an international team of archaeologists in the 1930s, hundreds of ancient mosaics from the cosmopolitan city were subsequently dispersed to museums across the globe, with twenty-four mosaics entering the collection of the BMA. Phase I will focus on the digital documentation and analysis of the mosaic of Narcissus as a prototype for ongoing research bringing together the fragments of ancient Antioch for contemporary beholders. The Greek myth of Narcissus tells the story of a beautiful Theban hunter doomed to love his own reflection and is the origin of the modern psychiatric term “narcissism”. Researching the mythology, materials, conservation history, archival material, historiography, and contemporary reception of the Narcissus mosaic and myth offers extensive opportunities to collaborate with scholars across a range of disciplines at JHU, in the Baltimore museum community, and beyond. Investigators will move between the Baltimore Museum of Art, the CRL processing lab in Gilman Hall, and Special Collections. The course will involve some travel to visit other mosaics from Antioch now in collections at Harvard’s Dumbarton Oaks in Washington D.C., and the Princeton Art Museum in Princeton, New Jersey.

Area: Humanities

Assyria, centered in northern Iraq, created one of the world’s first great empires that dominated the ancient Near Eastern world from around 900 to 612 BCE. In concert with imperial expansion came an explosion of artistic production ranging from palace wall reliefs to small-scale luxury objects. This seminar examines the close relationship between the arts and politics in the Assyrian empire. Some themes that will be explored are: historical narrative, text and image, portable luxury arts and gender, politics and religion. The course will engage in close visual analysis of the ancient materials and readings of critical scholarship.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

Review of important issues in ancient Near Eastern history and culture from the Neolithic era to the Persian period. Included will be an examination of the Neolithic agricultural revolution, the emergence of cities, states and writing, and formation of empires. Cultures such as Sumer and Akkad, Egypt, the Hittites, Israelites, Assyrians, Babylonians, and Persians will be discussed.

Area: Humanities

A basic introduction to Egyptian Religion, with a special focus on the nature of the gods and how humans interact with them. We will devote particular time to the Book of the Dead and to the "magical" aspects of religion designed for protective purposes.

Area: Humanities

Ancient Mesopotamia, modern-day Iraq, Syria, and Iran, is the “cradle of civilization.” It witnessed new inventions previously unknown to the ancient world: urban cities, writing systems, kingship, and empires. This course examines the close relationship between war and peace and art in ancient Mesopotamia (ancient Sumer, Babylonia, and Assyria) from 3500 to 539 BCE. During the semester students will be introduced to the art, architecture, and archaeology of ancient Mesopotamia. This course is aimed at students without a previous background in art historical or archaeological approaches to Mesopotamia, but more advanced students are welcome.

Area: Humanities

Introduction to the monuments and culture of Egypt from 3500 B.C. to 100 A.D. From the pyramids at Giza to Hellenistic Alexandria, this course surveys in slide illustrated lectures the remains of one of the world’s greatest early cultures.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

Chances are you’ve heard of Cleopatra and the curse of King Tut’s tomb. You may have even met a mummy or two, whether in the flesh or on the silver screen. Even today, 5,000 years after the dawn of Egyptian civilization—and half-way around the globe—the land of the pharaohs continues to fascinate the Western world. But, how is it that ancient Egypt came to be so deeply entrenched in Western culture? This course considers the history of Western interaction with ancient Egypt and examines the consequences of laying claim to a culture that is not one’s own. We will approach our study through the lens of consumption, both material and cultural, situating these phenomena within their historical and contemporary contexts. By engaging with both primary and secondary sources, we will consider the power relations embedded in Egyptian archaeology and the writing of history as well as the ethics of collecting and displaying ancient Egyptian material culture. We will also investigate the popularization of ancient Egypt known as “Egyptomania,” focusing on the commoditization of ancient Egyptian culture in Western media and merchandise. By the end of the class, students will be able to engage with the complex, yet fundamental, question of who owns culture and what is at stake when we uncritically consume an image of the past.

Area: Humanities

How and why did our nomadic hunting and gathering ancestors become farmers? What led agricultural societies to build cities, develop writing, religious institutions, wage war, and trade for exotic goods? This course surveys prehistory and ancient history from the origins of human culture to the emergence civilization. Although prehistory and ancient history yield evidence of tremendous cultural diversity this course emphasizes common elements of past human experience, culture, and culture change. These include the origins of modern humans and their adjustment to a variety of post-ice age environments, shifts from hunting and gathering to agricultural lifeways, and the initial development of the world’s earliest cities and civilizations.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

This course examines Africa’s ancient past from the emergence of biologically modern humans, ancient hunter-gatherers, the earliest animal herding and farming populations, to cities and civilizations. While Egypt plays an undeniably central role in world history, this course concentrates in particular on ancient geographies other than Egypt.

Area: Humanities

The consumption of alcohol is one of the oldest known human practices. Almost every culture has some type of mind-altering beverage that influences and shapes many facets of society. This course is a cross-cultural examination of the power and significance of alcohol in the ancient world. From the Neolithic to the Classical symposium to the Egyptian festival, the importance of communal drinking—alcohol or otherwise—is a uniting factor across the ancient world. This class will unpack the impact and significance of alcohol across a wide-range of ancient cultures, and examine what the study of alcohol might reveal about ancient societies. This includes alcohol as medicine, its religious and ritual functions, alcohol as a community unifier (and divider) and identity builder, and its practical and economic uses. Students will apply anthropological and archaeological theories to understand why, how, and to what effect humans drink.

Area: Humanities

One of the most significant transformations in human history was the “urban revolution” in which cities, writing, and social classes formed for the first time. In this course, we compare five areas where this development occurred: China, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley, Egypt, and Mesoamerica (Mexico/Guatemala/Honduras/Belize). In each region, we review the physical setting, the archaeological and textual evidence, and the theories advanced to explain the rise (and eventual collapse) of these complex societies.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Recent excavation and research have shed light on several ancient cultures of the Nile and its tributaries.We will look at the available archaeological and textual (all Egyptian) evidence for these societies and their interactions with Egypt between 3500 and 300 B.C. We will also discuss research aims and methods employed now and in the past in Egypt and the Sudan.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

This class will aim to cover the production and choice of funerary objects for Egyptian elite tombs in several eras of antiquity: the Middle and New Kingdoms, the Third Intermediate Period, and the Late Periods. Students will work with specific objects after learning generally about them, and they will carry out analyses of materials, pigments, construction methods, and erosion and degradation effects. They will create a virtual exhibition for the Museum's website and present their results for inclusion in the museum cataloguing project.

Area: Humanities

This course introduces technologies archaeologists use to map ancient landscapes. These include Geographic Information Systems (GIS) mapping software, advanced Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers, and various types of satellite imagery. Taught together with AS.131.653.

Area: Natural Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Climate change, population growth, war - what questions do archaeologists ask about the ancient past, how do they collect relevant evidence, and how do they arrive at satisfying answers to their questions? This course will review major theoretical currents in archaeology including evolutionary, cultural-historical, processual and post-processual approaches and discuss the future of archaeology as a scientific and humanistic discipline. Basic techniques for analyzing major categories of artifacts such as lithics, ceramics, archaeobotanical, and zooarchaeological materials will also be introduced.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Applications of GIS in archaeology have recently expanded dramatically and GIS has now become an indispensable tool for archaeological research worldwide. This course will introduce the major applications of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) in archaeology. These include the history of GIS in archaeology, air photography and satellite imagery, predictive modeling, hydrological modeling, viewsheds, and least-cost routes. It will grapple with theoretical issues manifest in archaeological GIS including conflicts between environment and social understandings of the ancient past, and will foster discussion of issues that affect outcomes of analyses including spatial scale and boundary delineation choices that can dramatically influence results. Students will learn the basics of ESRI’s ArcGIS software. Taught with AS.131.657.

Area: Humanities, Natural Sciences

This course examines the archaeology of the Arabian Peninsula from the earliest Paleolithic in the region (c. 1.5 million years ago) through the first few centuries of the Islamic era (c. 1000 AD). We will review basic geology and environmental conditions, examine the development of animal herding and crop cultivating lifeways, and scrutinize the rise of ancient South Arabian complex societies and civilizations. Co-listed with AS.131.664.

Area: Humanities

This course explores economic and social histories of water in the ancient Near East. It examines water’s diverse roles in ancient Mesopotamian, Egyptian, Levantine and South Arabian agriculture, politics, ritual and religion, including water’s interconnected significance in Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Taught jointly with AS.131.615.

Area: Humanities

This course will introduce students to the vast body of rituals that were practiced and performed in antiquity, with a particular emphasis on rituals from ancient Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Hebrew Bible. In addition to examining rituals from a comparative perspective, anthropological and sociological studies of ritual will be read and discussed to shed light on the social, cultural, and political significance of ritual in the ancient world and beyond.

Area: Humanities

Geoarchaeology is a multidisciplinary subfield that applies the tools and techniques of earth science to understand ancient humans and their interactions with environments. This course examines basic topics and concepts, including archaeological site formation, paleo-environmental reconstruction, raw materials and resources, soil science, deposition and erosion of wind and water-borne sediments in different environments such as along rivers, lakes and coastlines, radiocarbon and other chronometric dating methods, and ground-based remote sensing, including ground penetrating radar.

Area: Natural Sciences, Social and Behavioral Sciences

This course will explore the artistic expression of Egyptian culture from the 3rd through the 6th Dynasties, ca. 2700-2100 B.C. Tombs, temples, statuary, and two-dimensional wall decoration provide a large visual vocabulary of Egyptian concepts. This class will look at these elements, separately and in combination in order to consider the intentions behind the art and evaluate the degree to which religious and ideological symbolism, known from later Egyptian art, should be understood in the early pyramid-building era.

Area: Humanities

What was it like to live in ancient Egypt? At first this question may seem deceivingly straightforward. But with further thought, its complexity becomes clear. Who are we concerned with? How the king lived? A poor farmer? His wife or children? A foreign immigrant? Moreover, what is our evidence for life in Egypt? Do all of the sources support similar interpretations? Thiscourse will begin to tackle these questions by considering the experiences of different people in ancient Egypt.

Area: Humanities

This writing intensive seminar examines the relationship between religion and science in ancient Mesopotamia and the rest of the Near East from the 4th millennium to the Hellenistic period. Using a variety of case studies, and through engagement with scholarly literature pertaining to the topic of the course, students will develop skills in specific research skills such as critical reading, analysis, and interpretation.

Area: Humanities

Writing Intensive

Using artistic, archaeological, and textual data, this course will apply recent anthropological and archaeological theories for understanding identity to ancient Egypt. In order to successfully approach such a broad concept, which could easily encompass many other topics, we will focus specifically on three different types of identity: ethnic (and cultural), gender, and sexual. Throughout the semester, we will explore how scholars identify past identities and the issues associated with this process. We will also consider the ways in which these identities were fluid, socially or culturally restricted, and self-defined.

Area: Humanities

This course surveys museums, from their origins to their most contemporary forms, in the context of broader historical, intellectual, and cultural trends including the social movements of the 20th century. Anthropology, art, history, and science museums are considered. Crosslisted with Archaeology, History, History of Art, International Studies and Medicine, Science & Humanities.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

We examine the Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum collection to learn the materials and techniques utilized in the ancient world to produce objects in ceramics, stone, metal, glass, faience, bone and ivory.

Area: Humanities

Students will learn current procedures for surveying, cataloguing, documenting and rehousing collections using objects from the Archaeological Museum. This is a hands-on practicum course working closely with museum staff.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

This course will introduce students to the field of art conservation through the study of paintings, paper, books, objects, contemporary sculpture and historic preservation. Topics covered will include: methods of manufacture, agents of deterioration, preservation initiatives, conservation treatment and ethics, and conservation science. Cross-listed with History of Art.Class usually meets at 1:30 - 3:50 PM, except for days with field trips.

Area: Humanities

This hands-on course explores interpretive strategies for historic sites and culminates in the production of original, research-based, outdoor interpretive exhibits on the Homewood Campus.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

What role did the colorful surfaces of sculptures, vessels and textiles play in the ancient world? We examine historical texts and recent scholarly and scientific publications on the technologies and meanings of color in antiquity, and use imaging and analytical techniques to study polychromed objects from the Johns Hopkins Archaeological Museum

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

Working with the Catoctin Furnace historic site, students will gain hands-on experience connecting archaeology with interpretive exhibitions, public outreach, and community engagement. Several field trips to Catoctin required. M&S practicum course.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences

The course examines recent controversies in the conservation of major global art works and sites, raising questions concerning the basic theoretical assumptions, practical methods and ethical implications of art conservation. Cross-Listed with History of Art and Anthropology

Area: Humanities

This course will introduce and examine the legal systems that structure and guide museums’ management of collections and relationships with artists, employees, the public, the state, and the international community.

Area: Humanities

This seminar explores the complicated, often explosive concept of cultural property, including questions surrounding the ownership, preservation, and interpretation of artifacts, monuments, heritage sites, and living traditions. Cross-listed with Anthropology and History of Art.

Area: Humanities, Social and Behavioral Sciences