Annual Meeting 2010

The conference will present the results of recent fieldwork in the settlement of Punic Carthage. This fieldwork has been conducted by a team of Ghent University (2002-2005) in collaboration with the Institut National du Patrimoine (INP, Tunis), as well as the University of Amsterdam in 2000 and 2001. These results are set in the perspective of fieldwork by various teams over the last three decades, notably by the German Archaeological Institute (DAI Abteilung Rome), directed by Friedrich Rakob, and the University of Hamburg, directed by Hans Georg Niemeyer.
Particularly the Belgo-Tunisian and Dutch excavations have clarified our notion of the city’s structure and lay-out in the earliest period of its existence, the Archaic and Middle Punic periods. The southern city limit could be established with more precision on the basis of finds of a cleared-out 8th century BCE necropolis, extensive industrial working areas of the mid 7th till 5th century BCE and contemporary fortification walls. Special attention is paid to early chronology: recently obtained radiocarbon dates from the earliest levels date back to the late 9th century BCE and are discussed in connection to Greek Geometric finds from the same levels.