HMC Dean & Fellow awarded major funding for innovative new project

A research project led by Harris Manchester College’s Dean and Fellow and Tutor in Archaecology, Dr Linda Hulin, will soon get underway at the University of Oxford following a gift from charitable initiative Augmentum.

The project team, based at the School of Archaeology, will investigate the ways in which pan-Mediterranean trade

routes re-emerged and reconfigured following a period when rainfall declined sharply and state-run networks buckled under pressure from a range of social and political factors at the end of the Late Bronze Age.

Among the questions she and her team hope to answer are: was the persistence and reshaping of low-level trade bolstered by a network of friendly stops along the sailors’ routes and knowledge exchanged with fishing communities; and what were the effects of climate change on these networks, particularly along the north African coast and on smaller islands across the Mediterranean?

Dr Hulin said: ‘These are large open-ended questions and support from Augmentum gives us the means to devote time to them. We aim to combine strands of information that are usually kept separate and do so on a large scale, employing a mix of agent-based modelling software and geographical information systems to animate the complex interaction between the carrying capacity of the land, the bounty of the sea, and the contribution of coastal communities to the smooth function of sea-borne living, particularly before and after a period of significant and rapid climate change. We are also in a position to test the model through targeted coastal survey.’

The gift from Augmentum will allow two postdoctoral fellows to join the project for three years.

Augmentum is a private charitable initiative dedicated to supporting projects that improve lives, empower communities and strength our connection with nature and the past.

Alessandro Braglia, Head of Philanthropy at Augmentum, said: ‘We are proud to support Dr Hulin and her project at the University of Oxford as it promises to transform our understanding of the ancient sailing world. By shifting the focus to the practical needs of mariners and the role of coastal communities, this research is likely to create a disruptive understanding of the Mediterranean, its economy and its civilisations.’