Julkaisuseuranta

This article presents the re-examination of the Brobacka multiperiod settlement and burial site. The site, which was discovered in the1960s, was subjected to several excavations during the second half of the 20th century. Following these studies, the site was dated back to the Early Iron Age. The Brobacka tenant farm and other archaeological remains of…

SYGIS, the Finnish Archaeological Survey and Mapping Project of Jebel Bishri in Syria, was initiated in the late 1990s when the project plan was accepted by the Syrian General Directory of Antiquities and Museums (DGAM) and NASA’s world monitoring programme. The cooperation with NASA meant receiving X-SAR Shuttle Mission 2000 remote-sensed data from Jebel Bishri,…

This is an essay about a foreign student, myself, learning archaeology at the University of Helsinki in the early 1970s. A venture that was successful thanks to the positive attitude of the university and, especially, my two mentors, Professor of Geology and Palaeontology Joakim Donner and Professor of Archaeology Carl Fredrik Meinander. I had the…

‘East archaeology’, research cooperation in the areas of present-day Russia, has been one part of the research activities of the Department of Archaeology at the University of Helsinki in the post-war era. The first steps were taken as part of the state-controlled Finnish-Soviet scientific cooperation between the 1950s and 1970s, but Glasnost and Perestroika opened…

In this article we reflect upon the development of conflict archaeology, especially in Finland, as well as the even more recent emergence of dark heritage as a field of academic enquiry. We trace how research at the University of Helsinki has influenced these fields both nationally and internationally, and draw parallels with current events including…

Archaeological work on the African continent carried out by the researchers from the University of Helsinki has been an important part of the research output of the department of archaeology in the late-20th and early-21st centuries. This has been closely intertwined to the lifework of late professor Ari Siiriäinen (1939–2004). In this chapter, I review…

South American archaeology became one of the focus areas of the Department of Archaeology of the University of Helsinki in the 1980s. Martti Pärssinen, then of the University of Turku, first contacted professor Ari Siiriäinen during that time, and these two developed a close partnership that resulted in four major archaeological-historical research projects in the…

This paper provides a review of my archaeological research in Utsjoki, the northernmost municipality of Finland, starting in 1984. The fieldwork consisted of excavations at the Stone Age and Early Metal Period Ala-Jalve site over the field seasons of 1984–1987, sporadic archaeological surveys during the excavation periods and larger scale surveys in the summers of…

Teaching excavations are an inextricable part of university teaching in archaeology. Students studying at the University of Helsinki were involved in university-led fieldwork from the very beginning of the establishment of archaeology institution. Students participated in excavations led by the first archaeology professor, Aarne Michaёl Tallgren, and thereafter students continued to be part of the…

This article provides an overview of archaeological science applications in artefact studies at the University of Helsinki. Since the first metal artefact analysis published in the 1860s, University of Helsinki researchers have carried out numerous nationally pioneering scientific artefact studies, developed new analytical procedures, and embraced the international trends of integrating chemical, microscopic, and isotopic…

Carl Fredrik Meinander (6 October 1916–23 August 2004) was professor in Finnish and Scandinavian Archaeology at the University of Helsinki in 1970–1982. In 1934 he enrolled to study archaeology under Professor A.M. Tallgren, who introduced him to the Bronze Age and the Montelian typological classification. Professor Aarne Äyräpää guided him to the Neolithic Stone Age.…

In the 1960s Björn Kurtén, Professor of Palaeontology at the University of Helsinki, took the first steps to analyse bone materials from archaeological sites. His main interests were ancient faunal populations and their distribution history. In the 1970s and afterwards, other scholars from the natural sciences– for example, Ann Forstén, Mikael Fortelius, Jukka Jernvall, Leif…

Ella Margareta Kivikoski (25 May 1901 in Tammela–27 July 1990 in Helsinki) was the first woman in Finland to defend her Doctoral thesis in Archaeology in 1939. Many duties in the State Archaeological Commission of Finland provided a good basis for her research career. In 1941 she received a docentship (an associate professorship) at the…

The first chair of archaeology in Finland was an extraordinary one for J.R. Aspelin at the Imperial Alexander University in Helsinki from 1878–1885. It was then considered that archaeology’s task was to evoke Finnish national consciousness; thus, the chair was opposed by Finland’s Swedish-minded circles. It was also debated whether archaeology should be taught at…