Classics & Archaeology

ABSTRACT

Following the award of a major National Endowment for the Humanities Challenge grant in 1998 to endow the Chair for Ancient Mediterranean Studies, the archaeological program of Loyola Marymount University's Department of Classics and Archaeology has expanded rapidly. In order to consolidate these gains and to take advantage of the wonderful opportunities that this progress has opened up, the Department is seeking an endowment of $1,000,000.

BACKGROUND

In 1998, the National Endowment for the Humanities awarded Loyola Marymount University a highly competitive and prestigious challenge grant to expand the University's Classics Department in two areas. Geographically, the department wished to move eastward to include the ancient Near East in its curriculum, since the Near East was the root of much of what subsequently became classical Latin and Greek civilization. Further, the department wanted to balance its offerings in classical philology with material culture studies and archaeology.

To achieve this, the Classics Department proposed the establishment of the NEH Chair in Ancient Mediterranean Studies. The mandate for the professor who would fill that chair would be to move rapidly to put on a firm footing the new academic programs that the Classics faculty envisioned. The phrase "Ancient Mediterranean Studies" was intended to indicate the geographical extension to the Levant and the new dimension of archaeology that would characterize the newly enriched department.

In the Fall of 1998, Prof. William J. Fulco, S.J., was chosen to fill the NEH chair. He had previously taught at the University of California, Berkeley, where he oversaw the Ph.D. program in Ancient Near Eastern Religions and taught the doctor cycle of comparative ancient Afroasiatic linguistics and archaeology. He subsequently curated the archaeological collections at the University of Southern California where he was also an adjunct professor of archaeology. During that period at USC, 1988-1998, Dr. Fulco occasionally taught archaeology at Loyola Marymount University. At the same time, he established the joint membership for LMU-USC in the consortium that excavates every other year at the large archaeological site of Megiddo in Israel, run by Tel Aviv University. From that time onward, and prior to the NEH Endowment, Loyola Marymount University students had begun to participate in summer archaeological dig experiences.

NEH GRANT: ESTABLISHMENT OF THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL CENTER

Since 1998 and the establishment of the chair, seven important developments have come together to make the new programs flourish and grow far beyond expectations:

1) the large archaeological collections and the archaeological library which the California Province of the Jesuits had encouraged Dr. Fulco to amass over some 35 years were gifted to Loyola Marymount University;

2) almost 5000 square feet were allocated to the new Center for the study of archaeology in the newly acquired University Hall;

3) a growing number of significant gifts were donated to the University for the new archaeological center;

4) the University became increasing involved in both national and international forums related to archaeology;

5) the much expanded opportunities for Loyola Marymount University students to participate in Near Eastern archaeological excavations;

6) the increase in student enrollment in archaeological courses; and

7) the opening up of new possibilities for interdisciplinary pursuits with the science disciplines.

1) THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL LIBRARY AND ARCHAEOLOGICAL ARTIFACT COLLECTION

THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL COLLECTION consists of two major components, the sherd collection and the display items. The sherd collection is an assemblage of thousands of "diagnostic" pottery pieces sorted and filed by provenance and period, from the neolithic to the Islamic eras. Geographically these study collections range in the west from ancient Rome, Greece, Cyprus, the Middle East extended to Mesopotamia in the northeast and Egypt to the south. The intact or display items consist of pieces which illustrate the various phases of archaeological history in their geographical spreads. There is an entire Early Bronze group of pottery, some 45 pieces, excavated from a tomb in Jordan, a gift from the Jordanian Department of Antiquities; a large collection of chalcolithic materials, especially stone tools, from Tuleilat Ghassul, a gift of the Pontifical Biblical Institute in Jerusalem; thousands of flints and stone tools from various periods, most notably an impressive collection of prehistoric hand-axes; a large collection of Roman and Byzantine pottery; Egyptian and Phoenician statuary, Egyptian scarabs and amulets, and intact pottery representative of the various Near Eastern cultures. These materials have enabled Loyola Marymount University faculty to teach all of its archaeological courses "hand-on." The students are encouraged to handle the ancient artifacts without fear (we also have a lab for reconstruction if something breaks!). This type of archaeological instruction on the undergraduate level is unique in the United States.

THE LIBRARY, now beautifully housed in University Hall, consists of a collection in excess of 10,000 items in archaeology, ancient Near Eastern and classical languages and cultures, biblical texts and studies, ethnography and ancient religions. The holdings of the library are soon to increase as described below under Gifts. This collection is now used extensively not only by students from the Department of Classics and Archaeology (note the expanded name of the Department!), but also by students doing papers and research in the Departments of History, Theology, Philosophy, and even Film Production, where archaeology is an ever popular subject for neophyte script writers.

2) THE ARCHAEOLOGICAL CENTER

The recent acquisition of University Hall, the former center for Hughes-Raytheon, a magnificent facility of approximately 1,000,000 square feet, was a boon for the new archaeology program. During the summer of 2000, the program moved into the new 5000 square foot space allotted for it. It consists of a beautiful library of almost 1500 sq. ft., a photography room for macro and digital photograph, a laboratory-workroom for the students which accommodates 12-20 students at a time, depending on their projects, a large museum room where the artifacts are housed in glass cases with cabinets for the sherd collections, a second museum room which houses the large specialized numismatic library along with the collection of ancient coins and small artifacts (Egyptian amulets and scarabs, cuneiform tablets, etc.), and finally, a small "wet lab" adjacent to the lab-workroom, which also serves as a kitchen with refrigerator and microwave, intentionally designed to encourage the students to "hang out" in the archaeological complex; a great way to learn by osmosis.

3) GIFTS: ANCIENT ARTIFACTS AND BOOKS

As alumni and benefactors see the growth and success of our archaeological program and its integration with the teaching of Classics, they have been increasingly generous in their support. Some recent acquisitions include an exquisite Egyptian coffin of the Late Ramesside period, appraised for $125,000, numerous small antiquities and gifts of archaeological books for the library, and most recently a unique Phoenician terra cotta statue of the Goddess Tanit dating to c. 500 BC, found in the Mediterranean off the coast of Haifa. One very large gift which will start arriving soon is that of several thousand books and manuscripts pertaining to the Near East: history, archaeology, languages, culture, and religion. A former executive of Aramco, who attended the first international conference on Near Eastern archaeology sponsored by Loyola Marymount University (see below), and has kept in contact has donated his collection to the Center.

4) INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCES AND PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS

Through the Archaeological program, Loyola Marymount University has hosted two very successful international conferences in Near Eastern archaeology. The first conference which Dr. Fulco organized was in January 1998, before the NEH grant was awarded. It was held at Loyola Marymount University and leading scholars in the field from Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Cyprus, Lebanon and Oman were invited to speak. Every invited scholar accepted the invitation. Over 300 participated in the symposium.

In May 2000, Dr. Fulco, again through the Department of Classics and Archaeology, obtained a grant of $50,000 from the Rothschild Foundation in Jerusalem. The grant enabled the University to host the "Management Planning for Archaeological Sites Workshop" that Dr. Fulco organized in Corinth, Greece. The Getty Conservation Institute agreed to help in the organization and running of the workshop as partners with LMU, and contributed approximately $60,000 in expenditures for the project. Participants, many of them government officials, came to the conference from Lebanon, Israel, Jordan, USA, Palestine, Italy, Albania, Greece, the UK, Egypt, Macedonia, and Saudi Arabia. Considering the present tensions in the Near East, bringing together these scholars and government officials in the same room to work together was in itself quite an accomplishment.

Loyola Marymount University is now a full participating member of the American Schools of Oriental Research, and a consortium member of the Tel Aviv University/Penn State Megiddo Expedition. Through the faculty of the department, it also maintain regular contact with the Getty Conservation Institute, the Jordanian Department of Antiquities and the Israel Antiquities Authority. There are also cordial relations with the Palestine National Authority's Department of Antiquities and other parallel government bodies in the Near East, Turkey, Greece and Italy. In March 2001, Dr. Fulco lectured at the American University of Beirut and began the process of establishing a cooperative LMU-AUB program which will, among other things planned, enable our students to participate in archaeological study and excavations in Lebanon.

5) ARCHAEOLOGICAL OPPORTUNITIES FOR STUDENTS

In addition to Loyola Marymount University's early connection with Megiddo, the opportunities for Loyola Marymount students to participate in archaeological digs during summers have increased significantly. In off years of the Megiddo dig (which operates in even number years), students may participate in the excavations at neolithic site of Sha'ar Hagolan in Galilee, sponsored by the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. We have had a regular participation now in the remarkable excavations at Tell Mozan = ancient Urkesh, the Hurrian capital, in northern Syria, one of the most significant sites in modern archaeology. One of our graduates is now doing his Ph.D. work at the University of California, Los Angeles, in Mozan studies as a consequence of his Loyola Marymount participation at this site. This year we are sending one student to work with the American University of Beirut's excavation at Tell Kasel in Syria. There is now also an ongoing opportunity to participate in the archaeological surveys in Cilicia, Turkey, with the department's Dr. Matthew Dillon. Additionally, Dr. Jane Crawford, the chair of the department, is pursuing other possibilities for participation in archaeological digs in Italy. We have also received the offer to participate in summer archaeological work at Petra, Jordan, but this has not yet been organized.

6) INCREASE IN STUDENT ENROLLMENT

Although courses in archaeology were popular from their inception at Loyola Marymount, the number of students wishing to take those courses has increased dramatically in the past three years. It is not unusual to have to limit enrollment so that a class is not overwhelmed with size, especially since most classes involve some hands-on work with artifacts. Regularly we list a course as limited to 18 or 25 but are cajoled to raise that limit to 35 to accommodate students who have good reasons for being in that course. Egyptology, Archaeology of the Near East, and similar courses are always at capacity. In the Fall of 2000, to accommodate the needs of the Theological Studies Department, Dr. Fulco offered a course entitled "Archaeology vs. the Bible?" which drew almost fifty students.

Because of this growth, the Department of Classics two years ago renamed itself the Department of Classics and Archaeology, and established a minor in archaeology. Courses currently offered under the archaeological rubric are:

ARCH 201 Beginning and Intermediate Classical Hebrew

ARCH 301 Rapid Readings in Classical Hebrew

ARCH 354 Near Eastern Religions

ARCH 361 Ancient Near East

ARCH 361 Ancient Near Eastern Languages

ARCH 401 Near Eastern Archaeology

ARCH 402 Mediterranean Archaeological Studies.

ARCH 403 Classical Numismatics

ARCH 404 Egyptology

In addition, credit is granted for student participation in summer excavations in the Near East, usually at the rate of one credit per week of active excavation. Almost every semester there are also directed and special courses arranged with individual students.

7) INTERDISCIPLINARY OPPORTUNITIES WITH SCIENCES

Conversations are well under way between the Department of Classics and Archaeology and the Department of Chemistry, specifically with Dr. James Landry who currently also oversees the Honors Program and the major in Natural Science. What is envisioned is a new program in Scientific Archaeology with extensive laboratory work as its major component. This program will start out as an "emphasis" in either department, but gradually become a Master's Degree program in its own right. The respective deans are currently part of this discussion, and the Getty Conservation Institute has repeatedly expressed its desire to collaborate in such a program, especially in accepting interns for specific projects and in making its laboratory facilities accessible in areas where the scientific equipment may not be available at Loyola Marymount University.

As envisioned and already in the planning stages, the program in Scientific Archaeology will open up a variety of career paths for students. The majority of participants in the program will come from science majors who will make use of archaeological data and artifacts as the subject matter for their scientific investigations and laboratory work; but there will also be humanities students without extensive scientific background who will have the satisfaction of learning one or more specialized techniques in the laboratory for dealing with ancient materials, and thereby acquire a foothold in disciplines which would otherwise likely be closed to them.

Already in preparation are three areas of collaboration: (1) the examination of the wooden Egyptian coffin donated to LMU, to determine the chemistry of the pigments used, the type of wood and how it was shaped, and the painting layers; (2) a numismatic project, to determine what sort of damage has been done to some of both Loyola Marymount University's and the Getty's ancient coins because of chemicals in their previous storage environment, how to arrest and repair that damage, and to draw up a protocol for ideal future storage; and (3) an examination of chalcolithic pottery (c. 6000-4500 BC) from Tuleilat Ghassul in Jordan to determine the chemistry of its inclusions, the firing temperature of some of the ware, the nature of the slips employed, etc.

In the project involving the wooden Egyptian coffin, it is the intention of the Scientific Division of the Getty Conservation Institute to bring several specialists in their diverse fields to the campus of Loyola Marymount University to join University faculty in working closely with the students in the various areas under investigation. This investigation will probably take the structure of an upper level seminar for eight to twelve students.

NEW STRATEGIES

The rapid development of the archaeological program at Loyola Marymount University, a success exceeding our most optimistic expectations, is now pointing to new strategies to take advantage of this exceptional asset.

For one thing we need to enlarge our department by at least one person, ideally a full-time tenure-track professor, proficient in archaeology. This faculty member will assist in bridging the humanities and the sciences and will facilitate the program in scientific archaeology. This faculty member would perhaps hold a joint appointment in the College of Liberal Arts and the College of Science and Engineering. Although we sometimes make use of suitable courses in other departments for the archaeology minor, such as some Art History courses, and soon we will have cooperative arrangements with the College of Science and Engineering, and also with the Getty, the present growth in our offerings makes the hiring of another full-time faculty member a pressing need. This need will certainly become even greater as we consolidate the inchoative program in scientific archaeology. It should be noted that at present all of the courses listed above are taught by the NEH chair. In addition to teaching, he must oversee the laboratory and library, be the official representative of the University to the professional societies and government bodies mentioned in (4) above, do research, and coordinate the diverse summer archaeological opportunities for the students. This matter is currently under discussion between the relevant University faculty together with the deans of Liberal Arts and Science and Engineering.

RECURRING ANNUAL NEEDS: THE REQUEST FOR AN ENDOWMENT

In addition to the hiring of an additional faculty member, now under discussion by the University, the Department of Classics and Archaeology is seeking to establish an endowment of $1,000,000 to cover other pressing annual needs. These funds will enable us to consolidate our present assets and programs and enable us to move into new directions on a sure footing.

SUMMARY

Loyola Marymount University has developed an engaging and intellectually challenging hands-on archaeological program that is unique for students at the undergraduate level. The success of this program in view of the rapidly increasing student interest, involvement, and enrollment is pointing to new opportunities, especially in interdisciplinary studies with the sciences. To build on the significant foundation that the Department of Classics and Archaeology has achieved to date and to enable the Department to move forward in new directions, Loyola Marymount University requests an endowment of $1,000,000.