Research

Nicolle Hirschfeld, Assistant Professor, received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr and her Ph.D. from the University of Texas at Austin, with an M.A. in nautical archaeology from Texas A&M.  She has excavated at sites throughout the eastern Mediterranean and dug through museum basements all over Europe, looking especially for material evidence of interactions among the different cultures of Late Bronze Age Greece, Anatolia, Cyprus, and Egypt.  She is deeply involved in the excavation and study of the ships that wrecked at Uluburun and Cape Gelidonya (Turkey) ca. 1300 and 1200 BCE.  Other special interests include potmarks (ancient barcodes), the scripts of Cyprus, and seafaring in the ancient Mediterranean.

Dr. Hirschfeld is also president of SWTAS, the San Antonio society of the Archaeological Institute of America.

Read the latest about Dr. Hirschfeld's fieldwork off the Albanian coast here.

View Dr. Hirschfeld's database of potmarks of Hala Sultan Tekke here.

Teaching

In addition to Greek Mythology and introductory Latin courses, Dr. Hirschfeld teaches:

• Classics 1309: Pirates, Merchants, and Marines: A History of Seafaring in the Ancient Mediterranean
• Classics 1304: Introduction to Classical Archaeology
• Art History 3320: Minoan and Mycenaean Civilizations
• Classics 3306: Ancient Cyprus

Recent Publications

• "Cypriot pottery," in J.Aruz, K. Benzel, J. Evans, eds., Beyond Babylon: Art, Trade, and Diplomacy in the Second Millennium B.C., New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York & New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 321-324.
• "How and Why Potmarks Matter," Near Eastern Archaeology (71.1-2) 120-129.
• "The potmarks from Troy VI-VII in the Sammlung Heinrich Schliemann, Berlin," in M. Wemhoff, D. Hertel, A. Hänsel, eds. Berliner Beiträge zur Vor- und Frügeschichte, Neue Folge, Band 14, Berlin Staatliche Museen zu Berlin - Preussischer Kulturbesitz, 301-306.
• “Chapter 6: Potmarks,” in T. J. Barako, ed., Tel Mor: The Moshe Dothan Excavations, 1959-1960 Israel Antiquities Authority Reports 32 (Jerusalem 2007) 183-190.
• “Appendix S: Trireme Warfare in Herodotus,” in R. Strassler, ed., The Landmark Herodotus: The Histories (Pantheon 2007) 824-834.
• “Joan du Plat Taylor: The Road to Apliki” and “Chapter Five: Marked Objects from Apliki Karamallos” in B. Kling and J. D. Muhly, eds., Joan Du Plat Taylor’s Excavations at the Late Bronze Age Mining Settlement at Apliki Karamallos, Cyprus, SIMA CXXXIV:1-2 (Sävedalen 2007) 3-6, 253-268.
• American Journal of Archaeology Online Book Review 111.1 (January 2007): Review of M. Lindblom, Marks and Makers: Appearance, Distribution and Function of Middle and Late Helladic Manufacturers’ Marks on Aeginetan Pottery, SIMA 128 (Jonsered 2001). http://www.ajaonline.org/pdfs/book_reviews/111.1/AJA1111_Hirschfeld.pdf

Fieldwork

• Butrint 3rd century BCE shipwreck (Albania)
• Kizilburun Roman shipwreck  (Turkey)
• Zawiyet Umm el-Rackam (Egypt)
• Kommos, Crete
• Uluburun Late Bronze Age shipwreck (Turkey)
• Pylos Regional Archaeological Project
• Ancient Corinth
• Tsoungiza, Nemea (Greece)
• Front Royal, Virginia

Awards

Research awards include summer stipends (Trinity University and California State University Long Beach), grants from the Leon Levy-Shelby White Program for Archaeological Publications, the Mellon 1984 Foundation, and the ASOR Endowment for Biblical Research and the following fellowships: J. William Fulbright, Harriet and Leon Pomerance (AIA), George A. Barton (ASOR), Olivia James Traveling fellowship (AIA).

“The Cypro-Minoan Corpus Project: First Preliminary Report,” co-authored with Joanna Smith, won the first ‘Best Poster’ prize awarded by the AIA, at the 1998 annual meetings.