Event Home

09/09/2025 05:30 PM ISAW Lecture Hall
Foot end of an Egyptian mummy showing Anubis facing right with solar disk above him and a Greek inscription.

The Materiality of Death in the Transitional Phase: The Funerary Landscape of Roman Egypt

Leah Mascia

Dr. Leah Mascia presents on the ways in which funerary customs of Roman Egypt adapted to a changing multicultural landscape while remaining firmly embedded in the Pharaonic tradition.
RSVP
10/14/2025 05:30 PM ISAW Lecture Hall
bronze figure of a man with tattoo like line designs on the body

How China’s Early Empires Conquered and Colonized the Yangtze Delta

Brian Lander

This lecture will take place in person at ISAW. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. This talk will analyze how the Chu, Qin and Han empires conquered and colonized this region, gradually transforming it from a culturally alien frontier into a regular, if remote, part of the Han empire. The paucity of texts on this region’s early history reflects the disdain early China’s literate elites held towards it and makes archaeological evidence particularly important.
RSVP
11/05/2025 10:00 AM Online
Two students carefully observing ancient stone objects in a gallery display

Open House for Prospective Students

ISAW's open house for prospective doctoral students will take place online. Registration is required; click through for the registration link. Zoom information will be provided via confirmation email to registered participants. The event will include an opportunity to meet the ISAW faculty; an information session about our academic program; a Q&A session with current students; and sessions on archaeology, digital humanities, exhibitions, and the library at ISAW.
RSVP
12/04/2025 05:30 PM ISAW Lecture Hall
Book cover of Nature's Greatest Success

Nature’s Greatest Success

How Plants Evolved to Exploit Humanity

Robert N. Spengler

The domestication of plants in prehistory allowed humanity to demographically expand, form dense population congregations (urbanism and social hierarchies), and advance the arts and sciences. For millennia, humans drove the evolution of domestication traits in crops and animals. Archaeologists, ecologists, and geneticists are all working to develop new theories about how domestication in antiquity occurred; one of these theories – the ecological release hypothesis – suggests that crops and animals evolved traits of domestication as a response to humans simply removing predators and herbivores. Dr. Spengler will briefly explore a few key themes in this theory and the rich history of domestication and culture, which he traces in his recent book, Nature's Greatest Success: How Plants evolved to Exploit Humanity.
RSVP
Search Events:

When