Danielle Smotherman excavates Frankish Corinth in preparation for public visitors

Danielle Smotherman, PhD candidate in Archaeology, spent this past April and May as an area supervisor for excavations at Corinth under the direction of Guy Saunders and field director Larkin Kennedy.

The excavations in Corinth this year and last have been focusing on the Frankish area, just behind the site museum, which includes two units of rooms and a medieval church. The group’s primary aim has been the excavation and consolidation of the area in preparation for its first public visitors. In concert with these efforts, Danielle, along with other area supervisors, did research and prepared texts for a new website directed to the general public. Check out their progress here.

During her eight week stay, Danielle oversaw excavations in two rooms in Unit 2: Room 2 and Room 9, covering an area of approximately 50 m². As part of her duties, Danielle oversaw three to four workers, kept detailed daily records on the contexts, created drawings for each context, processed the small finds, the coins and the pottery from the two areas, produced Harris matrices for each area, and wrote up her findings (which can be found on ASCSA.net).

Excavations at Corinth started in 1896 through the American School of Classical Studies in Athens. The Frankish area had been previously excavated in the 1990s under the direction of Charles Williams. Danielle is currently at work on another excavation, the Upper Sabina Tiberina project in Vacone, Italy, where she is working as a field and conservation assistant for the field school; see: http://www.ncas.rutgers.edu/upper-sabina-tiberina-archaeological-field-school-0

Related Links

• Frankish Corinth Excavations
• Graduate Program in Archaeology