Archaeology Digs in Asia

August 15-September 18, 2010. Cotsen Institute, UCLA. Merv, one of the largest cities in the world in the 10th century CE, was also one of the greatest cities on the Silk Roads. The project is currently exploring Sultan Kala, the vast Islamic city of the 8th-13th century sacked by Genghis Khan in 1221.

Next scheduled in 2010. University of Pitt and the Mongolian Institute of History. Settlement pattern survey, excavation, ethnoarchaeology and the mapping of burial and ritual sites in the Late Bronze Age societies of central Mongolia.

June 15 - August 7, 2007. Center for the Study of Eurasian Nomads. Pedestrian survey and small-scale excavation at the site of Baga Gazaryn Chuluu; occupations dated from the Upper Paleolithic to the 19th and 20th century AD.

July 7-August 11, 2012. Institute for Field Research. Turkey has evidence of one of the earliest transitions from hunting and gathering to village farming in the world, but the early Neolithic of central Turkey is poorly understood. The Boncuklu project is investigating the appearance of the first villages and farmers in central Turkey.

The 2012 field season will consist of four weeks of archaeological fieldwork in July. Exact dates have yet to be finalized and will not be announced until March of 2012. University of Alberta and Irkutsk State University. The Baikal-Hokkaido Archeology Project (BHAP), formerly known as simply the Baikal Archaeology Project (BAP) consists of an international and multi-disciplinary team of scholars with expertise in archaeology, physical anthropology, ethnography, molecular biology, geophysics, geochemistry and environmental reconstructions. Funadomari is located approximately 100 m from the small hotel where project members will be staying in the town of Funadomari. Previous excavations of this site have revealed two grave clusters, each with 10 to 12 individuals. It is anticipated that an additional cluster will be identified this year with the use of ground penetrating radar (GPR) to assist in pinpointing the graves.

The Institute for Field Research conducts work throughout the globe, including Asia.

May 30-June 30, 2012. University of Northern British Columbia and theSyktyvkar State University in the Komi Republic. Ethnographic field school will begin with one week of coursework in Prince George followed by 30 days traveling from Moscow past the Arctic Circle to the reindeer herding camps of the Russian Tundra.

June 20-July 24, 2010. Cotsen Institute, UCLA. The project is focused on the excavation of the Temple of Royal Prosperity of the Baekje Kingdom in Buyeo, located about 100 miles south of Seoul.

Various dates to be determined. University of Sydney. Under the auspices of USCAP, three collaborative archaeological programmes are currently in progress in Afghanistan, Uzbekistan and China.

July 14-August 5, 2009. Silkroad Foundation. The Mongol-American Khovd Archaeology Project aims to advance material investigations of the peoples and cultures of the Altai Mountains, a crucial region between the nomads of the Mongolian steppes and the Silk Roads area within present-day northwest China.

June 17-July 21, 2012. Institute for Field Research. The Yangguanzhai Neolithic site in the Wei River Valley was discovered in 2004. The subsequent excavation of 17,000 square meters revealed rich deposits of Neolithic houses, storage pits, ceramic kilns, children’s burials, and such features as a moat and trash pit.