Session: #10

Regular session

Following two successful MERC-sponsored sessions at the EAA 2019 and EAA 2021 on portable material culture (i.e. archaeological small finds), we now wish to take the debate and discussion further at EAA 2022. As in previous years, we are interested in whether the idea of ‘a unity of culture’ within Medieval Europe is also visible in its portable material culture. To be more precise, what are the similarities and differences in portable material culture, ‘in and between areas and regions, and in the processes of transition, integration and reintegration which we might observe through and in material culture? One of the aims of this session is to serve as a forum for researchers dealing with this topic within Europe to reintegrate, share ideas and thought processes. To date, the chronological framework has focused primarily on the high and late medieval periods (1000-1550). This time, we would like also to include more recent finds (up to ca. 1700), which may (for example) explore how specific trends change from the late medieval to the post-medieval period.
We would accept papers focusing on, among others:
- finds that are typical and/or rare in regions, as well as their comparison with other areas
- possible borders and peripheries of common material culture
- interactions between local material culture and imported things
- moments of change, including material culture (or technologies) taking over older ones
- theoretical studies about interpreting material culture and ideas of ‘common material’ culture
- the impact of finds gathered by metal-detectorists and other public finders
- grave finds and their presence in burials

small finds, material culture, interregional studies, long-distance trade, consumption patterns, Pan-European horizon

yes

no

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no

Jakub Sawicki (Czech Republic) ¹

Michael Lewis (United Kingdom) ^2,3
Mária Vargha (Czech Republic) ⁴