Dear Friends of LAA,
 I am writing to cordially invite you to the next LAA meeting. It will be on the subject of burial and memorial in Late Antiquity, and is a thematic analysis of the topic, following on from  our fieldwork meeting on the subject last November. The conference will be held in Birkbeck, University of London on the 17 March 2018. Details are below. Please register via Eventbrite if you wish to attend: https://laaburial2018.eventbrite.co.uk. If  this is too difficult please reserve directly with me: michaelmulryan@gmail.com. An initial invitation via Eventbrite itself was sent out a week ago, so apologies if you are receiving this again.  Please feel free to distribute the attached poster (in three formats) for publicity within your institutions.
 Kind regards  Michael Mulryan and Luke Lavan
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This conference reviews the state of late antique funerary practices, on a thematic basis, from scientific examinations of skeletons and their DNA, to treatments of the deceased body, to the nature of memorial structures and how they were treated over  time.
(A) DEMOGRAPHY
(i) OSTEOLOGY: LATE ANTIQUE LIVES FROM BONES
09.45-10.45 Flavio de Angelis (Sop. Arch. Di Roma) and Andrea Battistini (Sop. Arch. Di Roma) Lives from Bones: Anthropological Evaluation in the City of Rome
(ii) BIOMOLECULES IN LATE ANTIQUITY (ISOTOPES, DIET, MIGRATION, EPIDEMIC, ENDEMIC DISEASE)
11.00-11.30 Alexandra Chavarria (Padova) Northern Italy
11.30-12.00 Mathew Emery (McMaster) Southern Italy (Skype)
(B) RITUALS AND IDENTITIES: DEATH RITUALS AND TREATMENT OF THE BODY
12.15-12.45 Rhea Brettell (Bradford) Organic residues from mortuary contexts (Britain).
12.45-13.15 Thibaut Devièse (Oxford) Colourants and dyes
Respondent: Béatrice Caseau (Paris IV) Treatment of the body: Ointments and perfumes
(C) COMMEMORATION, MONUMENTS, FUNERARY TOPOGRAPHY
(i) MEMORIALS - LATE ANTIQUE COMMEMORATION,
14.00-14.30 Zsolt Magyar (Budapest) Mausolea in Pannonia
14.30-15.00 Chris Sparey-Green (Kent) Mausolea in NW Europe
(ii) SPATIAL RELATIONSHIPS OF DEAD TO LIVING
15.15-15.45 Judit Ciurana Prast (Barcelona) Funerary Landscapes of Catalonia
15.45-16.15 Efthymios Rizos (Oxford) Christian elite burials in Anatolia / Constantinople & the cult of relics
(iii) MEMORIAL AND OBLIVION: SPOLIA AND ATTITUDES TO TOMBS
16.30-16.45 Luke Lavan (Kent) Spolia and the archaeology of memory
16.45-17.15 Douglas Underwood (Kent) City walls and tomb destruction  (Skype)
17.15-17.45 Nick Mishkovsky (Kent) City walls and tomb preservation  (Skype)
17.45-18.00 Conclusion.
All are welcome. Admission 25 GBP, 10 GBP Students. Registration is via Eventbrite:  https://laaburial2018.eventbrite.co.uk
Venue: Room 421 inside Birkbeck College, Malet Street, Bloomsbury, London WC1E 7HX. Metro: Russell Square.
Conveners: L.Lavan/M.Mulryan (Kent) T.Penn (Edin.) R,Darley (Birkbeck).
Sponsors: University of Kent, Birkbeck (University of London), J.Beale, Brill.
We hope you can make it.
Best,Luke Lavan, Rebecca Darley, Michael Mulryan, Tim Penn
Dr Michael Mulryan
Editor - Late Antique Archaeology
Honorary Research Fellow
Centre for Late Antique Archaeology
University of Kent
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