PhD/MA Research
INSTAR EMAP funds are being used to support one PhD scholar and one MA Scholar; both candidates being professional archaeologists with considerable field experience in early medieval archaeology. Both scholars are ‘bought out’ for periods of time from CRDS and Archer heritage Ltd to progress their postgraduate studies.
- Matt Seaver (PhD) Living with the dead in early medieval Ireland (EMAP PhD Scholar, CRDS)
- Rob O’Hara (MA) Archaeological excavations of an early medieval burial ground at Collierstown, Co. Meath (EMAP MA Scholar (First Class awarded 2010); Archer Heritage Ltd.)
INSTAR funding has also been used to leverage further scholarships and funding for students associated with EMAP. Several UCD School of Archaeology PhD scholars have also explicitly stated in recent successful IRCHSS funding applications that would be linked with the INSTAR Early Medieval Archaeology Project and its P.I. Dr. Aidan O’Sullivan. In summer 2010, Lorcan Harney and Jonathan Kinsella were both awarded prestigious IRCHSS Post-graduate scholarships to pursue PhDs in UCD School of Archaeology on the subjects, respectively, of Living with God: Archaeologies of the sacred and profane in Ireland (L. Harney) and Early medieval social change in Ireland: a study of the kingdom of Brega. Mr Kinsella subsequently decided to decline the scholarship, while Lorcan Harney left the employment of EMAP to commence his PhD in September 2010.
PhD scholars in UCD School of Archaeology that have exploited EMAP data or are otherwise formally linked with the project include (all supervised by Dr. Aidan O’Sullivan, EMAP P.I.):
- Greene, Sharon, - 'Settlement, Identity and Change on Connacht's Atlantic Isles, AD 400-1100' (PhD; IRCHSS Postgraduate Scholar) (PhD awarded Dec. 2009)
- Nugent, Louise - 'Medieval Pilgrimage in Ireland, AD 600-1600' (PhD awarded, January 2010)
- Nicholl, Triona - 'Houses, Dwelling Spaces and Daily Life in Early Medieval Ireland: an Experimental Archaeological Approach' (PhD; IRCHSS Scholar; submitted October 2010)
- Doyle, Maureen, - 'Dress, Ornament and Bodily Identities in Early Medieval Ireland: an Archaeology of Personhood' (PhD; UCD Ad Astra Scholar; submitted September 2010)
- Boyd, Rebecca, - 'Norse Houses in Ireland and Western Britain, AD 800-1100: a Social Archaeology of Dwellings, Ethnicity and Cultural Identity' (PhD; UCD Ad Astra Scholar; ongoing)
- Dolan, Brian, - 'The social and Technological Context of Ironworking in early medieval Ireland, AD 400-1100' (PhD, IRCHSS Scholar; NUI Travelling Scholar; Marie Curie Fellow; ongoing).
- Keating, Denise, - 'Early medieval childhood in Ireland: perspectives from archaeology and human osteology' (PhD; IRCHSS Scholar; supervised with Dr. Helen Lewis; ongoing)
- O'Hagan, Terry - 'In Tírechan's footprints: an archaeology of the early medieval Collectanea (PhD; UCD GII Scholar; ongoing)
- Seaver, Matt - 'Living with the dead: Early medieval settlement enclosures with burials, AD 400-1100' (EMAP PhD scholar: supported by INSTAR and CRDS; ongoing)
Some recent MA theses that particularly used EMAP data included:
- Niamh Arthur (2009) ‘The enigma of the Viking longphort: a landscape archaeological perspective’
- Sian Powderley (2009) ‘Norse rural settlement in Ireland and its North Atlantic context’
- Graham Harkness (2009) “Identifying ethnicity in archaeology: a case study of Anglo-Saxon communities in Ireland’
- Maura Farrell (2010) ‘Deviant Burial, deviant life? An examination of non-normative burials in medieval Ireland in the 5th to 12th centuries AD and their social implications’
- Margaret Williams (2010) ‘Smiths, pits and burials: places for ironworking and burials in early medieval Ireland.’
- Gary McDermott (2010) ‘Hiberno-Norse town defences in Ireland
EMAP’s policy is that all its online reports, bibliographies and databases can be used PhD and MA in Archaeology students in UCD School of Archaeology (and elsewhere in Britain and North America) as the basis for their own original scholarly studies. EMAP would strongly encourage any postgraduate students anywhere in the world to use EMAP’s reports, bibliographies and data reports in their studies – all available at www.emap.ie
All PhD, MLitt and MA/MSc students studying early medieval Ireland in any University/Third Level institution are welcome to contact EMAP for any help or assistance we can provide.
