Dr. Davide Tanasi, professor of Archaeology at the Arcadia Sicily Center, has been awarded a $1,700 grant from the Mediterranean Archaeological Trust at Oxford University in order to fund his research project, The Materiality of Death: The Greek Cemetery of Scala Greca at Syracuse (5th – 3rd Century BC). Over the past year, Dr. Tanasi has heavily involved Arcadia students in this research project.
After receiving authorization in 2012 from the Cultural Heritage Office of Siracusa to study a complex of Greek artifacts excavated in a western suburb of the city, Dr. Tanasi was able to work with students from the Arcadia Sicily Center to classify, document & study materials from the three richest tombs of the cemetery. Unfortunately, due to the poor preservation of most of thee artifacts, restoration is necessary in order to continue further research, and without the proper funds to do so, the project was suspended this Spring.
With the influx of funds that the newly awarded grant will provide, however, a professional restorer will work with the artifacts this summer, which will allow Dr. Tanasi to resume his research alongside Fall 2014 students from the Arcadia Sicily Center. By the end of the year, he plans to publish a preliminary article on a peer review journal presenting as case study the three richest tombs, and it is his desire to have the students who assisted him listed as co-authors.