UR students receive funding to travel to archaeological sites in Sardinia and Portugal
Student Experience
Gertrude Howland Summer Grants make it possible for undergraduates to learn more about ancient civilizations outside of the classroom.
While Indiana Jones might be fun to watch on the big screen, a University of Richmond grant gave two students a genuine experience of what it’s like to be an archaeologist.
Junior Tucker Radtke and sophomore Peter Searls were each awarded a Gertrude Howland Summer Grant last year. The Department of Classical Studies offers the grant to outstanding classics and archaeology students so they can take non-credit experiential learning programs exploring the worlds represented in UR’s Ancient World Gallery — Egyptian, Greek, Roman, and neighboring cultures.
“There is only so much a student can learn about archaeology in the classroom. They need to gain hands-on experience digging and working with artifacts,” said Elizabeth Baughan, a classics and archaeology professor. “And for students in the field of classical studies, studying pictures in a book or on a screen is no substitute for visiting ancient sites and museums firsthand.”
Radtke participated in archaeological fieldwork on residential and retail quarters at the Tharros Project, a Punic-Roman city on the western shores of Sardinia. Tharros served as a critical trading post from the 7th century B.C. to the 6th century A.D.
“The highlight of the trip for me was being able to witness the unearthing of a fully intact section of a mosaic floor located near the temple of the site. Spanning roughly 4’x4’, it was one of the largest intact pieces that had been found and recorded on the site to date,” said Radtke, who is double majoring in anthropology and classical civilization.
For six weeks, he dug Monday to Friday, from 7 a.m. until about 6 p.m. “It was a long day, but the site overlooked the Mediterranean, so it was really beautiful. Sometimes, we would go directly to the beach after work,” he said. “We still had plenty of time on the weekends to enjoy the city where we were staying and to explore other parts of Sardinia.”
He’s been interested in classics for some time. In high school, he studied Latin for four years. Then, he took Ancient Greek during his senior year, when he interned with the archaeology director of the Plum Bayou Mounds (formerly known as the Toltec Mounds) near Little Rock, Arkansas, his hometown.
“Archaeology will be my continued study,” Radtke said. “I have been awarded a Howland Grant for this upcoming summer for a field study in Bulgaria that focuses on underwater archaeology. These opportunities will be invaluable as I pursue graduate studies.”
Sophomore Peter Searls dreamed of being an archaeologist as a child. “I think it had something to do with history and Indiana Jones,” he said. Although he had several other career aspirations, things changed once he read “Three Stones Make a Wall,” by Eric H. Cline during his senior year of high school. “Ever since then I’ve been interested in archaeology, particularly in the Bronze Age and paleoanthropology, the study of pre-agricultural humans.”
Searls took part in a dig at the Santa Susana Archaeological Project in Redondo, Portugal. The site holds a villa complex that was a Western Roman Empire settlement, dating from the 1st century B.C. through the 5th century A.D.
While there, he learned more about ancient pottery. “The site had a fancy living space attached to a large workshop area which included a kiln, storage, grain tower and more,” Searls said. “There’s a lot of pottery from this site as the local clay, known as Redondo brown, is really soft with few rocks.”
The group also found several coins. “One was from the Republic era and had a god on it — no face because that wasn’t until the empire — and another coin had [former Roman emperor] Domitian on it.”
While Searls was previously set on becoming an archaeologist, he’s rethinking his options given the physical nature of the work. While he weighs his choices, he appreciates the hands-on experience made possible by the grant.
“There’s no chance I would’ve been able to do this trip without it.”