Biography
• Biography and Academic Background
After having finished a BA in Art History at the University of Amsterdam (1980), Laurens Thissen studied Archaeology of Western Asia under Maurits van Loon, Amsterdam, completing his MA in 1984 on the topic of the EBA pottery from Hayaz Höyük, for which he spent 4 months in Adıyaman, SE Turkey. Subsidiary subjects included Italian, Turkish and Hittite, the latter under Philo Houwink ten Cate. He continued to participate in the excavations carried out on Tell Hammam et-Turkman, supervising a step trench to trace the EBA development, and from 1989 onwards partook in the Ilipinar dig (J.J. Roodenberg). 1991–1994 he was based at Leiden University with a National Science Grant for a PhD dissertation subject on Anatolian–Balkan relations between 6500–5500 cal BC, which was completed in 1999. Promoted to PhD in 2000, Laurens joined Doug Bailey's SRAP project in Romania, studying the ceramics from a Boian site and from the multi-period site Teleor 003. Together with Frédéric Gérard he organised an e-Workshop (CANeW) on the Anatolian Neolithic, resulting in a symposium held in 2001 (see www.canew.org). Current projects include the maintaining and updating the 14C-databases and chronological charts on this site, providing a reliable source for 14C dates between 10,000–5000 cal BC for the Aegean area, Turkey and Upper Mesopotamia, in collaboration with Frédéric Gérard, Agathe Reingruber and Damien Bischoff. The CANeW team recently started a joint project with Bernhard Weninger from the Cologne University Radiocarbon Lab, to sample material for up to 100 14C dates from key Anatolian sites (see www.canew.org/ardp.html). Laurens Thissen is married, and together with his wife and two children lives and works in Amsterdam . He speaks English, French and German, and has some some knowledge of Turkish and Italian.
• Fieldwork
Laurens Thissen has worked with ceramics from the following sites, handled them, and sniffed them (see bibliography infra in the page for specific references):
Syria :
Tell Hammam et-Turkman (Early Bronze Age)
Turkey :
Hayaz Höyük (Late Chalcolithic–Early Bronze Age, Medieval)
Norşuntepe (Early Bronze Age)
Dündartepe/Alaca Höyük/Alişar/Büyük Güllücek (Late Chalcolithic–Early Bronze Age)
Ilıpınar (Late Neolithic–Chalcolithic–Early Bronze Age)
Menteşe (Late Neolithic–Middle Chalcolithic)
Yarımburgaz (Early–Middle Chalcolithic)
Toptepe (Middle–Late Chalcolithic)
Greece :
Makri (Middle Neolithic)
Survey of fortresses in the Othrys, Thessaly (Hellenistic)
Bulgaria :
Gălăbnik (Early Neolithic)
Karanovo (Early–Middle Neolithic)
Drama (Middle–Late Neolithic)
Romania :
SRAP project sites:
Teleor 003 (Starčevo-Criş/Dudesti/Vadastra periods)
Teleor 004 (Boian period)
• Bibliography
2006 (in press) L. Thissen. The beginnings of pottery in Turkey : an overview. In: 12,000 years ago in Anatolia: The oldest monuments of the world. Exhibition Catalogue Karlsruhe.
2006 L. Thissen. The ceramics of Teleor 008, a Boian period site in S. Romania. In D.W. Bailey, R. Andreescu, S. Mills and G. Jones [eds.]. The Southern Romania Archaeological Project: Third Preliminary Report. Cardiff : Cardiff Studies in Archaeology, 60–79.
2005 A. van As, L. Jacobs and L. Thissen. Preliminary data on Vadastra pottery from Teleor 003, Teleorman River valley, southern Romania. Leiden Journal of Pottery Studies 21, 61–68.
2005 A. van As, L. Jacobs and L. Thissen. Arguments for and against stone cooking in early sixth millennium B.C. southern Romania. Leiden Journal of Pottery Studies 21, 103–110.
2005 L. Thissen. The role of pottery in agropastoralist communities in early Neolithic southern Romania. In D.W. Bailey, A. Whittle and V. Cummings [eds.]. (un)settling the Neolithic. Oxbow Books: Oxford, 71–78.
2005 L. Thissen. Coming to grips with the Aegean in prehistory: an outline of the temporal framework, 10,000–5500 cal BC. In C. Lichter [ed.]. How Did Farming Reach Europe ? Anatolian–European relations from the secod half of the 7th through the first half of the 6th Millennium cal BC. Proceedings of the International Workshop Istanbul, 20–22 May 2004. Ege Yayınları: Istanbul, 29–40.
2005 A. Reingruber & L. Thissen. 14C database for the Aegean catchment (Eastern Greece, Southern Balkans and Western Turkey. In C. Lichter [ed.]. How Did Farming Reach Europe? Anatolian–European relations from the second half of the 7th through the first half of the 6th Millennium cal BC. Proceedings of the International Workshop Istanbul , 20– 22 May 2004. Ege Yayınları: Istanbul, 295–327.
2004 A. van As, L. Jacobs and L. Thissen. Preliminary data on Starčevo–Criş and Dudeşti pottery from Teleor 003, Teleorman River valley, southern Romania. Leiden Journal of Pottery Studies 20, 121–127.
2004 Bailey, D., R. Andreescu, L. Thissen, A. Howard, M. Macklin, C. Haită and S. Mills. Landscape archaeology of Neolithic Southcentral Romania: aims, methods and preliminary results of the Southern Romania Archaeological Project. Studii şi Cercetări de Istorie Veche şi Arheologie 51, 131–151.
2002 F. Gérard & L. Thissen [eds.]. The Neolithic of Central Anatolia. Internal developments and external relations during the 9th –6th millennia cal BC. Proceedings of the International CANeW Table Ronde, Istanbul, 23–24 November 2001. Istanbul : Ege Yayınları.
2002 L. Thissen. Time trajectories for the Neolithic of Central Anatolia. In Gérard & Thissen, 13–26.
2002 L. Thissen. The CANeW 14C databases, Anatolia, 10,000–5000 cal BC. In Gérard & Thissen, 299–337.
2001 J. Roodenberg & L. Thissen [eds.]. The Ilıpınar Excavations II. Leiden: Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten
2001 L. Thissen. The pottery of Ilıpınar, phases X to VA. In Roodenberg & Thissen, 3–154.
2000 L. Thissen. Thessaly, Franchthi and Western Turkey: clues for the neolithisation of Greece ? Documenta Praehistorica 2 7 , 141–154
2 000 L. Thissen. A chronological framework for the neolithisation of the Southern Balkans. In S. Hiller & V. Nikolov [eds.]. Karanovo, Band III. Beiträge zum Neolithikum in Südosteuropa. Vienna : Phoibos Verlag, 193–212.
2000 L. Thissen. Early village communities in Anatolia and the Balkans, 6500–5500 cal BC. Studies in chronology and culture contact . Unpublished PhD dissertation, University of Leiden
1999 L. Thissen. Trajectories towards the neolithisation of NW Turkey. Documenta Praehistorica 26, 29–39.
1999 L. Thissen. The neolithisation of Anatolia and the Balkans in eight stages. Orient Express 1999/3, 90–92.
1993 L. Thissen. Pottery tradition and innovation at Ilıpınar. Anatolica 19, 295–305.
1993 L. Thissen. New insights in Balkan–Anatolian connections in the Late Chalcolithic. Old evidence from the Turkish Black Sea littoral. Anatolian Studies 43, 207–237.
1993 An Early Bronze Age sequence at Tell Hammam et-Turkman, Northern Syria. 35 p. + illustrations. Unpublished. On file with the author.
1989–1990 L. Thissen. The pottery of Ilıpınar. A preliminary assessment. Anatolica 16, 80–111.
1989 L. Thissen. An Early Bronze III pottery region between the Middle Euphrates and habur: new evidence from Tell Hammam et-Turkman. In O. Haex, H. Curvers & P. Akkermans [eds.]. To The Euphrates And Beyond. Archaeological Studies In Honour Of Maurits N. van Loon. A.A. Balkema: Rotterdam/Brookfield, 195–211.
1985 L. Thissen. The Late Chalcolithic and Early Bronze Age pottery from Hayaz Höyük. Anatolica 12, 75–130.