Associate Professor Catherine J. Frieman
Areas of expertise
- Archaeology 2101
- Archaeology Of Europe, The Mediterranean And The Levant 210105
- Social Theory 160806
- Sociology And Social Studies Of Science And Technology 160808
Research interests
Innovation in prehistoric societies; Flint, ground-stone and other lithic technologies; Trade and communication in 4th-2nd millennia BC Europe; European Neolithic and Bronze Age society; Adoption of metal; Prehistoric metallurgy; Flint daggers; Ornaments and identity;Material culture studies; Archaeological theory
Biography
Catherine Frieman is an associate professor in European archaeology in the School of archaeology and anthropology. Previously, she was a post-doctoral research fellow at the Research Laboratory for Archaeology and the History of Art at the University of Oxford and a lecturer in archaeology at the University of Nottingham. She received a BA in archaeological studies from Yale University and an M.st and D.phil in archaeology from the University of Oxford. Catherine's D.phil examined the adoption of metal objects and metallurgy in 4th-2nd millennium BC northwest Europe through a close study of various lithic objects long thought to be skeuomorphs of metal.
Her research concerns the relationships between people, technology, and material culture. Her particular interests include prehistoric mobility, innovation, and ancient genetics. She is a specialist in ancient technology studies, especially prehistoric Eurasian stone and flint technology; skeuomorphism; the spread of metal and metal technology; flint daggers; and the maintenance of technological traditions. Her research crosses numerous periods and regions, including the archaeology of prehistoric and Roman Europe; Australian historic archaeology, including rock art produced by Aboriginal Australian people over the last 200 years; and technological developments in prehistoric Southeast Asia. She currently directs the British-based Southeast Kernow Archaeological Survey, and previously co-directed Triabunna Barracks excavations in Tasmania. Her current publications explore cross-disciplinary approaches to archaeological data and meaning making, including the impact of genetic data on archaeological narratives and models, as well as the methodological and ethical implications of this research. Her most recent monograph An Archaeology of Innovation was published by Manchester University Press in March 2021.
Researcher's projects
Southeast Kernow Archaeological Survey
Despite many generations of archaeological fieldwork in Britain’s southwestern peninsula and Cornwall’s central role in later prehistoric exchange networks, the prehistory of the southeastern part of the county has not been exposed to the same amount of modern archaeological investigation. The Southeast Kernow Archaeological Survey (SEKAS) project aims to develop a better understanding of the prehistoric landscape of this region which links the metal-rich uplands to the English Channel. The study region for the SEKAS project comprises of the area between the Tamar and the Fowey rivers and south of the A38, and the period from the Neolithic through to the later Iron Age.
The project was launched in 2012 as a collaboration between Dr Catherine Frieman (ANU) and James Lewis, a professional archaeologist currently based in Scotland. Since then, geophysical and topographic surveys have been conducted at a number of later prehistoric sites in the study area. The results of several of these surveys were incorporated into Mr. Lewis’ 2016 MA thesis Iron Age and Romano-British Enclosures of southeast Cornwall (Dept of Archaeology, University of Glasgow). Commencing in 2017, this ongoing fieldwork will provide the case study for Dr. Frieman’s ARC DECRA project Conservatism as a dynamic response to the diffusion of innovations (DE170100464).
The project homepage can be found: http://archanth.anu.edu.au/research/kernow-survey
Current student projects
Chair
Ru Griffiths - Scottish long cairns in their landscape and astronomical contexts (PhD)
Emma Biggs - Mapping mobility in Bronze Age Europe (PhD)
Panel member
Jennifer Hull - Osseous technology in Neolithic Southeast Asia (PhD)
Andrea Ulrichsen - Scientific mobility studies in the Pacific (PhD)
Chelsea Morgan - Methodological innovations in sex and gender (PhD)
Past student projects
Alex Broughton - Identifying Brothels in Roman Pompeii (Hons)
Kirsten Morrison - Barrow landscapes in Bronze Age Cornwall (Hons)
Emma Biggs - Chariot Burials of the Arras tradition (Hons)
John Hayward - Rock art on Mirrar land, Northern Territory (PhD)
Lisa Solling - Ritual landscapes in the Inka world (PhD)
Publications
- Frieman, C & Lewis, J 2022, 'Trickle down innovation? Creativity and innovation at the margins. World Archaeology', World Archaeology, vol. 53, no. 5, pp. 723-740.
- Bruck, J & Frieman, C 2021, 'Making Kin: The archaeology and genetics of human relationships', Zeitschrift fuer Technikfolgenabschaetzung in Theorie und Praxis, vol. 30, no. 2.
- Frieman, C & Lewis, J 2021, 'Bronze Age Wayfaring and the monumentalised landscape', in Catriona Gibson, Kerri Cleary, Catherine J Frieman (ed.), Making Journeys: Archaeologies of Mobility, Oxbow Books, Oxford United Kingdom, pp. 99-110.
- Frieman, C 2021, 'Emergent or imposed?', Antiquity, vol. 95, no. 397, pp. 247-248.
- Alpaslan-Roodenberg, S, Anthony, D, Babiker, H et al. 2021, 'Ethics of DNA Research on Human Remains: Five Globally Applicable Guidelines', Nature, vol. 599, no. 7883, pp. 41-46.
- Hofmann, D, Hanscam, E, Furholt, M et al. 2021, 'Forum: Populism, Identity Politics, and the Archaeology of Europe', European Journal of Archaeology, vol. 24, no. 4.
- Frieman, C 2021, An Archaeology of Innovation: Approaching social and technological change in human society, Manchester University Press, Manchester, UK.
- May, S, Taylor, L, Frieman, C et al. 2020, 'Survival, Social Cohesion and Rock Art: The Painted Hands of Western Arnhem Land, Australia', Cambridge Archaeological Journal, vol. 30, no. 3, pp. 491 - 510.
- Frieman, C, Teather, A & Morgan, C 2019, 'Bodies in Motion: Narratives and Counter Narratives of Gendered Mobility in European Later Prehistory', Norwegian Archaeological Review, vol. 52, no. 20, pp. 148-169.
- Frieman, C & Hofmann, D 2019, 'Present pasts in the archaeology of genetics, identity, and migration in Europe: a critical essay', World Archaeology, vol. 51, no. 4, pp. 528-545.
- Matthews, J & Frieman, C 2019, 'Telling stories about the past - theory and method in Australian Archaeology', Australian Archaeology, vol. 85, no. 3, pp. 252ââ¬â255.
- Lewis, J & Frieman, C 2018, 'Geophysical survey of four Cornish hillforts - later prehistoric settlements and gathering places in south-east Cornwall', Cornish Archaeology, vol. 57, pp. 145-169.
- Frieman, C & Lewis, J 2016, 'Mountain Barrows: A south-eastern Cornish barrow group in its local context', Cornish Archaeology, vol. 55, pp. 145-161.
- James, H, Willmes, M, Courtaud, P et al. 2019, 'Who's been using my burial mound? Radiocarbon dating and isotopic tracing of human diet and mobility at the collective burial site, Le Tumulus des Sables, southwest France', Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, vol. 24, pp. 955-966.
- Frieman, C & May, S 2020, 'Navigating Contact: tradition and innovation in Australian contact rock art', International Journal of Historical Archaeology, vol. 24, pp. 342-366.
- Frieman, C & Janz, L 2018, 'A Very Remote Storage Box Indeed: The Importance of Doing Archaeology with Old Museum Collections', Journal of Field Archaeology, vol. 43, no. 4, pp. 257-268pp.
- Frieman, C, Bruck, J, Rebay-Salisbury, K et al 2017, 'Aging Well: Treherne's 'Warrior's Beauty' Two Decades Later', European Journal of Archaeology, vol. 20, no. 1, pp. 36 - 73.
- Frieman, C, Piper, P, Nguyen, K et al 2017, 'Rach Nui: Ground stone technology in coastal Neolithic settlements of southern Vietnam', Antiquity, vol. 91, no. 358, pp. 933-946.
- Frieman, C & Wilkin, N 2016, '"The Changing of the Guards"?: British Prehistoric Collections and Archaeology in the Museums of the Future', Museum Worlds: Advances in Research, vol. 4, pp. 33-50pp.
- Roberts, B & Frieman, C 2015, 'Early metallurgy in western and northern Europe', in C Fowler, J Harding & D Hofmann (ed.), The Oxford handbook of Neolithic Europe, Oxford University Press, London, pp. 711-727pp.
- Frieman, C & Eriksen, B, eds, 2015, Flint Daggers in prehistoric Europe, Oxbow Books, Oxford, UK and Havertown, USA.
- Frieman, C & Eriksen, B 2015, 'Introduction. Flint daggers: A historical, typological and methodological primer', in Catherine J. Frieman and Berit Valentin Eriksen (ed.), Flint Daggers in Prehistoric Europe, Oxbow Books, Oxford, UK and Havertown, USA, pp. 1-9.
- Frieman, C 2015, 'Art thou but a dagger of the mind? Understanding lithic daggers in Europe and beyond', in Catherine J. Frieman and Berit Valentin Eriksen (ed.), Flint Daggers in Prehistoric Europe, Oxbow Books, Oxford, UK and Havertown, USA, pp. 161-165.
- Frieman, C 2015, 'Making a point: Re-evaluating British flint daggers in their cultural and technological contexts', in Catherine J. Frieman and Berit Valentin Eriksen (ed.), Flint Daggers in Prehistoric Europe, Oxbow Books, Oxford, UK and Havertown, USA, pp. 103-115.
- Frieman, C 2014, 'Double Edged blades : re-visiting the british (and Irish) flint daggers', Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, vol. 80, pp. 33-65.
- Needham, S, Parham, D & Frieman, C 2013, (ed.), Claimed by the sea: Salcombe, Langdon Bay, and other marine finds of the Bronze Age, Council for British Archaeology, York.
- Frieman, C 2013, 'Innovation and Identity: The Language and Reality of Prehistoric Imitation and Technological Change', in Jeb J. Card (ed.), The Archaeology of Hybrid Material Culture, Southern Illinois University Press, Illinois, pp. 318-341.
- Frieman, C 2012, 'Flint daggers, copper daggers, and technological innovation in late neolithic Scandinavia', European Journal of Archaeology, vol. 15, no. 3, pp. 440-464.
- Frieman, C 2012, 'Going to pieces at the funeral: Completeness and complexity in early Bronze Age jet 'necklace' assemblages', Journal of Social Archaelology, vol. 12, no. 3, pp. 334-355.
- Roberts, B & Frieman, C J 2012, 'Drawing Boundaries and Drawing Models: investigating the concept of the 'Chalcolithic frontier' in north-west Europe', in Michael J. Allen, Julie Gardiner, Alison Sheridan (ed.), Is there a British Chalcolithic? People, place and polity in the late 3rd millennium, The Prehistoric Society, London. 27-39.
- Frieman, C J 2012, Innovation and Imitation: Stone Skeuomorphs of Metal from 4th-2nd Millennia BC Northwest Europe, Archaeopress, Oxford.
- Frieman, C 2010, 'Imitation, identity and communication: The presence and problems of skeuomorphs in the Metal Ages', in Berit Valentin Eriksen (ed.), Lithic technology in metal using societies, Jutland Archaeological Society, Hojbjerg, Denmark, pp. 33-44.
- Frieman, C, Lamdin-Whymark, H, Pope, M et al, eds, 2010, LITHICS SPECIAL VOLUME: PAST LIVES FROM COLD STONE: 30 YEARS OF THE LITHIC STUDIES SOCIETY.
- Frieman, C 2008, 'Islandscapes and 'islandness': The prehistoric Isle of Man in the Irish seascape', Oxford Journal of Archaeology, vol. 27, no. 2, pp. 135-151.
- Frieman, C & Gillings, M 2007, 'Seeing is perceiving?', World Archaeology, vol. 39, no. 1, pp. 4-16.
Projects and Grants
Grants information is drawn from ARIES. To add or update Projects or Grants information please contact your College Research Office.
- Conservatism as a dynamic response to the diffusion of innovations (Primary Investigator)
- Beyond migration and diffusion: The prehistoric mobility of people & ideas (Primary Investigator)
