For the past two semesters, three students in the Undergraduate Research Opportunity Program (UROP)—along with curator Laura Motta and IPAMAA student Bailey Franzoi—have been working on cleaning, categorizing, and studying faunal remains excavated at the site of Tel Anafa. Janet Larios, Emma Nelson, and Alyssa Wakefield will present their research at the 2025 UROP Symposium on Wednesday, April 23, and the Undergraduate Research Symposium in the Department of Classical Studies on Friday, May 2. The students’ completed projects will also be displayed in the Kelsey Museum.
The site of Tel Anafa, located in modern-day Israel, was excavated in the 1960s–1980s under the direction of Saul S. Weinberg (University of Missouri) and Sharon C. Herbert (University of Michigan). Of the tens of thousands of faunal remains uncovered there, only about 15 percent had been studied prior to 2024. A project of the late Richard Redding, this research painted a picture of the evolution of Tel Anafa’s agriculture.
The most recent work being conducted in the Kelsey Museum’s Archaeobiology Lab intends to expand this inquiry by quantifying the remains, identifying bones, and applying modern techniques, all in an effort to understand more deeply the interplay between Tel Anafa’s inhabitants and their environment. So far, the team has cleaned and sorted approximately 15,000 specimens—about one-fifth of the material—and identified around 1,000 bones.
“Tel Anafa stands as a reference point for many archaeologists studying the Levant, due to its excellent display of cultural changes post-Roman expansion,” said Emma, an environmental studies and Earth sciences double major, “so having access to the vast amount of well-preserved, physical material means a great deal.”
Janet, who is majoring in ecology, evolution, and biology, aspires to be a marine biologist and an artist. During her time in the Archaeobiology Lab, she has been especially drawn to the remains of aquatic life found at Tel Anafa. Her project, “Tel Anafa from the Bronze Age to the Roman Period: Shells by the Lakeshore,” focuses on mollusks excavated at the site, with a goal of investigating elite residents’ interactions with their local environment. By comparing the structures of ancient gastropods and bivalves with modern counterparts, Janet’s research also points to environmental and ecological changes that have taken place across millennia and shines a light on the use of freshwater species in the Southern Levant—a topic about which little is known.
Emma and Alyssa, the latter of whom studies the archaeology of the Mediterranean and classical languages, are working jointly on a poster, “What Dental Wear Tells Us About Livestock Diets in the Late Hellenistic/Roman Time Period in Tel Anafa.” After spending much time washing, sorting, and assessing faunal remains, they decided to focus on the question of what dental wear from livestock can tell us about the human diet, since such tooth-wear patterns provide insights into the ages that these animals were typically butchered. Emma and Alyssa’s study of mammal teeth—which they have compared to published standards—contributes to wider analyses of Tel Anafa as “a bridge between several cultures and time periods in the Levant.”
