Biography

Piotr Łuczkiewicz is the Director of the Institute of Archaeology at the Maria Curie-Skłodowska University in Lublin, where he works as a researcher since 1998. Piotr is also a lecturer at the Free University of Berlin, where he taught since 2009. He habilitated at the Free University of Berlin in 2014, completed his Ph.D. at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow in 2004, and received his Master's degree in Lublin in 1993. Piotr is the author of more than 60 scientific publications and has edited 10 volumes. He has been a fellow of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation and the Excellence Cluster TOPOI. Piotr has led two research grants and participated in various international scientific projects.

Project Abstract

Looking at the last two centuries BCE, a paradoxical situation has developed in Central and Western Europe. On the one hand, a remarkable unification process of material and cultural phenomena is clearly visible, connecting the three important cultural areas (Northern Germany: Jastorf Circle; Poland: Przeworsk Culture; Center: La Tène Culture). At the same time, a 'Babylonian confusion' (Miron) of chronological concepts has emerged, which prevents us from connecting the developmental phases of the three areas; especially the absolute chronology varies decisively. As a result, no clear statements can be made about the simultaneity of developments or about regional delays and specific temporalities. The mutual quest for synchronization and synchronicity provides us with a fruitful approach to solve this unsatisfactory situation and to achieve a decisive surplus for the cultural interpretation of the achieved developments.

The key to our joint project (with Martin Schönfelder, coordinated by Prof. Michael Meyer) will be the synchronization of chronological systems based on the identification of widely distributed elements of material culture. This requires a critical view of horizontification by consequently asking whether similar objects were in fact contemporary - which will be supported by a critical evaluation of available absolute dates. Since chronological systems can be read as mapping intensities of cultural change, a successful synchronization will subsequently allow us to analyze and interpret the overarching, simultaneous cultural change processes that will become clearly visible.

Within the framework of project, we will work on this synchronization by evaluating the current state of research for the La Tène (Schönfelder), Przeworsk (Łuczkiewicz), and Jastorf (Meyer) cultures and combining the results into an overarching chronological concept.

Curriculum vitae

Since 2016

Head of Institute of Archaeology, Maria Curie-Skłodowska University

Since 2014

Private lecturer at the Free University of Berlin

2014

Habilitation ("Die Przeworsk-Kultur im Netz der Fernkontakte und Wechselwirkungen während der jüngeren vorrömischen Eisenzeit"), Free University of Berlin, Department of History and Cultural Studies

Since 2009

Teaching at the Free University of Berlin

2004

Ph.D. ("The armament of the population of Polish lands in the Younger pre-Roman Iron Age"), Jagiellonian University, Kraków

1993

Master ("La Tène swords of the Przeworsk culture"), Maria Curie-Skłodowska University

Selected Publications

2021. "Fortdauer oder Umbruch? Einige Bemerkungen zum Übergang zwischen der jüngeren vorrömischen Eisenzeit und der römischen Kaiserzeit im Osten Germaniens anhand ausgewählter Fundgattungen". In Die Chronologie der Vorrömischen Eisen- und Frühen Kaiserzeit in Mittel- und Südosteuropa: Probleme und Perspektiven, edited by Eugen Sava et al., 171-198. Chişinău, Berlin: Bons. 

2020. "On the chronology of the Late Pre-Roman Iron Age in eastern Germania in the light of selected types of brooches". Archeologické Rozhledy 72 (2), 238–259. https://doi.org/10.35686/AR.2020.8

2019, with M. Daszkiewicz, J. Kleemann and A. Kuzioła. "What shall we put in the grave? Archaeometric analyses of ceramics from a late Pre-Roman, Roman and Migration period cemetery in Malbork-Wielbark, northern Poland". Praehistorische Zeitschrift 94 (2), 414-453. 

https://doi.org/10.1515/pz-2019-0018

2004, with R. Bockius. Kelten und Germanen im 2. und im 1. Jh. v. Chr. – archäologische Bausteine zu einer historischen Frage. Monographien RGZM 58. Mainz: Verlag des Römisch-Germanischen Zentralmuseums.