Biography

Constanza Coppini currently collaborates with research projects in Iraqi Kurdistan and southern Iraq. 

She earned her PhD in Near Eastern Archaeology at the Freie Universität Berlin (2014), where she also held research positions at the Institute for Near Eastern Archaeology (project "Archaeological Excavations at Tell Fekheriye, Syria"). 

In 2017-18 she worked as research fellow at the Department of Humanities and Cultural Heritage at the University of Udine. 

From 2018 to 2020 she  carried out her own research project "The Middle and Late Bronze Age Settlement and Ceramic Production at Tell Barri and Tell Bazi" (White-Levy fellowship).

Project Abstract

The present research proposal aims at investigating (A)Synchronicities in the archaeological record of the Ancient Near East. Assuming that the sequence of settlement phases expresses within the archaeological record the flowing of Time, evidence of changes affecting a settlement and the communities expresses (a)synchronicities. A change affecting the political order in which they live or their culture does not necessary affect their everyday life or the perception of their contemporary time. (A)Synchronicities are often expressed in the concepts of resiliency, crisis and collapse. 

These three concepts are often misused in the interpretation of the archaeological record. The analysis of these three elements, applied to a specific historical period, will enable to better define the concept of (a)synchronicity in archaeology.  

The resulting models from this project, focusing mainly on Transtigrine examples, will constitute the theoretic framework for a larger project, to be affiliated to the EC-Center Chronoi, providing a diachronic analysis of cultural models of Mittani cultures transmitted into the Middle Assyrian culture. In the short period of time, corresponding to the Late Bronze Age Mesopotamia (1500-1200 BCE), the analysis of material culture and settlement patterns of Northern Mesopotamia and Syria reveals thus the gradual development of a new political and cultural asset, taking place in different stages of the duration of the Middle Assyrian Empire based partly on the geographic development of the Assyrian administration.

Curriculum vitae

02/2022 and 11/2021: affiliated researcher, „French Mission in Larsa (Tell es-Senkereh) and Tell el 'Uwaili, Iraq“,C.N.R.S. - Ministère de l'Europe et des Affairs Étrangères 

09/2020-09/2021: Scientific consultant, project "Reconstruction of the Mam Rashan Shrine, a Yazidi Shrine in South Sinjar, Iraq", World Monuments Fund (U.S.A.) 

09/2018-08/2020: Research fellow, “White-Levy Grant for Archaeological Publications”, Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology, Freie Universität Berlin 

09/2017-08/2018: Research fellow, Department of Humanities and Cultural Heritage Studies, Universitá degli Studi di Udine

11/2015-12/2016 and 02/2014-04/2015: Research Assistant, Project “Archaeological Research at Tell Fekheriye (Syria)”, Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology, Freie Universität Berlin 

03/2008-12/2014: PhD in Near Eastern Archaeology — Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Archaeology, Freie Universität Berlin

Selected Publications

“Fragments of power. The use of pottery and the reconnaissance of the presence of the Middle Assyrian state in the archaeological record”, in Pallavidini, M., Portuese, L. (eds), Near Eastern Weltanschauungen in Contact and in Contrast, Münster 2022, pp. 387-402

 “Problems of Transitions in the Second Millennium BC Northern Mesopotamia: a View from Tell Barri (Northeastern Syria)”, in Pierobon Benoit, R., Coppini, C., Palermo, R., Pappalardo, R. (eds), Exploring ‘Dark Ages’, Berlin 2022, pp. 15-32 

"Settling the land: settlements pattern and ceramics in the land behind Nineveh from the Middle Bronze Age to the establishment of the Middle Assyrian State", in Coppini C., Simi F. (eds.), Interactions and New Directions in Near Eastern Archaeology. Proceedings of Broadening Horizons 5 International Conference "Cultures in Contact", Trieste 2020, pp. 93-109

“The Italian-Kurdish Excavations at Gir-e Gomel in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq. Preliminary Report on the 2017 and 2018 field seasons”, with D. Morandi Bonacossi, H.A. Qasim, K. Gavagnin, E. Girotto, M. Iamoni and C. Tonghini. Mesopotamia LIII, pp. 67-162 

“Life at the edge of the settlement: the MBA-LBA transition at the northern and southern slope of Tell Barri (NE Syria)”, with A. D’Agostino, in P. Bielinski, M. Gawlikowski, R. Koliński, D. Ławecka, A. Sołtysiak and Z. Wygnańska (eds.), Proceedings of the 8th International Congress on the Archaeology of the Ancient Near East. Warsaw, 30 April-4 May 2012, University of Warsaw Vol. 1, Wiesbaden, pp. 385-410