Dr Christina Tsoraki

I am a Research Associate working on the Leverhulme-funded A New History of Bronze project. I specialise in prehistoric archaeology with a focus on material culture studies, lithic technology and microwear analysis. My research interests include object histories, cross-craft interactions, depositional practices, and household archaeology. Between 2013 and 2017 I was a Marie Curie Intra-European Research Fellow and a fixed-term lecturer in Material Culture Studies at the Faculty of Archaeology at Leiden University. I am also involved as a specialist researcher (specialising in ground stone technology) in many archaeological projects in Greece, Cyprus, Turkey and Britain ranging in date from the Early Neolithic to the Hellenistic period. I investigate topics as diverse as Anatolian Neolithic plant processing toolkits, Minoan craft technologies, goldworking in Early Bronze Age Britain, and household activities in Archaic Greece. Between 2012 and 2018 I was the Head of the Ground Stone research team for the Çatalhöyük Research Project (Turkey). 

2023 Research grant, ECR funding (Research Culture access and participation) University of Southampton 

2023 Research grant, Project title: Fleeting moments: Investigating period transitions in prehistory, Talent and Research Stabilisation Fund (UKRI), University of Southampton 

2013-2015 Marie Curie Intra-European Research Fellow, Faculty of Archaeology, Leiden University, The Netherlands, Project title: Crafting networks in early farming societies: tracing the residues of Neolithic activities through the study of stone artefacts (funded by the European Commision FP7/2007-2013 Grant agreement: PIEF-GA-2012-328862). The project investigated the role of household- and community-based practices in creating and sustaining technological and social networks in early farming societies. Employing different social units of analysis such as households and neighbourhoods the project explored how the interactions afforded by technological processes contributed to the sharing of knowledge materials and techniques among social groups (learning networks).

2008-2009 Wiener Laboratory in Archaeological Science, Fellow in Geoarchaeology, American School of Classical Studies at Athens, Greece.

Tsoraki, C., H. Barton, R. J. Crellin and O. J. T. Harris 2023. From typology and biography to multiplicity: bracers as ‘process objects’. Cambridge Archaeological Journal, 1-22. 

Crellin, R., Tsoraki, C., Standish, C., Pearce, R., Barton, H., Morriss, S., & Harris, O. 2023. Materials in movement: Gold and stone in process in the Upton Lovell G2a burial. Antiquity, 97, 86-103. doi:10.15184/aqy.2022.162 (published on-line in December 2022)

Tsoraki, C. 2022. Stone technology under the microscope: the contribution of microwear analysis of ground stone tools to the understanding of daily activities. In A. Baysal (ed.), Lithic studies: Anatolia and Beyond, 213-224. Oxford: Archaeopress.

Carey, C., C. Tsoraki, A. M Jones, O. J.T. Harris, R. J. Crellin, and P. Lyons 2022. Beaker and Early Bronze Age tin exploitation in Cornwall, UK: cassiterite processing identified through microwear and pXRF analyses. European Journal of Archaeology, 1-21. doi:10.1017/eaa.2022.30

Scarry, C. M., D. C. Haggis, M. S. Mook, R. D. Fitzsimons, W. F. Dibble, and C. Tsoraki, 2022. Commensal Politics and Identity Performance at Azoria an Archaic City on Crete. In C.M. Scarry, D. L. Hutchinson and B. S. Arbuckle (eds), Ancient foodways. Integrative approaches to understanding subsistence and society, 66-87. University Press of Florida.

Hodder, I. and C. Tsoraki (eds.) 2021. Communities at Work: The Making of Çatalhöyük. Çatalhöyük Research Project Series Volume 15. London: British Institute at Ankara.

Tsoraki, C. 2021. The ground stone technologies at Neolithic Çatalhöyük: issues of production, use and deposition. In I. Hodder (ed.,), Materials at Çatalhöyük: Reports from the 2009-2017 Seasons, 309-370. Çatalhöyük Research Project Series Volume 14. London: British Institute at Ankara.

Santiago-Marrero, C.G, Tsoraki, C, Lancelotti, C, and M. Madella 2021. A microbotanical and microwear perspective to plant processing activities and foodways at Neolithic Çatalhöyük. PLoS ONE 16(6): e0252312. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0252312

Tsoraki, C., H. Barton, R. J. Crellin and O. J. T. Harris 2020. Making marks meaningful: new materialism and the microwear assemblage. World Archaeology, 52:3, 484-502, DOI: 10.1080/00438243.2021.1898462

Li, W., C. Tsoraki, Y. Yang, Y. Xin and A. van Gijn, 2020. Plant Foods and Different Uses of Grinding Tools at the Neolithic Site of Tanghu in Central China. Lithic Technology 45: 154-164.

Li, W., J. R. Pagán-Jiménez, C. Tsoraki, L. Yao and A. van Gijn, 2020. The influence of grinding on the preservation of starch grains from rice. Archaeometry 62: 157-171.

Schotsmans, E. G. Busacca, L. Bennison-Chapman, A. Lingle, M. Milella, B. Tibbetts, C. Tsoraki, M. Vasić and R. Veropoulidou, 2020. Pigment Use at Neolithic Çatalhöyük. Near Eastern Archaeology 83: 156-167.

Haddow, S.D., C. Tsoraki, M. Vasic, I. Dori, C.J. Knusel and M. Milella, 2019. An Analysis of Modified Human Teeth at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 28: 102058.

Li, W., C. Tsoraki, W. Lan, Y. Yang, J. Zhang and A. van Gijn, 2019. New insights into the grinding tools used by the earliest farmers in the central plain of China. Quaternary International 529: 10-17.

Li, W., C. Tsoraki, W. Lan, Y. Yang, J. Zhang and A. van Gijn, 2019. Cereal processing technique inferred from use-wear analysis at the Neolithic site of Jiahu, Central China. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 23: 939-945

Tsoraki, C. 2018. The ritualisation of daily practice: exploring the staging of ritual acts at Neolithic Çatalhöyük, Turkey. In I. Hodder (ed), Religion, History and Place in the Origin of Settled Life, 238-262. University of Colorado Press.

Bickle, P., B. Chan, L. Czerniak, J. Pyzel and C. Tsoraki 2016. At home in the Neolithic: understanding diversity in Neolithic houses and households. Open Archaeology 2: 410-416

Nazaroff, A., C. Tsoraki and M. Vasic 2016. Aesthetic, Social, and Material Networks: A Perspective from the Flint Daggers at Çatalhöyük, Turkey. Cambridge Archaeological Journal 26: 65-92.

Relaki, M. and C. Tsoraki 2016. Variability and differentiation: a first look at the stone vase assemblage in the Petras cemetery. In M. Tsipopoulou (ed.), Petras Siteia. The Pre- and Proto-palatial cemetery in context. The 2nd International Petras Symposium, The Danish Institute at Athens, 14-15 February 2015, 159-178. Monographs of the Danish Institute at Athens, 20. Athens: The Danish Institute at Athens

microwear analysis, prehistoric technology, material studies, Bronze Age Crete, Neolithic Greece, Neolithic Çatalhöyük