Deborah Carlson
  • Professor
  • Sara W. and George O. Yamini Endowed Family Chair in Nautical Archaeology
  • President of Institute of Nautical Archaeology
  • Nautical Program Coordinator
  • Pronouns: She/Her/Hers
  • Phone: 979-845-6690
  • Email: dnc@tamu.edu
  • Office: Anthropology 117
  • Document: CV
Research Areas
  • Nautical Archaeology

Biography

Courses Taught:

  • ANTH 316 – Nautical Archaeology
  • ANTH/CLAS 353 – Archaeology of Ancient Greece
  • ANTH/CLAS 354 – Archaeology of Ancient Italy
  • ANTH/CLAS 444 – Classical Archaeology
  • ANTH 613 – Classical Seafaring
  • ANTH 660 – Field Archaeology
  • CLAS 121 – Beginning Latin I
  • CLAS 122 – Beginning Latin II
  • CLAS 221 – Intermediate Latin

Current Graduate Students:

  • Rebecca Bowles
  • Steven DeCasien
  • Claire Zak

Research Interests

Specialty:

  • Greek & Roman archaeology
  • Ancient seafaring

Current Research Projects:

I am a classical archaeologist specializing in trade and seafaring in the ancient Mediterranean, I earned an MA in Classical Archaeology from the University of Arizona, participating in terrestrial excavations at Tegea, Greece and Lugnano in Teverina, Italy. Later, as a graduate student in the Nautical Archaeology Program, I studied with Dr. George Bass, who invited me to serve as the assistant director of a fifth-century B.C. Classical Greek shipwreck excavation at Tektaş Burnu, Turkey (1999-2001). The amphora cargo from this wreck was the focus of my PhD dissertation at the University of Texas at Austin in 2004.

From 2005 until 2011, together with colleague Dr. Donny Hamilton, I excavated a ship that sank off the coast of Kızılburun, Turkey in the late second or first-century B.C. while transporting a marble column weighing more than 50 tons. I am proud to serve as President of the non-profit Institute of Nautical Archaeology (INA) and as an active member of the National Lecture Program sponsored by INA’s sister organization, the Archaeological Institute of America. I teach undergraduate courses in Greek and Roman archaeology, nautical archaeology, Latin, and a graduate seminar in Classical Seafaring.

My archaeological fieldwork has been funded by the Archaeological Institute of America, National Geographic, the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Philosophical Society, the Samuel H. Kress Foundation, and the American Research Institute in Turkey. In 2015 I co-published the proceedings of an international symposium on Byzantine trade entitled Maritime Studies in the Wake of the Byzantine Shipwreck at Yassiada, Turkey and I am presently overseeing the final publication of the Tektas Burnu shipwreck.

Educational Background

  • PhD, University of Texas at Austin, 2004

Selected Publications

    • 2017 W. Aylward and D.N. Carlson, “Excavation and Analysis of the Kızılburun Column Wreck: Construction Processes of Doric Peristyle Columns in the Late Hellenistic and Early Roman Periods,” in The Archaeology of Anatolia: Recent Discoveries (2015-2016) Volume II, editedby S. R. Steadman and G. McMahon (Cambridge Scholars Press) 230-256.

    • 2016 D. N. Carlson, “The Ships of Lake Nemi,” in the Oxford Classical Dictionary, edited by Sander M. Goldberg (Oxford University Press). https://oxfordre.com/classics/view/10.1093/acrefore/9780199381135.001.0001/acrefore-9780199381135-e-8156

    • 2015 D. N. Carlson, J. Leidwanger, and S. Kampbell, eds. Maritime Studies in the Wake of the Byzantine Shipwreck at Yassıada, Turkey (Texas A&M University Press, 2015). 272 pages.

    • 2014 D. N. Carlson, “Dating a Shipwrecked Marble Cargo Destined for the Temple of Apollo at Claros,” in Le sanctuaire de Claros et son oracle: Actes d’un colloque international à la Maison de l’Orient et de la Méditerranée à Lyon, edité par J.-C. Moretti (Lyon 2014), 51-61.

    • 2013 D. N. Carlson, “A View from the Sea: The Archaeology of Maritime Trade in the Fifth-Century B.C. Aegean,” in Handels- und Finanzgebaren in der Ägäis im 5. Jh. v. Chr. (Trade and Finance in the 5 th c. BC Aegean World) edited by A. Slawisch, BYZAS 18 (Istanbul 2013), 1-23.

    • 2011 D. N. Carlson, “The Seafarers and Shipwrecks of Ancient Greece and Rome,” in The Oxford Handbook of Maritime Archaeology, edited by A. Catsambis, B. Ford, and D. L. Hamilton (Oxford University Press) 379-405.

    • 2010 D. N. Carlson and W. Aylward, “The Kızılburun Shipwreck and the Temple of Apollo at Claros,” American Journal of Archaeology 114.1: 145-159.

    • 2009 D. N. Carlson, “Seeing the Sea: Ships’ Eyes in Classical Greece,” Hesperia 78.3: 347-365.

    • 2007 D. N. Carlson, “Mast-step coins among the Romans,” International Journal of Nautical Archaeology 36.2: 317-324.

    • 2003 D. N. Carlson, “The Classical Greek Shipwreck at Tektaş Burnu, Turkey,” American Journal of Archaeology 107.4: 581-600.