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A new Emmy Noether junior research group at Heidelberg University is investigating how local societies in the Northern Aegean interacted with one another in the Bronze Age. Led by Dr Filip Frankovic, the team is analyzing the influence of social exchange on societal, cultural, and political transformation in the region. The project is located at the Institute of Prehistory, Protohistory and Near Eastern Archeology and is being funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) to the tune of approximately 1.8 million euros over a period of six years.
Press Release
Heidelberg, 28 October 2025
New Emmy Noether Junior Research Group in Archeology
German Research Foundation funds project on Bronze Age in the Northern Aegean with approximately 1.8 million euros
A new Emmy Noether junior research group at Heidelberg University is investigating how local societies in the Northern Aegean interacted with one another in the Bronze Age. Led by Dr Filip Frankovic, the team is analyzing the influence of social exchange on societal, cultural, and political transformation in the region. The project is located at the Institute of Prehistory, Protohistory and Near Eastern Archeology and is being funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) to the tune of approximately 1.8 million euros over a period of six years.
The Northern Aegean was long regarded by researchers as a marginal area of “Minoan” and “Mycenean” civilizations. Recent studies, however, have highlighted its autonomy. “The region had its own momentum and actively influenced its neighbors,” underlines Dr Frankovic. At the same time, parts of the Northern Aegean, which includes several islands of present-day Greece as well as the adjacent mainland, are largely uninvestigated and have barely become accessible to archeology. In the context of his project “Local agency in a connected world” the archeologist wants to explore how regional interactions shaped societies there in the second millennium BCE. His case study looks at Magnesia, the northern Sporades, eastern Locris and the northern Gulf of Euboea.
The project includes field research by Dr Frankovic and his team on the island of Skopelos. Here the researchers collect surface materials to identify locations of new archeological finds. In addition, they analyze Late Bronze Age materials – mainly ceramic objects – from Pefkakia Magoula, which belonged to the Magnesia coastal region. The group compares the results with findings documented in neighboring regions of eastern Locris and the northern Gulf of Euboea.
The findings from the region of these case studies will serve as a starting position for further investigations. By means of Geographic Information System data, the researchers are reconstructing how people moved around on land and at sea. Based on this data Filip Frankovic will trace how regional and subregional networks arose and in which way differently organized communities interacted. The analysis of usage traces on ceramic artefacts aims to show how local societies reacted to the introduction of new objects and practices. The studies are taking place in cooperation with researchers from the universities of Warsaw (Poland) and Prague (Czech Republic), as well as the Greek Ministry of Culture, represented by the ephorate of Magnesia.
Filip Frankovic studied archeology at the University of Zagreb (Croatia) and obtained his doctorate in 2021 at Heidelberg University’s Institute of Prehistory, Protohistory and Near Eastern Archeology. Following that he did research and taught at the universities of Heidelberg, Würzburg, and Munich. From 2024 he served as curator of the prehistory department of the Archaeological Museum in Zagreb. His Emmy Noether junior research group started work in September 2025.
The DFG’s Emmy Noether Programme gives exceptionally qualified early career researchers the chance to qualify for the post of professor at a university by leading an independent junior research group for a period of six years.
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https://www.uni-heidelberg.de/fakultaeten/philosophie/zaw/ufg – Institute of Prehistory, Protohistory and Near Eastern Archeology
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