Curator collection ancient Near East

Lucas PetitLucas Petit

Dr. Lucas Petit

Curator, department ancient Near East

phone: +31 (0)71 5163 149
fax: +31 (0)71 5149 941
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Lucas Petit (1973) studied Archaeology of the Southern Levant at Leiden University and minored in Geology at the University of Utrecht. After graduating in 1997, he was involved in various archaeological projects in Syria, Jordan, Palestine and Benin. From 1999 to 2002, he worked as the executive project director for the University of Frankfurt am Main in Benin (West Africa). This resulted in a PhD degree in 2003. Petit was involved in numerous other projects throughout Africa, the Middle East and Europe. Together with two colleagues, he initiated the construction of a museum in northern Burkina Faso, studied cave drawings in the Chadian Sahara and excavated a water tunnel in Palestine. In 2004, he returned to Leiden University as a postdoctoral fellow in the NWO project 'Settling the Steppe'. In this project, he studied the settlement cycles in the Middle Jordan Valley during Iron Age II. At the same time, Petit worked as a substitute lecturer on the archaeology of the Southern Levant. In 2010 he was appointed as the curator of the Near East department of the Dutch National Museum of Antiquities.

Expertise

  • Archaeology of the Southern Levant
  • Archaeology of Benin and Burkina Faso
  • Grinding stones and other stone objects
  • Excavation method and theories  

Key research projects

  • Grinding stones of Tell Deir 'Alla and Tell Hammeh, Jordan (1996-1997)
  • The prehistory and history of north-western Benin (1999-2002)
  • Oursi hu-beero. A Medieval house complex in northern Burkina Faso (2000-2010)
  • Iron Age settlement cycles in the Middle Jordan Valley (2004-2008)   

Representative publications

  • Petit, L.P., C. von Czerniewicz and C. Pelzer (eds.) 2011. Oursi hu-beero. A Medieval house complex in Burkina Faso, West Africa. Leiden: Sidestone Press
  • Petit, L.P. 2010. Bookreview: Carver, M. 2010. Archaeological Investigation - London/New York, Routledge. PalArch's Journal of Archaeology of Egypte/Egyptology 7 (8): 1-3
  • Kaptijn, E. and Petit, L.P. (eds.) 2009. A Timeless Vale. Archaeological and related essays on the Jordan Valley in honour of Gerrit van der Kooij on the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday. ASLU 19. Leiden: Leiden University Press
  • Pelzer, C. Czerniewicz, M. von and Petit, L.P. 2009. De l'evénement à l'histoire structurelle: Oursi hu-beero. In S. Magnavita, L. Koté, P. Breunig and O.A. Idé (eds.), Crossroads / Carrefour Sahel. Cultural and technological developments in first millennium BC / AD West Africa, 213-222. Monograph Series Volume 2. Frankfurt am Main: Africa Magna Verlag
  • Petit, L.P. 2009. Settlement Dynamics in the Middle Jordan Valley during Iron II-III. BAR International Series 2033. Oxford: Archaeopress
  • Petit, L.P. 2009. A wheel-made anthropomorphic statue from Iron Age Tell Damieh, Jordan Valley. In E. Kaptijn and L.P. Petit (eds.), A Timeless Vale. Archaeological and related essays on the Jordan Valley in honour of Gerrit van der Kooij on the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday, 151-160. ASLU 19. Leiden: Leiden University Press
  • Hourani, F., Kaptijn, E., Petit, L.P.,al-Ghul, O. and Kooij, G. van der. 2008. Dayr 'Alla Regional Project: Settling the Steppe (Third Campaign 2006). Annual of the Department of Antiquities of Jordan 52, 427-444
  • Petit, L.P. 2008. An ethnographic study of three Betammaribé pottery workshop in north-western Benin. Leiden Journal of Pottery Studies 24
  • Petit, L.P. 2008. Late Iron Age Levels at Tell Damieh. New excavation results from the Jordan Valley. Proceedings of ICAANE 2006, 177-187. Madrid
  • Petit, L.P., Czerniewicz, M. von and Pelzer, C. 2008. Crime Scene Investigations: Oursi hu-beero, Burkina Faso. Proceedings of the SaFa conference in Frankfurt am Main, Germany. (online)
  • Petit, L.P. 2005. Archaeology and history in North-western Benin. BAR International series 1398. Oxford: Archaeopress