The Second International
Congress on
Black
Sea Antiquities
The
Department hosted the Second International Congress on Black Sea Antiquities for an entire
week at the beginning of September 2001.
Holding such a meeting
is possible only through the collaboration of a large number of
people who should be mentioned here. The organising committee
consisted in three members of the department: Yaşar Ersoy,Marie-Henriette
Gates and Jacques Morin. The congress was organised in close
collaboration with Gocha Tsetskhladze, of Royal Holloway and
Bedford New College, University of London, who is, in fact, the
main inspiration for these gatherings. The congress benefited
greatly from the contribution of the office of the rector of the
University, who offered a reception for the participants on the
first day of the congress and helped solve numerous problems;
the Dean of the Faculty of Humanities and Letters as well
facilitated our work at all turns. The University also provided
a generous sum of money, which made the congress financially
feasible. Bilkent University Preparatory School contributed its
performance hall where the sessions of the congress were held.
Several students from the department, as well as Charles Gates,
contributed their time during the congress to make technical
matters run smoothly, these are: Murat Akar,
Hüma
Arslaner, Başak Baskan,
Ayşe Batman, Ahmet Şevket Çağan, Ayşe Kocabeyoğlu, and
Ayşe Tuğcu.
Czech Republic, Denmark, Egypt, France, Georgia,
Germany, Great Britain, Greece, Italy, Poland, Romania, Russia,
Spain, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine and USA. Sir John Boardman,
the eminent classical scholar from Oxford, presided over the
congress and gave the opening lecture on Sunday evening. Nearly
100 papers were presented over six half-day sessions each
covering either a region (Anatolia and the Caucasus, Russia and
Ukraine, Romania and Bulgaria), or a theme (Byzantium and its
Black Sea Neighbours, Persian influence), with one general
session regrouping a variety of subjects and, finally, one
entire day devoted to excavation and survey reports; poster
sessions were organised each day in parallel to the oral
presentations. The subjects covered varied considerably, mostly
in archaeology, art and history, with a few papers on
numismatics and literature. The abstracts of most can be read on
the website of
the congress at
http://www.bilkent.edu.tr/~arkeo/blacksea/blacksea.htm.
The breadth of subjects covered during the congress shows
the great dynamism of research in this part of the world, as
well as the fruitful collaboration of many international
teams.
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The
week of the congress concluded with a series of excursions.
The entire group visited the Museum of Anatolian
Civilisations on Friday morning, guided by Marie-Henriette
Gates. Those unable to stay the weekend visited Gordion in
the afternoon. One large group travelled to the Black Sea
shore, first to Sinop to visit the Roman amphora kiln site
of Demirci and the antiquities in the city and museum; this
portion of the trip was guided by Dominic Kassab-Tesgör,
and then on to the museum at Samsun. A second group was
taken by Geoffrey Summers of METU to his excavation at Kerkenes
Dağ and other
important Central Anatolian sites.
The
participants enjoyed themselves during their stay at Bilkent
and left with a very positive impression of our University.
More importantly, from a scholarly perspective, they were
able to renew contacts with known scholars and make new
ones, especially with younger colleagues. Discussions were
lively throughout the week, at the end of the regular
sessions themselves and also during lunch breaks. Although
organising this congress involved a great deal of work and
worrisome problems, the organisers feel very proud that it
was a success.
Jacques
Morin
Newsletter No. 1
- 2002, Pg. 16
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