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Ofer Bar-Yosef
Professor of Anthropology and Curator of Paleolithic Archaeology in the Peabody Museum, Harvard, USA. |
Ofer Bar-Yosef is one of the world's most renowned experts in
Paleolithic (Stone Age) archaeology. The son of native Palestinians
whose own parents had emigrated from different parts of the world, his
interest in human prehistory was kindled in his most formative years,
as were his love of poetry and archaeology. He began formally to study
archaeology and geography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem,
obtaining his Ph.D in 1970 and later becoming Professor of Prehistoric
Archaeology there. His major work includes the seminal discovery that
the Qafzeh hominids were 80,000-100,000 years old, twice the ages that
had been previously attributed. His deductive analyses of those
findings have shown that mankind is not directly descended from the
Neanderthals, who were in fact the contemporaries of our Cro-Magnon
ancestors. A wealth of evidence now supports his theory, that
technological revolution on a massive scale accompanied the supplanting
of our Neanderthal cousins by our Cro-Magnon ancestors. He continues to
accumulate that evidence through excavations conducted on prehistoric
Levantine sites as well as on Paleolithic and Neolithic sites in China
and the Republic of Georgia. Both in the field and in the laboratory,
Professor Bar-Yosef has made major contributions to the development of
systematic methods for analysis of issues such as the origins of
farming communities, the archaeological markers of warfare and the
emergence of marked territoriality. He was among the first
archeologists to make use of thermoluminesence and electron spin
resonance techniques that allow the dating of fossils of such early
origin that they are not amenable to radiocarbon dating. His theories
and deductive analyses of mankind's prehistorical cultural record are
based on every type and combination of evidence that he can acquire.
They include climatic clues from sediment layers and studies of
regurgitated micromammal remains. In 1988 Professor Bar-Yosef moved to
Harvard where he was appointed to his current position as MacCurdy
Professor of Prehistoric Archaeology at Harvard University and head of the Peabody Museum's Stone Age laboratory. He has published widely and through his vocation for teaching and his desire to resolve the chronological and geographical gaps in present day records, he has inspired a new generation of researchers who continue to revolutionise the field of archaeology. His own broad experience in pursuing the intellectual challenge of interpreting traces from the past have made him a strong advocate of sharing the lessons that geologists, bioanthropologists, palaeontologists and archaeologists can glean from the same field experience. |
