Gary O. Rollefson

Last updated

Gary O. Rollefson (born August 2, 1942) is a Near Eastern prehistoric archaeologist.

Contents

Biography

Gary O. Rollefson was born in Forest City, Iowa. He was the oldest of three boys. In 1957, the Rollefson family moved to Long Beach, California where he completed high school. He attended the University of California, Berkeley and graduated in 1965 receiving a Bachelor of Arts in Anthropology. [1]

After serving as a translator in the Vietnam War, [1] he went on to study anthropology at the University of Arizona, where he was awarded a Master of Arts in 1972 and a Ph.D. in 1978. [2]

Rollefson spent five years working at cave sites in Israel [1] while working toward his dissertation entitled, A Quantitative and Qualitative Typological Analysis of Bifaces from the Tabun Excavations, 1967-1972. [2]

In 1978 Rollefson went to Jordan on a fellowship, working at archaeological sites outside Amman, Jordan, and in 1985 made a significant discovery of 8,000-year-old plaster figurines at the ancient settlement of 'Ain Ghazal, Jordan. [3] 'Ain Ghazal is one of the largest known Neolithic agricultural settlements in the Near East. Rollefson continues to do work in the region today. [1] He has lectured and published extensively. His articles have appeared in a number of journals including American Antiquity , Current Anthropology , Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research , Journal of Anthropological Archaeology and Holocene .

He has held various teaching positions throughout the United States, Jordan and Germany since 1970. Currently, he is Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at Whitman College in Walla Walla, Washington, [2] and Professor Emeritus of Anthropology at San Diego State University.

Selected works

See also

Archaeological Tours

He leads educational journeys to Jordan for Far Horizons Archaeological and Cultural trips

Related Research Articles

Whitman College Private liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington, U.S.

Whitman College is a private liberal arts college in Walla Walla, Washington. The school offers 53 majors and 33 minors in the liberal arts and sciences, and it has a student-to-faculty ratio of 9:1. Whitman was the first college in the Pacific Northwest to install a Phi Beta Kappa chapter, and the first in the U.S. to require comprehensive exams for graduation. Alumni have received 1 Nobel Prize in physics, 1 Presidential Medal of Freedom, 7 Rhodes Scholarships, 1 Marshall Scholarship, 3 Schwarzman Scholarships, 35 Watson Fellowships, and 93 Fulbright Fellowships.

ʿAin Ghazal is a Neolithic archaeological site located in metropolitan Amman, Jordan, about 2 km north-west of Amman Civil Airport. The site is remarkable for being the place where the ʿAin Ghazal statues were found, which are among the oldest large-sized statues ever discovered.

Erich Schmidt (archaeologist) American archaeologist and photographer (1897–1964)

Erich Friedrich Schmidt was a German and American-naturalized archaeologist, born in Baden-Baden. He specialized in Ancient Near East Archaeology, and became professor emeritus at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago. He was also a pioneer in using aerial photography in archaeological research.

Oleg Grabar French-born American art historian (1929–2011)

Oleg Grabar was a French-born art historian and archeologist, who spent most of his career in the United States, as a leading figure in the field of Islamic art and architecture.

Patrick Vinton Kirch is an American archaeologist and Professor Emeritus of Integrative Biology and the Class of 1954 Professor of Anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley. Concurrently, he is professor in the department of anthropology at the University of Hawai'i Manoa. The former Curator of Oceanic Archaeology in the Phoebe A. Hearst Museum of Anthropology, and director of that museum from 1999 to 2002, he is a member of the board of directors of the Bishop Museum.

Alexander H. JoffeAlex Joffe is an archaeologist and historian of the Near East.

Frank Moore Cross American scholar and academic

Frank Moore Cross Jr. (1921–2012) was the Hancock Professor of Hebrew and Other Oriental Languages Emeritus at Harvard University, notable for his work in the interpretation of the Dead Sea Scrolls, his 1973 magnum opusCanaanite Myth and Hebrew Epic, and his work in Northwest Semitic epigraphy. Many of his essays on the latter topic have since been collected in Leaves from an Epigrapher's Notebook.

Joyce Marcus is a Latin American archaeologist and professor in the Department of Anthropology, College of Literature, Science, and the Arts at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. She also holds the position of Curator of Latin American Archaeology, University of Michigan Museum of Anthropological Archaeology. Marcus has published extensively in the field of Latin American archaeological research. Her focus has been primarily on the Zapotec, Maya, and coastal Andean civilizations of Central and South America. Much of her fieldwork has been concentrated in the Valley of Oaxaca, Mexico. She is known for her "Dynamic model", four-tiered hierarchy, and her use of interdisciplinary study.

Zarqa River Jordanian river near Amman, tributary of the lower Jordan River

The Zarqa River is the second largest tributary of the lower Jordan River, after the Yarmouk River. It is the third largest river in the region by annual discharge and its watershed encompasses the most densely populated areas east of the Jordan River. It rises in springs near Amman, and flows through a deep and broad valley into the Jordan, at an elevation 1,090 metres (3,580 ft) lower.

Anson Rainey

Anson Frank Rainey was professor emeritus of ancient Near Eastern cultures and Semitic linguistics at Tel Aviv University. He is known in particular for contributions to the study of the Amarna tablets, the noted administrative letters from the period of Pharaoh Akhenaten's rule during the 18th Dynasty of Egypt. He authored and edited books and articles on the cultures, languages and geography of the Biblical lands.

Clive Stephen Gamble, is a British archaeologist and anthropologist. He has been described as the "UK’s foremost archaeologist investigating our earliest ancestors."

Peter Michael Warren, is a British archaeologist and academic, specialising in the Aegean Bronze Age. From 1977 to 2001, he was Professor of Ancient History and Classical Archaeology at the University of Bristol, where he is currently Professor Emeritus and a senior research fellow at the university.

ʿAin Ghazal statues Early Neolithic statues found in Jordan

The ʿAin Ghazal Statues are a number of large-scale lime plaster and reed statues discovered at the archeological site of ʿAin Ghazal in Jordan, dating back to approximately 9000 years ago, from the Pre-Pottery Neolithic C period. A total of 15 statues and 15 busts were discovered in 1983 and 1985 in two underground caches, created about 200 years apart.

Hani Hayajneh

Hani Hayajneh is a professor of Ancient Near Eastern Languages and civilizations at Yarmouk University, Jordan. He is expert in the field of cultural heritage studies, especially the Intangible cultural heritage. His research focuses on areas including the cultural history and heritage of the Arabian Peninsula from ancient periods to modern times. He represented Jordan on cultural heritage issues in the Intergovernmental Committee of the UNESCO Convention for Safeguarding Intangible Cultural Heritage.

Burton MacDonald

Burton MacDonald is a Canadian biblical archaeologist specialising in the archaeology of Jordan. He has been a professor at St. Francis Xavier University since 1965 and is currently Professor Emeritus in the Religious Studies department.

Ilse Kohler-Rollefson German scientist

Ilse Köhler-Rollefson is a German scientist known for championing pastoralism, Ethnoveterinary medicine and camels with special reference to India. She found the Raika people whose way of life was under threat because of their dependence on camels and she decided to help. In 2017 she was awarded the highest award for women in India, the Nari Shakti Puraskar and, in 2018, the Federal Cross of Merit of the German Federal Government.

Zeidan A. Kafafi is a Jordanian archaeologist and academic who has directed and otherwise contributed to numerous excavations in and around Jordan and has assisted the institutional development of local academic institutions. He is a Professor Emeritus who recently served as the President of Yarmouk University.

Wadi Shuʿeib is a Neolithic archaeological site in Wadi Shuʿeib, Jordan. Considered a "mega-site", it consists of the remains of large village occupied through the Pre-Pottery Neolithic B and Late Neolithic periods.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "Minnesota State University: A Biography of Gary Rollefson". Archived from the original on 2008-06-04. Retrieved 2009-01-01.
  2. 1 2 3 Whitman College Anthropology Department – Gary Rollefson
  3. "History". American Schools of Oriental Research. American Schools of Oriental Research. Retrieved 13 December 2014.