Thursday 21 May, 2026, 6:00pm
Boardroom, Vere Gordon Childe Centre Madsen Building, University of Sydney
You are invited to a lecture by Dr Susan Lupack from Macquarie University to be held at 6:30 pm on Thursday 21 May 2026 in the Boardroom, Vere Gordon Childe Centre Madsen Building, University of Sydney
Prior to the presentation, please join us at 6:00 pm for the NSW Friends of the AAIA AGM. Nominations are called for the NSW Friends Committee for 2026-27 using the form found here
Please register here to assist with setting up and for catering for the refreshments following the lecture.
“The Perachora Peninsula Archaeological Project: What a Difference Fresh Approaches Can Make!”
In 1930, nearly one hundred years ago, Humfry Payne of the British School at Athens broke ground on an excavation that would reveal one of the earliest and wealthiest sanctuaries of ancient Greece – the Sanctuary of Hera Akraia at Perachora. At this 8th–2nd century BCE sanctuary, Hera was the principal deity, but the Corinthians also worshipped Medea’s slain children within its temenos, and it housed an oracle. In addition, more than 900 Egyptianising faience amulets and figurines highlight its strategic position at the crossroads of all trade and military operations between the Aegean and the Corinthian Gulf. Over four seasons (2020, 2023–2025) the Perachora Peninsula Archaeological Project has been investigating the landscape surrounding this sanctuary, focusing on the site located just above it. Our project is using methodologies that were not available to the researchers who worked at the site in the past, including intensive surface survey, photogrammetric visualizations and Lidar, and finding that the site extended further than was thought by either of the past excavators.
| | Dr Susan Lupack is a Senior Lecturer of Greek archaeology in the Department of History at Macquarie University. One of her main research interests is to investigate the economy and religion of Late Bronze Age Aegean Mycenaean society by combining archaeological material with the textual information provided by Linear B tablets. Susan is an active field archaeologist – she has worked on several intensive surveys and excavations including the Pylos Regional Archaeological Project and the Agora Excavations, and from 2006–2012 she co-directed the Eastern Boeotia Archaeological Project. She is now co-directing the Perachora Peninsula Archaeological Project with Panagiota Kasimi, the Ephor of the Corinthia – a project which applies intensive surface survey and Lidar to illuminate the economic, political, and religious landscapes surrounding the Sanctuary of Hera at Perachora. |
