The Netherlands Institute for the Near East

Nederlands Instituut voor het Nabije Oosten  -  Institut néerlandais du Proche-Orient

In his respective functions of Local Director of the Netherlands Institute in Istanbul (1978-1994), staff member and General Director of the Netherlands Institute for the Near East at Leiden (until 2009) Jacob Roodenberg has carried out archaeological research projects in the southeastern and western parts of the Anatolian peninsula.

The last twenty years, under the project title Early farming communities in the eastern Marmara region, he has directed multidisciplinary investigations successively at Ilıpınar in the Iznik Lake basin, and Menteşe and Barcın in the plain of Yenişehir. This research program including socio-economic, cultural and environmental aspects has already generated a large corpus of data, which was published, together with others, in three monographs and many articles. These publications yielded new insights into stratigraphy, house building, pottery and small finds, human population, domesticated plant and animal species, and provided the basic chronological framework for the earliest sedentary communities of northwest Turkey dating from the second half of the seventh millennium BC onwards.

His current activities comprise publishing data of previous archaeological research in addition to various editorial work. As Editor-in-Chief Roodenberg is responsible for the regular appearance of Anatolica – an international refereed journal dealing with issues on the civilizations of Anatolia and peripheral regions.

Selected bibliography