Laura Banducci
Associate Professor, Coordinator and Undergraduate Advisor
| Degrees: | B.A. (McMaster), M.Phil (Cambridge), M.A., M.A., Ph.D. (Michigan) |
| Phone: | 613-520-2600 x 2930 |
| Email: | laura.banducci@carleton.ca |
| Office: | 2A52 Paterson Hall |
| Website: | Browse |
Biography
Laura Banducci is an archaeologist with a particular interest in the Roman republican period and in the Etruscan civilization of central Italy. She earned an MA in Latin and her MA and PhD in Classical Art and Archaeology from the University of Michigan. She has worked on archaeological projects in England, Greece, and Italy.
Her research focuses on three principal areas:
- diet and dining practices, collectively referred to as ‘foodways’
- how artefacts were made, used, re-purposed and discarded
- entertainment and leisure culture
Her research is grounded in the idea that an individual’s daily behavior, as reflected by the material record, can provide important insights into large-scale societal changes in the ancient world.
Since 2009 she has worked on the Gabii Project Excavations (excavating the town of Gabii, 18 km East of Rome). Excavations are leading to important discoveries regarding urbanism, burial practices, and domestic and public architecture in Roman Italy. The project is run as an archaeological field school for students interested in learning state-of-the-art excavation, study, and recording techniques. As the Director of Finds at Gabii, Dr. Banducci is responsible for coordinating the study and publication of the vast array of artefacts from the site. This excavation is currently supported by an Insight Grant from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada and the participation of students in the project is supported by an Early Researcher Award from the Government of Ontario.
She is co-director of the Gabii Legacy Data Project a collaboration between the Gabii Project and the Soprintendenza Speciale Archeologia, Belle Arti e Paesaggio di Roma to study, digitize, and preserve archaeological materials from unpublished excavations in the 1990s. The project aims to integrate the documentation (excavation diaries and a photographic archive) and the ceramics and small finds of these earlier excavations together with the data recovered in the contiguous area by the ongoing modern excavation.
She co-directed the Capturing the Life Cycle of Ceramics in Rome project (CaLC-Rome), teaming with colleagues from the University of Missouri, the University of Glasgow, and the University of Burgundy Franche Comté in France. The goal was to examine traces of the production and use of ceramics excavated in the late 19th century from funerary and sanctuary contexts in Rome, stored in the Capitoline Museums. The project employed high-resolution imaging techniques that support the detailed metrical study of use wear traces to consider pottery consumption practices. The results are presented through an online catalogue, making both the 3D models and the scientific data available to the research community and the broader public.
She is a member of the collaborative program in Digital Humanities and the Food Studies group at Carleton. She also advises students about summer fieldwork opportunities and is a point of contact for Carleton’s minor in archaeology.
2024-2025 Courses
ARCY 1009B/CLCV 1009A: Introduction to Archaeology II (W)
LATN 1005A: Introduction to Latin I (F)
CLCV 4210B: Non-Elite in the Roman World (W)
Selected recent publications
Books
2023. L.M. Banducci and M. D’Acri eds. Gabii through its Artefacts. Archaeopress. Open Access.
2021. L.M. Banducci and Anna Gallone eds. A Cemetery and a Quarry from Imperial Gabii. University of Michigan Press. Online. Open access.
2021. L.M. Banducci. Foodways in Roman Republican Italy. University of Michigan Press.
Articles
2023. “Multifunctionality and Roman oven-to-table wares: Internal red-slip pans.” In American Journal of Archaeology 127.3, 397-417 and supplemental appendix online. doi: 10.1086/724595
2020. A. Martin, M.J. Cuyler, L.M. Banducci. “Santa Maria in Aracoeli (Rome): Frank Brown’s Excavation in 1963.” Archaeologiae XVIII: 11-80.
2018. L.M. Banducci, R. Opitz, and M. Mogetta. “Measuring use wear on black gloss pottery from Rome through 3D surface analysis.” In Big Data on the Roman Table, Edited by P. Allison and M. Pitts. Special Issue of Internet Archaeology 50.
2018. A. Johnston, M. Mogetta, L. Banducci, R. Opitz, J. Farr, E. Casagrande Cicci, A. Gallone, N. Terrenato. “A Monumental Mid-Republican Building Complex at Gabii.” In Papers of the British School at Rome 86, 1-35. doi: 10.1017/S0068246217000423
2015. “A tessera lusoria from Gabii and the afterlife of Roman gaming.” In HEROM: Journal of Hellenistic and Roman Material Culture 4.2, 199-221. Open Access.
2014. L.M. Banducci. “Function and use of Roman pottery: a quantitative method for assessing use-wear.” In Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology 27.2, 187-210. doi: 10.1558/jmea.v27i2.187