Mikeska, Christine A.

University of North Carolina

Research Title: Feeding the City, Feeding the Gods: Animal Economies at Bronze Age Hattuša

Ms. Mikeska is a PhD candidate in the Department of Anthropology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill (UNC-CH), where she also completed her Masters degree. Specializing in zooarchaeology, Ms. Mikeska combines the traditional methods of zooarchaeology with isotope analysis to investigate human-animal interactions and the social networks that structured them. Her dissertation project focuses on the development of complex systems of animal provisioning at urban Boğazköy-Hattuša during the Middle and Late Bronze Ages. Complicating traditional top-down narratives of early urban economy, Ms. Mikeska investigates the potential for multiple parallel animal economies supplying the city's diverse needs and the ways in which these economies changed as Hattuša developed into the capital of Anatolia’s first empire. In addition to her doctoral focus on Bronze Age Anatolia, Ms. Mikeska has also worked on archaeological excavations in Italy and Cyprus, as well as analyzed archaeological faunal assemblages from sites in Europe, Africa, and North America.