Photo of Professor Jessica Pearson

Professor Jessica Pearson D. Phil. (Oxon)

Professor of Bioarchaeology Archaeology, Classics and Egyptology

    Research

    Research Overview

    My research involves the use of stable isotope analysis in the reconstruction of ancient foodways to provide clues about the foods consumed by past populations and the impact of diet on health and demography, animal domestication and the onset of farming and sedentism, religious behaviours and ancient infant feeding practices. My research also involves using strontium and oxygen isotope analysis to reconstruct ancient mobility and kinship practices.

    Ancient Human Diet and the transition to agriculture

    For a number of years I have worked on the carbon, nitrogen, sulphur, oxygen and strontium isotope analysis at three important locations in Central Anatolia: Neolithic Catalhoyuk, Neolithic Boncuklu, Epipalaeolithic and Neolithic Pinarbasi.

    Research Grants

    What’s in a house? Exploring the kinship structure of the world´s first houses

    LEVERHULME TRUST (UK)

    May 2021 - March 2025

    DIS-ABLED Past Lifeways and Deathways of the Disabled in 14th-18th Century Central Europe: an Interdisciplinary Study

    EUROPEAN COMMISSION

    August 2018 - November 2021

    Scratching the Surface: A Bioarchaeological Study of Funerary Practices and Emergent Social Complexity in the Neolithic Near East

    DEPARTMENT FOR BUSINESS, ENERGY AND INDUSTRIAL STRATEGY (BEIS) (UK)

    September 2018 - September 2019

    Building large communities: Multi isotope investigations of human mobility and diet in the earliest large villages

    ARTS AND HUMANITIES RESEARCH COUNCIL

    January 2015 - December 2018

    Bone chemistry, food and status.

    BRITISH ACADEMY (UK)

    January 2006

    Use of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios to infer animal diet in prehistory: Implications for human palaodietary reconstruction.

    ROYAL SOCIETY (CHARITABLE)

    April 2006 - December 2006