About
I completed my archaeological training in 2003 (University of Durham) and was awarded a Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship (University of Leicester, 2004) with fixed-term lecturing posts in British Prehistory (Universities of Bangor, Sheffield, Nottingham, Oxford). I then gained a fixed-term lectureship in European Prehistory (University of Cambridge, 2006) before joining Liverpool as Lecturer in European Prehistory (Rankin Lectureship, 2007). I was promoted to Senior Lecturer in 2013 and Reader in 2022.
My research is developing data-led archaeological method towards an improved understanding of past social organisation and mechanisms of social change in Europe before Rome. My publications focus on the fields of settlement archaeology, gender archaeology, and the history of archaeology, and I am best known for my hillfort excavations, my work on The Celts, and my efforts to return women to our disciplinary histories (Pope and Davies 2023; 2025). New directions include the integration of aDNA into narratives of prehistoric kinship (Smyth et al. 2025; Carlin et al. 2025; Pope (2025).
I am committed to undergraduate training in a research excavation context, to professional British standards. Between 2005-2011, I co-directed ASDU excavations on the Kidlandlee Dean Bronze Age Landscapes Project (Northumberland). At Liverpool, I established the departmental field school in 2010, with excavations at Merrick’s Hill, Eddisbury Hillfort (Cheshire) as part of the HLF-funded 'Habitats and Hillforts' Project between 2010-11 (Pope et al. 2020). Between 2012-2018, I directed excavations at Penycloddiau Hillfort (Flintshire) in partnership with Cadw (Welsh Assembly Government), Denbighshire County Council, and the Global Institute for Field Research (California) as featured on BBC 'Digging for Britain' with Prof. Alice Roberts.
I am Vice President of The Prehistoric Society, series Editor of BAR sub-series Prehistory of Ireland and Britain; former Chair of the Archaeology and Gender in Europe research network (European Association of Archaeologists), and Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London. I work in various advisory and consultancy roles (East-West Rail, Butser Ancient Farm, Hands Off Old Oswestry Hillfort). My advocacy work is focused on equality issues, as co-founder of British Women Archaeologists, who have lobbied since 2008 for improved pay and conditions for women workers in the wider heritage sector (Pope and Teather 2025).
As an expert in Late Bronze Age and Iron Age Europe and archaeological method, I look forward to welcoming new postgraduate students to study here at Liverpool, with its thriving research community in global prehistory and the Classical world.