Melissa Cradic

Office

Biography

I am an archaeologist and museum curator specializing in mortuary archaeology, with a focus on the ancient Mediterranean and Middle East. I have excavated in Israel and Cyprus and have directed archaeological field schools and study tours abroad. My research, which focuses on the ritual and material roles of the body in secondary and re-used burial contexts, has been supported with fellowships at research institutes such as the Albright Institute of Archaeological Research in Jerusalem (2016-2017), Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania (2019-2020), and the Getty Research Institute (2021-2022).  

Education

Education

B.A.  in Archaeology and Classical Humanities, The George Washington University, 2010

M.Phil in Archaeology, University of Cambridge, 2012

Ph.D., in Ancient History & Mediterranean Archaeology, University of California-Berkeley, 2017

Selected Publications & Presentations

2022     Melissa S. Cradic. Area H: Levels H-13 to H-15, in I. Finkelstein and M. Martin (eds.) Megiddo VI: the 2010-2014 Seasons. Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University Monograph Series 41. Pp. 63-86. Emery & Claire Yass Publications in Archaeology, Tel Aviv University.

2022     Mario Martin, Melissa S. Cradic, and Rachel Kalisher. Intramural Burials in Area K, in I. Finkelstein and M.Martin (eds.) Megiddo VI: the 2010-2014 Seasons. Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University Monograph Series 41.Pp. 224-305. Emery & Claire Yass Publications in Archaeology, Tel Aviv University. 

2022     Mario Martin and Melissa S. Cradic. Tomb 100, in in I. Finkelstein and M. Martin (eds.) Megiddo VI:the 2010-2014 Seasons. Institute of Archaeology of Tel Aviv University Monograph Series 41.Pp. 308-401. Emery & Claire Yass Publications in Archaeology, Tel Aviv University

2022     Melissa S. Cradic. Sensing the Dead in Household Burials of the Second Millennium BCE, in K. Neumann and A. Thomason (eds.) Handbook of the Senses in the Ancient Near East. Pp. 405-428. Routledge/Taylor & Francis.

2021     Melissa S. Cradic. Materializing the Ancestors: Sacred Body Parts and Fragments in the Ancient Near East, in N. Laneri (ed.) The Sacred Body: Materializing the Divine through Human Remains inAntiquity. Material Religion in Antiquity 1. Pp. 84-113. Oxbow/Casemate.

2021     Robert S. Homsher and Melissa S. Cradic. Palestine during the Bronze Age, in K. Dell (ed.) The Biblical World, 2^nd ed. Pp. 429-451. Routledge/Taylor and Francis. 

2019     Vanessa Linares, Matthew J. Adams, Melissa S. Cradic, Israel Finkelstein, Oded Lipschits, Mario A.S. Martin, Ronny Neumann, Philipp W. Stockhammer, and Yuval Gadot. First Evidence of Vanillin in the Old World: Its Use As Mortuary Offering In Middle Bronze Canaan. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports 25: 77- 84.

2018     Melissa S. Cradic. Residential Burial and Social Memory in the Middle Bronze Age Levant. Near Eastern Archaeology 81: 191-201. 

2017      Melissa S. Cradic. Embodiments of Death: The Funerary Sequence and Commemoration in the Bronze Age Levant. Bulletin of the American Schools of Oriental Research 377: 219-248.