Rick Schulting

Research Interests

Mesolithic and Neolithic of Western Europe, complex hunter-gatherers, transition to agriculture, mortuary analysis, stable isotope analysis and dietary reconstruction, skeletal evidence of interpersonal violence.

Current Activities

I have had a long-standing interest in the Mesolithic and Neolithic of Western Europe, both in themselves, and in terms of the transition to farming. Recent and ongoing research is focussed on improving our understanding of chronology, through the use of AMS 14C dating, and of palaeodiet, through the use of stable carbon and nitrogen isotope analysis. Another current research strand involves a re-assessment of extant Neolithic skeletal collections from various regions of western Europe, from the point of view of evidence for interpersonal violence.

Most recently, I have extended my interests to Eurasian steppe pastoralists, and to the hunter-gatherers of Siberia and northern Japan, as a member of the Baikal-Hokkaido Archaeological Project (http://bhap.arts.ualberta.ca/).

An edited volume titled 'Sticks, Stones & Broken Bones: Neolithic Violence in a European Perspective' (OUP), published in 2012, presents overviews of violent injuries on skeletons from various regions of Europe.

Co-Investigator - Cultivating Societies: assessing the evidence for agriculture in Neolithic Ireland: http://www.chrono.qub.ac.uk/instar