Daphne D. Martin, PhD

EDUCATION

Daphne D. Martin is a humanist interested in the role of material culture in constructing shared identities for societies past and present. Her research ranges from how communities in the ancient world performed and preserved identity through the creation, use, and deposition of objects to issues of public archaeology and heritage studies in present societies and, in particular, questions of restitution and repatriation.

Dr. Martin recently completed her PhD in Classics (Classical Art and Archaeology) at the University of Cambridge, where she was a Paul Mellon and A. G. Leventis Fellow. Prior to this, she earned her B.A. at Yale University (’19), double majoring in Classics and History of Art.

The topic of her dissertation research, which she is currently shaping into a monograph for publication, is the material construction of identity in archaic Sparta and Lakonia. In the thesis, she draws on cross-disciplinary approaches from archaeology, art history and anthropology to shed light on this elusive and oft-misunderstood society.

Dr. Martin has more than 8 years of fieldwork experience at archaeological sites in Greece and Italy and has worked at museum institutions in Greece, the U.S., the U.K. and the Netherlands, most recently on an on-going provenance research project at the Allard Pierson (University of Amsterdam).