1939 in archaeology
Below are notable events in archaeology that occurred in 1939.
Excavations
- Major excavation of Ostia Antica in Italy begins.
- University of Pennsylvania project at Piedras Negras, Guatemala ends.
- Palace of Nestor in Pylos by Carl Blegen.
- Tomb of Psusennes at Tanis by Pierre Montet.
- Deserted medieval village of Seacourt near Oxford by Rupert Bruce-Mitford.
- Medieval settlement at Bere, North Tawton, England, by Martyn Jope.
- Bowl barrow at Knap Hill, Wiltshire, England, by C. W. Phillips.
Publications
- Grahame Clark: Archaeology and Society.
Finds
- May
- *Sutton Hoo ship burial unearthed by Basil Brown and Edith Pretty in Suffolk, England. On July 28 the Sutton Hoo helmet is excavated.
- *Battle of Thermopylae site unearthed by Spyridon Marinatos in Greece.
- August 25: The Lion-man statue is discovered in the Hohlenstein-Stadel, a cave in southern Germany.
- Matthew Stirling discovers the bottom half of Stela C at Tres Zapotes in Veracruz, Mexico.
- Wyllys Andrews discovers the Maya civilization site of Kulubá in Yucatán, Mexico.
Miscellaneous
- May 6: Dorothy Garrod is elected to the Disney Professorship of Archaeology in the University of Cambridge, the first woman to hold an Oxbridge chair.
Births
- January 15: Neil Cossons, English industrial archaeologist and museum director
- July 12: Peter Addyman, English archaeologist
- November 6: Peter J. Reynolds, English experimental archaeologist
- December 10: Barry Cunliffe, English archaeologist
- November 27: Malcolm Todd, English archaeologist
Deaths
- March 2: Howard Carter, English Egyptologist