Stiintele socio-umaniste in contextul evolutiei globalizate
- dezvoltarea si implementarea programului de studii si cercetare postdoctorala

Profil

Place of work: Giurgiu County Museum

Studies

• Decembre 2009 – public presentation of the PhD thesis with the title The first cemeteries from the Neolithic and Calcolithic on the territory of Romania at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University, Iaşi, Faculty of History, Department of Archaeology
• May 2007 – Special course “III Summer School di Archeologia. Aerial Aerchaeology Training School”, University of Foggia, Italy (Director: Giuliano Volpe; Coordinator: Chris Musson)
• February 2007 – Special course Archeologia funeraria e antropologia di campo (Funerary Archaeology and Field Anthropology) (Prof. Henry Duday; organized by Ecole Français du Rome; Roma, Italia)
• October 2006 – July 2008 –“Vasile Pârvan” research and formation scholarship at Accademia di Romania, Rome, Italy
• October 2003 – June 2005 – MA degree at “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iaşi, Romania, Faculty of History, Department of Archaeology with the paper Cultural and historical interpretation of the necropolis from Cernica
• October 2003 – March 2005 – MA degree at the “1 Decembrie 1918” University of Alba Iulia, Romania, Faculty of Letters and History, Department of Systemic Archaeology with the paper The Necropolis of Cernica: verification with modern methods of the conclusions obtained by using traditional methods
• November 2001 – July 2002 - Erasmus scholarship at the University of Bari, Italia
• 1998 – 2002 – BA degree at the “Alexandru Ioan Cuza” University of Iaşi, Romania, double specialization: History (Archeology) and English Literature and Language, with the thesis The A1 and A2 phases of the Gumelnitza Civilization

Interests: prehistoric archaeology, funerary archaeology, quantitative archaeology, spatial analysis

FUNERARY SPACE IN PREHISTORY AT THE LOWER DANUBE. An analysis of the spatial coordinates of the funerary practices from Mesolithic till the beginning of the Bronze Age, between the Southern Carpathians, the Stara Planina Mountains and the Black Sea

The place where the human communities choose to establish a settlement and to bury their deceased is extremely important. Some locations, such as the case of the Cernica, Sultana, Cernavoda and other sites, continued to be used along time, the human communities finding these areas especially good for habitation.

The prehistoric communities had different ways of treating their dead. Sometimes they kept them close, as proven by the articulated or disarticulated osteological remains found inside the domestic space. Other times they created a special place for their dead, separated yet close enough, so we can assume the relationship with the dead remained tight.

With this project I will try to decipher the spatial relationship between the world of the living and the world of the dead. This relationship, modified as time passed, analyzed also from the perspective of the landscape, can give us clues regarding the intimate relationship between the living and their dead, and can also indicate changes of ideology.

When analyzing the relationship between the cemetery and the settlement I will consider elements such as the distance between the two structures, the cardinal direction of the burial area reported to the habitation area, visibility, etc. Another element that will be considered is the landscape chosen for burial and its relationship with other landscape elements in the area, such as water (river or lake), mountains, etc. Once these elements identified, an analysis of the dynamics in the relationship between the habitation area and burial area could be done. This analysis will focus both on smaller areas (such as at Cernavodă, Sultana – Malu Roşu and Valea Orbului, Vărăşti, Ostrovu Corbului, or at Durankulak), and on larger spatial and temporal frames. I will also analyze the situation of the human remains located inside the domestic space. I will first consider the following factors: distance from the center of the settlement (central, medial and peripheral location), the choice of the cardinal segment of the settlement (location of the human remains in the N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W or NW sector of the settlement), and the relationship of the human remains with other archaeological features (such as houses, pits, hearths). The social implications of the use of domestic space for the deposition of human remains (articulated or disarticulated) will be discussed considering the above mentioned characteristics and also the dichotomy of “preferred” versus “avoided” locations.

The final objective of the research is the identification of some behavioral patterns and of some possible determining factors, both at general and evolutive level.

Main publications

• 1. Cristian Schuster, Raluca Kogălniceanu, Alexandru Morintz, The Living and the Dead: An analysis of the relationship between the two worlds during Prehistory at the Lower Danube, Editura Cetatea de Scaun, Târgovişte, 2008; ISBN 978-973-8966-81-9.
• 2. Alexandru Morintz, Raluca Kogălniceanu, Orientarea mormintelor necropolei neo-eneolitice de la Cernica. O nouă abordare, în Istros, XV, Editura Istros, 2009, p. 9-46; ISSN 1453-6943.
• 3. Raluca Kogălniceanu, Hamangia – Anatolia: differences and resemblances at the level of funerary practice, în volumul Arheologia spiritualităţii preistorice în ţinuturile Carpato-ponto-danubiene (Symposium, 27-29 martie 2007, Constanţa), Constanţa, Editura Arhiepiscopiei Tomisului, 2009, p. 77-88; ISBN 978-606-8001-04-03.
• 4. Alexandru Morintz, Raluca Kogălniceanu, A First Step Towards the Spatial Analysis of the Hamangia (Neolithic) Necropolis from Cernavoda, Romania, în Origini, XXX, 2008, p. 165-186, Gangemi Editore; ISBN13 978-88-492-1611-0, ISBN10 88-492-1611-4.
• 5. Raluca Kogălniceanu, Child burials in intramural and extramural contexts from the Neolithic and Chalcolithic of Romania: the problem of “inside” and “outside”, în Babies Reborn: Infant/Child Burials in Pre- and Protohistory Proceedings of the XV UISPP World Congress (Lisbon, 4-9 September 2006) / Actes du XV Congrès Mondial (Lisbonne, 4-9 Septembre 2006) Vol. 24, Session WS26 (ed. Krum Bacvarov), BAR S1832, Archaeopress, Oxford, 2008; ISBN 978-1-4073-0316-1.
• 6. Raluca Kogălniceanu, Dove sono gli uomini? Si può parlare di “pratiche funerarie” nella civiltà di Cucuteni?, în volumul N. Ursulescu, R. Kogălniceanu, C. Creţu (eds.), Cucuteni – Tesori di una civiltà preistorica dei Carpazi, Atti di Convegno italo-romeno, Roma, 18 ottobre 2007, Iaşi, Editura Universităţii „Al. I. Cuza”, 2008, p. 201-216; ISBN 978-88-96335-00-0.
• 7. Nicolae Ursulescu, Raluca Kogălniceanu, Apparition des nécropoles dans le néolithique de Roumanie et de l’Italie, în Studia Antiqua et Archaeologica, Iaşi, Editura Universităţii „Al. I. Cuza”, XII, (2006) 2007, p. 11-42; ISSN 1224-2284.
• 8. Raluca Kogălniceanu, Utilizarea testului χ2 în arheologie. Studiu de caz – necropola de la Cernica, în Arheologia Moldovei, Editura Academiei Române, XXVIII, 2005, p. 265-302; ISSN 0066-7358.
• 9. Raluca Kogălniceanu, Observaţii asupra mormintelor şi resturilor osteologice umane din cuprinsul aşezărilor gumelniţene de pe teritoriul României, în BCSS, Alba Iulia, Editura Universităţii „1 Decembrie 1918”, 7, 2001, p. 39-46; ISSN 1454-8097.