Please note that the program has been updated, with changes, on September 25rd! See updated program schedule below!
The book of abstracts can be viewed here:
The complete program can be downloaded here:
Wednesday, September 23rd – Afternoon
Location: Student Commons, B100 East Side Multipurpose Room
Session 1 – Texts, communication, and mobility in the ancient world
| Time | Name | Title |
| 1:30–1:50 | Virginia Martos Armenteros | “Should I Stay or Should I Go?”: Tracing Migration Routes and Travel Concerns in the Hellenistic Period through the Oracular Tablets of Dodona |
| 1:50–2:10 | Tom Francis, Muhammad Rehan | Modeling Alphabet Diffusion and Community Interactions in Ancient Italy with Spatiotemporal Point Processes |
| 2:10–2:30 | Adam Schor | The Social Reach of Roman Elite Men (350–430 CE): Letter Collections, Ego-Network Comparison, and Static Network Simulation |
| 2:30–2:50 | Emma Glenister | Understanding the Viziers of Egypt’s Early Middle Kingdom through Social Network Analysis |
| 2:50–3:10 | Discussion |
Coffee Break 3:10–3:40
Session 2 – Relational ecologies, landscapes, and archives
Location: Student Commons, B100 East Side Multipurpose Room
| Time | Name | Title |
| 3:40–4:00 | Francisco Rivera | Archives of Migration and Disrupted Connections during Northern Chile’s Industrial Mining Expansion |
| 4:00–4:20 | Marcony Alves, Carl Knappett | The Affordances of the Amazonian Floodplain in the Late Precolonial Period (CE 1000–1600) |
| 4:20–4:40 | Agnieszka Brylak | Connecting Nahua Gods: Network Analysis in the Study of Pre-Hispanic Religion |
| 4:40–5:00 | Discussion |
5:00–6:00 Keynote Lecture
Barbara Mills – Connecting Chaco: How Network Analysis Changed my View of the Chaco World
Reception 6:10–8:00
Location: Duke of York, 39 Prince Arthur Ave.
Thursday, September 24th – Morning
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
Session 3 – Settlements, landscapes, and regional systems
| Time | Name | Title |
| 8:50–9:10 | Khaled Abu Jayyab, Elizabeth Gibbon, Lisa Wolff, Lianna Sternklar, Deniz Dernek, Koushan Amir-Khosravi, Emmett Kohl McPherson, Rowan Berrian, Aly El Hemasy, Brittany Mayers | The Structure of Domestic Life: A Multivariate and Network Analysis of Chalcolithic Houses in Mesopotamia |
| 9:10–9:30 | Kristina Donnally | People, Place, Palace: Integrating Spatial and Social Networks within the Middle Bronze Age Palace at Mari (Tell Hariri, Syria) |
| 9:30–9:50 | Camilla Mazzucato, Ricardo Alba, Dan Chamberlin, Ramazan Parmaksız, Lisa Yeomans, Beatrice Demarchi | Human-avian hybrid communities within socio-material-ecological networks: the case of Çatalhöyük |
| 9:50–10:10 | Discussion | |
| Coffee Break 10:10–10:30 |
Session 4 – Materials, cult, and community in the Near East and Egypt
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
| Time | Name | Title |
| 10:30–10:50 | Yulia Prozorova | Pottery Decoration and the Interaction Sphere of the Yarmoukian Culture in the Neolithic Levant: A Network Analysis Approach |
| 10:50–11:10 | Luisa Garcia Gonzalez | Beyond the Macro: A Graph-Based Approach to Model Material-Social Intersections in tomb QH35p of Elephantine (Egypt) |
| 11:10–11:30 | Rocio Da Riva | Moving gods and elusive temples in Late Babylonia |
| 11:30–11:50 | Discussion | |
| Lunch 11:50–1:10 |
Thursday, September 24th – Afternoon
Session 5 – Deposition, ancestry, and regional identity
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
| Time | Name | Title |
| 1:10–1:30 | Ana Arzelier, A. Menuge, D. Linard, M.-H. Pémonge, F. Mendisco, M. Legros, A. Blin, M.-F. Deguilloux, M. Gandelin, V. Ard, M. Pruvost | Connecting the dead: kinship, mobility, and social networks in Neolithic dolmens of South-Western France |
| 1:30–1:50 | Emma Buckingham | Networks of Ancestrality: Funerary Assemblages and Elite Self-Fashioning in South Italy and the Adriatic |
| 1:50–2:10 | Tamas Czuppon | Avar networks. Analysing burial customs to model regional networks |
| 2:10–2:30 | Inga Utkina-Wöhrl | Looking at hoards through networks: First results of the network research on early medieval depositions in the Middle Dnieper Area |
| 2:30–2:50 | Discussion |
Coffee Break 2:50–3:20
Session 6 – Bronze Age Mediterranean maritime interaction
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
| Time | Name | Title |
| 3:20–3:40 | Giulia Michienzi | Networks in Motion: Modelling Interactions in the Bronze Age Central Mediterranean |
| 3:40–4:00 | Karl Smith, Linda Hulin, Max MacDonald | Agent-Based Sailing Models as a Basis for Network Analysis: a Case Study from The Practical Mariner |
| 4:00–4:20 | Discussion | |
Friday, September 25th – Morning
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
Session 7 – Method, inference, and uncertainty
| Time | Name | Title |
| 8:30–8:50 | Shawn Graham, Pedro Trapero Fernandez | Travellersim Redux: Generating Networks from Archaeological Data |
| 8:50–9:10 | Paula Gheorghiade, Tom Brughmans, Michele Coscia, Nikos Salamanos | How Similar is “Similar”? Bridging Theory and Method in Ceramic Network Analysis |
| 9:10–9:30 | Ray Rivers | Possibilistic and Probabilistic Uncertainty in Modelling Exchange Networks |
| 9:30–9:50 | Discussion |
Coffee Break 9:50–10:20
Session 8 – Routes, roads, and spatial networks
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
| Time | Name | Title |
| 10:20–10:40 | Adrian Proestos, Stephen Smith | Re-evaluating stratigraphic relationships at Gravina di Puglia through network analysis |
| 10:40–11:00 | Antonio Merola | Mapping Romanization: Social and Spatial Networks in the Peligna Valley |
| 11:00–11:20 | Discussion |
Lunch and Poster Session 12:00–2:30
Location: Dept. of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations, BF 200B, 4 Bancroft Ave. 2nd Floor.
Robert Crotts – The View from Beaver Hall: Joseph Frobisher’s Estate and Social Networks in Early Nineteenth-Century Montreal
Shaghayegh (Poppy) Ghasemi – Present but Unseen in Timurid Iran
Rosemary Ott – Representation Matters: Visibility of the Foreign in the Iconography of New Kingdom Egyptian Queens
Friday, September 25th – Afternoon
Location: Multi Faith Center (Koffler House), Main Activity Hall (KP 208), 2nd Floor
Session 9 – Cult, ritual practice, and settlement networks
| Time | Name | Title |
| 2:30-2:50 | Alice Capobianco | From Living Practices to Ancient Networks: Ethnoarchaeology for the reconstruction of Roman unguent and incense production |
| 2:50–3:10 | Sebastian Kheml | Economic and Military Drivers of the Worship of Asclepius in Roman Dacia: A Quantitative Approach |
| 3:10–3:30 | Discussion | |
Coffee Break 3:30–3:50
Session 10 – Transmission, patronage, and connection in medieval and early modern worlds
| Time | Name | Title |
| 3:50–4:10 | Sarah Ahmed | John Wesley’s Global Medical Networks |
| 4:10–4:30 | Anna Penkała-Jastrzębska | The Formation of a Network of Political Allegiance, Social Relations, and Magnate Influence in the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth during the First Half of the Eighteenth Century — preliminary research |
| 4:30–4:50 | Ke Ma | Mapping Chinoiserie: A Data Modelling Approach to Chinese Cabinets in the Court Architecture of the Holy Roman Empire, ca. 1650–1800 |
| 4:50–5:10 | Discussion |
5:10-5:30 Closing Remarks
The Connected Past 2026 is sponsored by:
University of Toronto, Department of Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations
University of Toronto, the Archaeology Center
University of Toronto, Department of Classics
University of Toronto, Jackmans Humanities Institute
University of Toronto, Department of Art History
University of Toronto, Mediterranean Archaeology Collaborative Specialization
