Therkorn

Amsterdam Archaeological Centre, full-time researcher in the programme: North-South Duality and the Archaeological Landscape

1971 BA: Anthropology (major) & Art History (minor), University of California, Davis

1984 MA: Cultural prehistory, the Institute for Pre- and Proto-history, University of Amsterdam

2004 PhD: European Archaeology; Amsterdam Archaeological Centre, University of Amsterdam.

1973 -1978: assistant supervisor on excavations in the southwest of England for the Department of the Environment. Sites dating from the Bronze Age to the Late Medieval period.

1978 – 1999: from assistant supervisor to project director in the province of Noord-Holland, where a total of 26 ha in Zaanstad, Schagen, Velserbroek, Uitgeesterbroek and the Broekpolder has been excavated within the Oer-IJ Estuary Project with traces dating from the late Neolithic to the Modern.

2000 – present: continuing the development of methodology and thematic approaches for the Noord-Holland region in the wider perspective of Indo-Europe, while publishing excavation results towards synthesis. 

My focus of research is on landscape within a contextual archaeological approach. The wonderful conditions of preservation and the excellent build-up of stratigraphy in the province of Noord-Holland, with at some sites a 1 to 2.5 m deep layering with accompanying traces and materials including wood and bone, has lent possibilities for studying various facets of small scale farming society through all periods, from the late Neolithic, onwards. Most interesting, I find, is the long-term aspect afforded by these sites: whether in traces of housing and  cosmology, as the traces left by religious practice and landscape use and definition through marking areas with various types of features. An important facet of interpretation derives from study of the common structuring principles and traditions shown by such diverse features as barrows and offering sites in conjunction with, and in comparison to, everyday spaces such as hearths, housing, acreage, pastureland, roads and pathways. Ethnohistory, anthropology, mythology, cultural astronomy and archaeology are the combined fields used in interpreting meanings and in defining transformations of traces etched in the ground up through the 19th century.

Key Publications

(1984-2000: Interim reports each year in Archeologische Kroniek van Noord-Holldand, Holland.)

1984 Therkorn, L.L.,R.W. Brandt, J.P. Pals & M. Taylor. An Early Iron Age Farmstead: site Q of theAssendelver Polders Project. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society 50. 351-73.

1987 The structures, mechanics and some aspects of inhabitant behaviour. in R.W.Brandt, W. Groenman-van Waateringe & S.E. van der Leeuw (eds) Assendelver Polder Papers I (Cingula 10), Amsterdam . 177-224.

1987  Therkorn, L.L. & A.A. Abbink 1987. Seven levee sites: B, C, D, G, H, F, and P. in R.W.Brandt, W. Groenman-van Waateringe & S.E. van der Leeuw (eds) Assendelver Polder Papers I (Cingula 10), Amsterdam. 115-167.

1987  The inter-relationships of materials and meanings: some suggestions on housing concerns within Iron Age Noord-Holland. in I. Hodder (ed) The Archaeology of Contextual Meanings. Cambridge. 102-10. 

1988  The excavation at Schagen-Lagedijk, 1978. in J.H.F. Bloemers (ed) Archeologie en Oecologie van Holland tussen Rijn en Vlie (Studies in Prae- en Protohistorie 2) Assen/Maastricht. 186-205.  

1991  Onderzoek en beheer: Het Waterlandproject. in J.H.F. Bloemers & T. van Dorp (eds) Pre-& Protohistorie van de Lage Landen. (chp. 3 Open Universiteit). Houten. 41-51.

1991  De empirische cyclus in werking: het Assendelver Polder Project. in J.H.F. Bloemers & T. van Dorp (eds) Pre-& Protohistorie van de Lage Landen. (chp. 14 Open Universiteit). Houten. 157-7.  

1998  Therkorn, L.L. , E.A. Besselsen & J.F.S. Oversteegen. 1998. Assendelver Polders Revisited: excavations 1997. Amsterdam . 59pp + figures and tables.     

1999   Therkorn, L.L. , M. Diepeveen-Jansen & E.Besselsen, 1999. Ontwerp Project Wetland-West: Broekpolder, Amsterdam (excavation report AAC), 26 pp.  

1999  Therkorn, L., Diepenveen-Jansen & E. Besselsen 1999. Project Wetland West: Broekpolder. Verslag van het opgravingsseizoen mei-november 1998. Amsterdam. 17pp.

1999 Therkorn, L.L. , M. Diepeveen-Jansen, E. Besselsen & H. Van London, 1999: Project Wetland-West: Broekpolder. Voortgangsverslag over de tweede helft van het eerste jaar 1998-1999 (deelopdracht 1), Amsterdam (excavation report AAC), 13 pp.

2003 Bloemers, J.H.F. & L.L. Therkorn. Wisselende Seizoenen en Verborgen Landschappen: wetland archeologie in de Velserbroek . Prov. Noord-Holland, Haarlem .

2004 Landscaping the Powers of Darkness & Light: 600 BC – 350 AD settlement concerns of Noord-Holland in wider perspective. PhD. thesis, Uni. of Amsterdam. 351 pp.

2005 From the Assendelver Polder to Oer-IJ Estuary Project, in: M.H. van den Dries & W.J.H. Willems (eds), Innovatie in de nederlandse Archeologie: Liber amicorum voor Roel Brandt. SIKB, Gouda, 85-99.

2006 [re-issue of 1998 report] Therkorn, L.L. , E.A. Besselsen, J.F.S. Oversteegen. Assendelver Polders Revisited: excavations 1997. AAC Projectenbureau 36. Amsterdam. 91 pp. 

2008 Marking while taking land into use: some indications for long-term traditions within the Oer-IJ estuarine region, In: S. Arnoldussen & H. Fokkens (eds), Bronze Age Settlements in the Low Countries, Oxbow Books, Oxford, 151-166.

2008 Therkorn, L.L. & E.A. Besselsen. ‘Speciale’ kuilen op vindplaats AHR02: enkele opmerkingen over de betekenisgeving aan het graven en opvullen van kuilen. In: J.P. Flamman & E.A. Besselsen (eds). Het verleden boven water. Archeologische monumentenzorg in het AHR-project. Rapportage Archeologische Monumentenzorg148, Delft/Amersfoort, 243-254.

2009 Therkorn, L.L., E. Besselsen, M. Diepeveen-Jansen, S. Gerritsen, J. Kaarsemaker, M. Kok, L. Kubiak-Martens,J.Slopsma & P. Vos. Landscapes in the Broekpolder:excavations around a monument with aspects of the Bronze Age to the Modern (Beverwijk & Heemskerk, Noord-Holland). AAC Project Bureau Themata 2, Amsterdam, 399 pp + 8 plans.  

2009 Landscapes in the Broekpolder

2006 Assendelft Revisited

phd thesis: 2004 Landscaping the Powers of Darkness and Light

2005 From the Assendelver Polder to Oer-IJ Estuary Project