Publication of Danai’s PhD thesis

We are delighted to announce the publication of SEAFRONT project member Danai Theodoraki’s doctoral thesis, High-Resolution Climatic Changes at Early Neolithic Franchthi, now available in the LEIZA Publications series and Propylaeum Open Access.

This study investigates how early farming communities at Franchthi interacted with their environment at the onset of the Early Neolithic. It explores how climatic conditions may have influenced the spread of early farmers from the Near East into Europe. By combining laser-induced breakdown spectroscopy (LIBS) and oxygen isotope analysis of archaeological mollusc shells, the study bridges the gap between archaeological and climatic records, providing a high-resolution reconstruction of past climatic conditions as well as insights into human resilience in the face of climate change.

Danai’s work forms an important contribution to the aims of the SEAFRONT project, which explores the relationship between short-term climatic fluctuations and human behaviour during the Neolithic transition in the Mediterranean. Her research further demonstrates the potential of shell geochemical archives for bridging archaeological and environmental records.

The publication is available in Open Access through Propylaeum.