Georges Raepsaet

Georges Raepsaet (born 3 August 1947) is a Belgian classical archaeologist and historian of antiquity. His main research interests are the archaeology of ancient technologies, especially traction systems in Greco-Roman land transport and farming, the production and trade of ancient ceramics and the wider socioeconomic implications of these technologies, as well as Roman Gaul. His methods include the use of experimentation. Born in 1947 in the Eastern Flemish town of Oudenaarde, Belgium, Raepsaet received his Master in Ancient History in 1969, and another one in Arts and Archaeology in 1972, both at the University of Brussels. In 1977 he completed his dissertation on the Pagus Condrustis and the Romanization of Northern Gaul. In the following year, Raepsaet became senior lecturer at the Université Libre de Bruxelles where he was appointed professor in 1992 and taught until his retirement in 2007. His courses focused, inter alia, on classical archaeology, ancient economic and social history, history of pre-industrial technologies, archaeology of Roman Gaul and excavation techniques. He founded and directed the university research units Laboratoire d’Archéologie classique and Centre de Recherches archéologiques. From 1997 to 1999 Raepsaet co-directed a research programme on the process of technological innovation in antiquity and the Middle Ages. Currently, he works as an expert for the European Science Foundation and chairs the scientific committee of the Royal Museum of Mariemont. Since 1970 Raepsaet has been on the editorial board of the Belgian journal L’Antiquité Classique for which he has been reviewing each year about thirty books on classic archaeology, economic history and ancient technology. Since 1970 Raepsaet has participated in and directed several archaeological excavations and fieldworks in Western Europe and the eastern Mediterranean basin. These include underwater excavations at Martigues, France, and Amathus on Cyprus, as well as fieldwork at the site of the Diolkos on the Isthmus and Styra on Euboea (1984–88).