About

The overall archaeological picture of southeastern Nigeria remained largely unknown until the late 1950s, following the pioneering excavations conducted by Professor Charles Thurstan Shaw at Igbo-Ukwu. Shaw’s work marked the first professional archaeological research in southeastern Nigeria and fundamentally transformed understanding of the region’s past. Subsequently, Professor Donald Dean Hartle of Arizona, USA, undertook extensive archaeological investigations across the region, identifying and documenting numerous archaeological sites. These early efforts were later complemented by the work of indigenous Igbo archaeologists in the 1970s and 1980s, notably Fred Anozie, EmenikeChikwendu, and Alex Okpoko, and, from the 1990s onward, by a new generation of archaeologists.

Archaeological data from southeastern Nigeria, spanning the Late Stone Age, Neolithic, Metal Age, and more recent historical periods, underscore the region’s rich cultural history, diversity, and geographic significance within West Africa. Despite the exceptional insights these studies have provided into ancient Igbo civilisation and its importance in African and global historiography, the region remains archaeologically underexplored.

The Igboland Archaeological Research Project seeks to address this gap by expanding systematic archaeological knowledge across the Igbo region, which encompasses the five southeastern states as well as Igbo-speaking areas of south–south and central Nigeria. The project aims to reconstruct the cultural history of the Igbo people, investigate long-term human–environment relationships, and document artistic and technological traditions within their broader environmental and historical contexts.

In addition, much of the existing research in southeastern Nigeria has been limited by the absence of integrated environmental datasets and landscape-scale approaches, resulting in an incomplete understanding of settlement dynamics and human–environment relationships over time. Many areas of Igboland remain unsurveyed, while several occupational phases are poorly dated or entirely undocumented. At the same time, accelerating development, erosion, and land-use change threaten archaeological sites across the region, heightening the urgency for systematic research and community-engaged heritage documentation. By integrating archaeological survey and excavation with environmental reconstruction, scientific analyses, and public engagement, the Igboland Archaeological Research Project seeks not only to fill critical knowledge gaps but also to contribute to sustainable heritage management and broader debates on early urbanism and cultural resilience in West Africa.