Archaeology in numbers
Who pays for research into the ancient world, who does it, and what they study. Grants and papers from Göbekli Tepe to Byzantium, counted from open research data.
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Facts
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Where the money goes
Who pays
Each block is a funder, sized by its grant money for this choice. Click one to see only its grants.
Who receives it
The university or body that holds the grant. Click a name to filter.
Countries
Where the money lands. Click to filter.
Periods
Money per period. A grant can cover more than one. Click a period to filter.
Money by start year
Grant money by the year the work began.
Every grant
| Grant | Funder | Holder | Start | Amount |
|---|
Which past gets studied
Papers per period, per year
Move over the chart to read a year; click a period to bring it forward.
Universities and institutes
Countries
Countries of the authors' institutions.
How the work is done
Papers on our period that use each method, 2000 to last year. Sorted by growth.
Behind the papers
Funders thanked in papers
Funders named in papers on our period, last five years.
Journals
Where the papers appear.
Free to read?
Open access status of the papers.
Most cited new research
Journal papers on our period from the last two years, by citations so far.
In our own news
What the stories on Ancient Herald are about.
Who made the news
Institutions named in our stories.
Where
Countries of the finds.
How
Methods behind the finds.
When
Stories per desk.
Where these numbers come from
Grants and papers come from OpenAlex, an open index of the world's research (CC0). We count papers filed under archaeology that mention our periods, and grants whose title or description is about archaeology or one of our periods; every grant of $250,000 or more is checked a second time before it counts.
Amounts are in US dollars as OpenAlex converts them. They exist only where funders publish them: American, British, European, Canadian, Japanese and Australian funders report well, many others report nothing. So the money section shows what is public, not everything that is spent. Counts of papers by institution count each paper once for every institution on it. Long official names are shortened on the charts; the full name shows when you point at one. The data refreshes weekly; grants monthly.