Seminars and Events 2026
Public Lecture
What Happened to the Christians in Palestine After the Muslim Conquests of the 630s AD?: An Archaeological Perspective
Dr Robert Schick
The Subject: Around one thousand churches were in use in the Byzantine period in modern-day Israel and Jordan, but almost all have been in ruins for many centuries. So, what happened to those church buildings after the Muslim Conquests? Careful archaeological examination can reveal how long those buildings remained in use and when and how they went out of use, reflecting what was happening to the Christian communities worshipping there, as the numbers of Christians declined in the first centuries after the Muslim Conquests.
The Speaker: Dr. Robert Schick is an independent scholar who researches the history and archaeology of Jordan in the Late Roman to Islamic periods, with a focus on southern Jordan. He has participated in numerous excavations in Jordan since 1980. His second interest is the Islamic sites and monuments of Jerusalem. He received his PhD from the University of Chicago in 1987 for a dissertation on the Christian communities in Palestine from Byzantine to Islamic rule. He is a freelance translator of scholarly literature from German and Arabic into English. He has taught archaeology at the Palestinian al-Quds and Bir Zeit Universities between 1995 and 1998, and Islamic Studies in Hyderabad, India, from 2000 to 2006. He was based at the University of Mainz from 2014 to 2019.
When: 6.00 pm Friday 20 March, 2026
In Person: Australian Institute of Archaeology, Terrace Way, Macleod
La Trobe University, Building TER 11 (Melways 873-4)
Please book: Christopher Davey 0421 595 966, cdavey@aiarch.org.au