Research projects
Here is a small sample of the types of research projects that School staff and honorary fellows are involved with.

The Other From Within: Indian Anthropologists and the Birth of the Nation
This project, funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, traces the development of anthropology as an academic discipline in India and as an instrument of state formation across the transition to independence, ca. 1900 to 1970.
Earthen Empire: Earth and turf building in the Roman North-West
Earthen Empire: Earth and Turf Building in the Roman North-West is a Leverhulme-funded research project directed by Dr Ben Russell (Classics) and Dr Chris Beckett (Engineering), exploring earth building traditions in the Roman world.
Another World? East Africa and the Global 1960s
Another World? East Africa and the Global 1960s seeks to understand and explain how East Africa’s global connections systematically broke down after independence, opening up a set of new and unpredictable paths forward.
Birthing Abolition (Marie Sklodowska-Curie Postdoctoral Fellowship)
A project that explores the manner in which enslaved women’s reproductive practices informed the gradual abolition of slavery in the middle to large slave holdings of Rio de Janeiro state from 1850 (the definitive end of the country’s slave trade) to final abolition in 1888.
Enslaved Childhoods: Redefining Roman Slavery
This three year project, led by Dr Ulrike Roth, explores the role of child slavery in the Roman world, testing the hypothesis that Roman slavery was largely child slavery.
Building (Ancient) Lives: new perspectives on the past for a sustainable future
A Leverhulme Trust Early Career Fellowship project at the interface of archaeological research and architectural application studying prehistoric and early medieval buildings and their materials to inspire modern sustainable architecture.
Engineering the Byzantine water supply: procurement, construction and operation
A new project funded by the Leverhulme Trust will build on archaeological research completed nearly a decade ago by Prof James Crow, on the Water Supply System of Byzantine Constantinople
Artisans and the Craft Economy in Scotland 1780-1914
This three year project, directed by Professor Stana Nenadic, takes a contemporary approach to craft, applied to Scotland, c. 1780-1914
Mapping Edinburgh's Social History
MESH – Mapping Edinburgh’s Social History – is a path-breaking AHRC funded project that uses data based on addresses and areas to represent historical information. It provides a spatial dimension that enriches and enhances an understanding of the past.
A History of Distributed Cognition
A 3 year project, funded by the AHRC, exploring historical expressions of the philosophical notion that cognition is distributed across brain, body and world.
An Atlas of Hillforts in Britain and Ireland
Funded by AHRC, this four-year collaboration between the Universities of Edinburgh and Oxford will create an online, interactive database of Iron Age hillforts across the Britain and Ireland.
'Becoming Coolies': Rethinking the Origins of the Indian Ocean Labour Diaspora, 1772-1920
This two and half year project, funded by the AHRC, aims to challenge existing assumptions about 'first wave' Indian migrants. Led by Professor Crispin Bates (University of Edinburgh) and Dr Andrea Major (University of Leeds), it situates Indian indentured labour migration within the broader story of labour mobility in the Indian Ocean region in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries.
Archive
This archive includes a list of historical Research Projects
More projects
We have other projects listed on subject area research websites.