Astrid NotermanResearcher

About me

Astrid A. Noterman completed her PhD on Merovingian reopened graves from northern France in 2016 at the Centre for Medieval Studies (CESCM) at the University of Poitiers in France. Her approach to early medieval grave reopening includes archaeology, mortuary studies and early medieval written.

She is particularly interested in reconstructing the chronology of reopenings through the taphonomical analysis of disturbed graves. She has developed the use of archaeothanatological approaches understanding the dynamics of re-entered and re-worked burials.
Her ongoing research interests include also Merovingian historiography, and 19th century archaeology and its implications for the construction of French identity.

In 2017, she co-organized the first international conference in France on the topic of grave reopening, in partnership with the Groupe d’anthropologie et d’archéologie funéraire: https://www.gaaf-asso.fr/rencontres/rencontre-autour-reouvertures-de-tombes-et-manipulation-ossements/
The conference proceedings were published in 2020.

She is also an associate member of the Center for Medieval Studies (CESCM) since 2017 and which is a Mixed Research Unit (UMR) managed by the University of Poitiers and the CNRS (Centre national de la Recherche scientifique).
She is part of a research group working on the practice of grave reopening: reopenedgraves.eu

From 2018, she is a post-doctoral researcher in the Department of Archaeology and Classical Studies at Stockholm University. She is working on a three-year project project funded by the Swedish Research Council on ‘Interacting with the dead. Belief and conflict in Early Medieval Europe (AD 450-750)’/ ‘Att handskas med de döda. Tro och tvist i Europa efter Rom (450-750 e. kr.)’ and led by Alison Klevnäs.