Lenape, Munsee, Iroquois, and Monongahela are
names which remind us of
the many Native American peoples who lived in the region that is now
Pennsylvania before the coming of Columbus. How they lived and how they
interacted with one another is better known now than in the past,
thanks to recent archaeological finds and new historical studies. Marshall
Becker examined the history of the Lenape culture and how the Lenape interacted
with other Native peoples.
Marshall J. Becker took all 3 of his degrees from
the U of Penna. His
doctoral research focused on settlement studies at Tikal (Becker 1999:
Tikal Report 21).
After completing his doctorate he continued a research program in Italy
that focused on studies of human skeletons from archaeological sites; first
in the Greek colonial world, then in Iron Age Rome and later at Etruscan
Tarquinia. This research was paralleled by archaeological and ethnohistorical
studies of the peoples of the Delaware Valley, with specific focus on the
Lenape and their post-Contact culture history. Present research in
Italy focuses on the medieval populations of cities in the north.
An allied project involves the analysis of all the skeletons recovered
from the past 100 years of excavation at the Prague Castle in the Czech
Republic.
Professor Becker has been at West Chester University
for 32 years, during which time he has maintained his contacts with the
University Museum (now in a consulting capacity to the Mediterranean Section)
and the Department of Anthropology (now as a Research Fellow) at the University
of Penna. His present work at the Museum involves the analysis of
all the cremated and other human bone found in or associated with vessels
from
Etruria.