EXPLO just successfully completed its very first field campaign: from June 24th to August 2nd, 2019 a team of 20 underwater archaeologists from Switzerland, Germany, Bulgaria and North Macedonia (headed by Albert Hafner, Ariane Ballmer and Johannes Reich, University of Bern), supported by a team of dendrochronologists (headed by Matthias Bolliger, University of Bern), a team of palaeoecologists (headed by Andy Lotter and Willy Tinner, University of Bern), a team of archaeobotanists (headed by Amy Bogaard, University of Oxford, and Ferran Antolin, University of Basel), as well as a team of geodesists (headed by Andreas Wieser, Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich) extensively explored the prehistoric lake shore dwelling of Ploča Mičov Grad, Bay of Bones at Gradište on the eastern coast of Lake Ohrid (Rep. North Macedonia). This expedition was carried out in partnership with the Museum in Ohrid (Daniela Nedeljkovic) and the Center for Prehistoric Research in Skopje (Goce Naumov). Stunning results are expected from the upcoming post-processing and lab work. Many thanks to everyone who contributed!
The following institutions and individuals supported the campaign with technical equipment: Underwater Archaeology of the City of Zurich (Andy Mäder, Sandro Geiser), Underwater Archaeology Dept (Regine Stapfer, Lukas Schärer) and Dendrochronology Lab (Matthias Bolliger) of the Archaeological Service of the Canton of Bern, the Dept of Space Research & Planetary Science of the Physics Institute of the University of Bern (Daniele Piazza & team), The North Face (Max Steffen), the Institute of Geomatic Engeneering of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich (Andreas Wieser), and Dr. med. Jürg Wendling, Biel. Thank you!