Staff profile

I am currently a PDRA at the Department of Archaeology and Psychology working on a research project developed for the AHRC/DFG Anglo-German funded collaborative research initiative in the humanities. It was awarded in November 2020 in collaboration with colleagues from the archaeological research centre at Schloss Monrepos, in Neuwied, Germany, and the University of Mainz, Germany. (AHRC: Research Grant AH/V002899/1 AHRC/).

Prior to this, I completed my BA in Archaeology and Anthropology at Durham University in 2015, during which I specifically focussed on the visual aspects of the Scandinavian Bronze Age, namely that of rock art in Southern Sweden. Through my thesis entitled “Nordic Bronze Age Ship Iconography: The Establishment of a Maritime Biography of Naval Agents”, I have become increasingly interested in prehistoric activities in naval environments. Following on from this, I have deepened my knowledge in this field through a study of all the different forms of anthropomorphs displayed on rocks in Southern Sweden. This project was conducted during my MPhil in Archaeological Research at Cambridge University.

Having gained great insight into rock art and all its different facets, I then decided to broaden my expertise in this field by expanding into other areas with open-air/landscape rock art. Funded by the Leverhulme Trust, I was very fortunate to be deploying and developing approaches from archaeology, psychology and Geographic Information Systems in order to understand the nature and function of Upper Palaeolithic rock art in the valleys in and around Portugal’s Côa Valley and Spain’s Siega Verde. I investigating the relationship between the hunter-gatherer’s, their prey as well as their art creations at the time. The psychology of perception was used to understand the specific nature of art perception and prey recognition; a new, multidisciplinary concept that links art, landscape and human perception.

Having previously looked at Swedish Bronze Age open air petroglyphs and Portuguese Upper Palaeolithic (UP) open air art, my current research moves yet another step further and focuses in on UP portable plaquette art from the site of Gönnersdorf and Andernach (Rhineland, Germany). Questions such as: How did people function in their lifespace, and how did the mechanics of routine actions interact with the creation and function of Palaeolithic art? What did domestic life look like in the Upper Palaeolithic? are at the forefront of that research. 

• European Prehistory
• Prehistoric Rock Art
• Visual Psychology
• Visuality in the Past
• Upper Palaeolithic Art
• Bronze Age Scandinavia
• Landscape Archaeology

Chapter in book

• Meyering, L. Fleshing out the stickman: A hypothesis about the longlegged anthropomorphs in Scandinavian rock art. In J. Dodd, & E. Meijer (Eds.), Giving the Past a Future (136-146). ArchaeoPress, Access Archaeology

Doctoral Thesis

• Meyering, L. (in press). Multidisciplinary approaches to the composition, context, visibility and perception of Upper Palaeolithic rock art in the Coa Valley, Portugal. Doctoral thesis, Durham University. (Thesis). Durham University. Retrieved from https://durham-repository.worktribe.com/output/1641979

Journal Article

• Meyering, L., Kentridge, R., & Pettitt, P. (2020). The visual psychology of European Upper Palaeolithic figurative art: using Bubbles to understand outline depictions. World Archaeology, 52(2), 205-222. https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2020.1891964
• Pettitt, P., Meyering, L., & Kentridge, R. (2020). Bringing science to the study of ancient senses - archaeology and visual psychology. World Archaeology, 52(2), 183-204. https://doi.org/10.1080/00438243.2020.1909932