About
The 11th International Congress of Phoenician and Punic Studies will take place at the Old University Building (the former Jesuits’ Complex) in Valletta between the 9 and 13 November 2026. It is hosted by the University of Malta in collaboration with the Superintendence of Cultural Heritage, the National Museum of Archaeology/Heritage Malta, and the Missione Archeologica Italiana a Malta.
Building on past editions of the Congress, this gathering is intended to bring together scholars, early-stage researchers and students working in the field of Phoenician and Punic archaeology. Presentations will be delivered in a number of parallel sessions. The overarching theme of the Congress is intended to put emphasis on the fact that the Phoenician and Punic story unfolds in a millennium marked by the most culturally diverse settings in Mediterranean history. The varied responses to Phoenician presence and settlement are challenging the neat narratives of historical reconstruction which favoured cultures as homogenous entities. How do we marshal the material record of archaeological evidence to counter the views of the Mediterranean world of the first millennium BCE as “Graeco-Roman”? How do processes of social interaction map out archaeologically at different scales of analysis, from the level of the local site to a region and beyond? How does one explain variation at the different levels of lived experience, in politics, religion and ritual, music, art and craft, exploration and trade? How aware are scholars of the ideological biases that may have conditioned modern historiography on the ancient Phoenicians? We especially invite Congress participants to submit abstracts for papers and posters which address these issues, directly or indirectly. A session will be devoted to doctoral researchers.
The official languages of the Congress will be English, French, Italian and Spanish.
The Congress is overseen by the International Scientific Committee (ad interim) and managed by a local Organizing Committee chaired by Nicholas Vella (University of Malta).
The Call for Papers will be announced in social media and the congress website in mid-December.