My interests concern Greek colonization, colonial urbanization and the relations between Greeks and barbarians. In an attempt to respond to the questions raised by these issues, I am directing two archaeological missions. The first, in Syria, is located in the large Ras al-Bassit bay. This is the ancient Posideion of the Greeks, one of the oldest contact sites from the 1^st millennium BC between Greeks and peoples on the Syro-Palestinian coast. The research conducted on this site has given us a better understanding of how contacts developed between Greeks and Orientals and the origins of one of the key periods in art and architecture of ancient Greece, the Orientalizing period.

The second dig site is Argilos, in northern Greece, a region that the Greeks colonized starting in the 8^thcentury BC. This was the first Greek colony in the Lower Strymon region, a settlement founded by colonists from the Cycladic island of Andros. Argilos enjoyed tremendous prosperity in the 6^th and 5^thcenturies BC, and the digs have turned up a number of surprisingly well-preserved buildings, allowing us to study the urban development of a colonial city, the evolution of homes, and contacts and trade with indigenous peoples.

In Montreal, in the Mediterranean Archaeology Laboratory, students and research assistants work on databases relating to these projects and help in the stylistic and chronological analysis of the excavated archaeological materials.