The European Association of Archaeologists (EAA) is a membership-based, not-for-profit association, open to archaeologists and other related or interested individuals or bodies in Europe and beyond. It was founded in 1994 at an Inaugural Meeting in Ljubljana, Slovenia, where its Statutes were formally approved, and recognized by the Council of Europe in 1999. EAA has had over 11,000 members on its database from 60 countries worldwide, working in prehistory, classical, medieval, and historic archaeology. EAA holds an annual conference and publishes the flagship journal of European archaeology, the European Journal of Archaeology. The EAA also publishes an in-house newsletter, The European Archaeologist (TEA). The registered office of the Association is in Prague, Czech Republic.
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Mission
The EAA sets the professional and ethical standards of archaeological work through its Statutes, Code of Practice, Principles of Conduct for Contract Archaeology, and Code of Practice for Fieldwork Training. The EAA Communities help define important aspects of archaeological work through constant discussion and consultation with EAA membership at EAA annual conferences. The EAA further promotes international cooperation though interactions with Affiliate Organizations. In 1999, the EAA was granted consultative status with the Council of Europe, which in 2003 was upgraded to participatory status.
The EAA aims are to:
Governance
The EAA is governed by an Executive Board elected by full members of the Association. The Executive Board comprises three or four Officers (President, Incoming President, Treasurer, and Secretary) and six Ordinary Members. The current president is Felipe Criado-Boado.
Awards
The EAA awards prizes and honours relevant to its aims. These include the European Archaeological Heritage Prize, the EAA Student Award, and Honorary membership in the EAA.
European Archaeological Heritage Prize
The EAA instituted the European Archaeological Heritage Prize in 1999. An independent committee awards the prize annually to an individual, institution, (local or regional) government or a (European or international) officer or body for an outstanding contribution to the protection and presentation of the European archaeological heritage.
Student Award
A Student Award was instituted in 2002 and is awarded annually for the best paper presented at the EAA Annual Meeting by a student or an archaeologist working on a dissertation.
Annual Meetings
The EAA inaugural meeting took place in Ljubljana, Slovenia in September 1994. The official first annual meeting took place in September 1995 in Santiago de Compostela, Spain, and an annual meeting has taken place every year since. The table below shows the meeting locations and dates since the year 2010.
Publications
The EAA publishes the quarterly European Journal of Archaeology (EJA), originally the Journal of European Archaeology (1993–1997), the monograph series THEMES In Contemporary Archaeology, and an electronic newsletter, The European Archaeologist (TEA).