Editing Colin Renfrew (section)

==Academic==
[[File:Lord Renfrew is shown the Roman gold coins from near St Albans by Sam Moorhead (8241370038).jpg|thumb|right|Lord Renfrew looking at artefacts including Roman gold coins]]

In 1965, Renfrew was appointed to the post of lecturer in the [[Department of Archaeology, University of Sheffield|Department of Prehistory and Archaeology at the University of Sheffield]]. Between 1968 and 1970, he directed excavations at [[Sitagroi]], Greece. In the [[1968 Sheffield Brightside by-election]] he unsuccessfully contested this parliamentary constituency on behalf of the [[Conservative Party (UK)|Conservative Party]]. In that year he was elected a Fellow of the [[Society of Antiquaries of London|Society of Antiquaries]], in 1970 was elected Fellow of the [[Society of Antiquaries of Scotland]] and in 2000 elected an Honorary Fellow of the [[Society of Antiquaries of Scotland]].

In 1972, Renfrew became Professor of Archaeology at the [[University of Southampton]], succeeding [[Barry Cunliffe]]. During his time at [[Southampton]] he directed excavations at [[Quanterness chambered cairn|Quanterness]] in Orkney and [[Phylakopi]] on the island of [[Milos|Milos, Greece]]. In 1973, Renfrew published ''Before Civilisation: The Radiocarbon Revolution and Prehistoric Europe'' in which he challenged the assumption that prehistoric cultural innovation originated in the [[Near East]] and then spread to Europe. He also excavated with [[Marija Gimbutas]] at Sitagroi.

In 1980, Renfrew was elected a Fellow of the British Academy. In 1981 he was elected to the [[Disney Professorship of Archaeology]] in the [[University of Cambridge]], a post he held until his retirement. In 1990 Renfrew was appointed the founding Director of the [[McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research]].

In 1987, he published ''Archaeology and Language: The Puzzle of the Indo-European Origins'', a book on the [[Proto-Indo-Europeans]]. His "[[Anatolian hypothesis]]" posited that this group lived 2,000 years before the [[Kurgan hypothesis|Kurgan]]s, in [[Anatolia]], later diffusing to Greece, then Italy, Sicily, Corsica, the Mediterranean coast of France, Spain, and Portugal. Another branch migrated along the fertile river valleys of the [[Danube]] and [[Rhine]] into central and northern Europe.

He developed the [[Anatolian hypothesis]], which argues that [[Proto-Indo-European]], the reconstructed ancestor of the [[Indo-European languages]], originated approximately 9,000 years ago in [[Anatolia]] and moved with the [[Neolithic Revolution|spread of farming]] throughout the Mediterranean and into central and northern Europe. This hypothesis contradicted [[Marija Gimbutas]]'s [[Kurgan hypothesis]], which states that Proto-Indo-European was spread by a [[Human migration|migration]] of peoples from the [[Pontic–Caspian steppe]] approximately 6,000 years ago.

From 1987 to 1991, he co-directed excavations at [[Markiani]] on [[Amorgos]] and at Dhaskalio Kavos, [[Keros]], Greece.

Renfrew's work in using the archaeological record as the basis for understanding the ancient mind was foundational to the field of [[Cognitive archaeology#Evolutionary Cognitive Archaeology (ECA)|evolutionary cognitive archaeology]].<ref>{{cite book |last1=Renfrew |first1=Colin |date=1982 |title=Towards an Archaeology of Mind: An Inaugural Lecture Delivered before the University of Cambridge on 30th November 1982 |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |doi=10.1080/00665983.1984.11077826}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |last=Renfrew |first=Colin |editor-last1=Renfrew |editor-first1=Colin |editor-last2=Zubrow |editor-first2=Ezra B W |title=In The Ancient Mind: Elements of Cognitive Archaeology |location=Cambridge |publisher=Cambridge University Press |date=1994 |pages=3–12 |chapter=Towards a Cognitive Archaeology |isbn=9780521456203}}</ref> Renfrew and his student, [[Lambros Malafouris]], coined the phrase [[neuroarchaeology]] to describe an archaeology of mind.<ref>{{Cite journal |last1=Malafouris |first1=Lambros |last2=Renfrew |first2=Colin |date=2008 |title=Introduction |journal=Cambridge Archaeological Journal |volume=18 |issue=3 |pages=381–385 |doi=10.1017/s0959774308000425 |s2cid=231810895 |issn=0959-7743}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |editor-last1=Malafouris |editor-first1=Lambros |editor-last2=Renfrew |editor-first2=Colin |title=The Cognitive Life of Things: Recasting the Boundaries of the Mind |location=Cambridge |publisher=McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research |date=2010 |isbn=9781902937519}}</ref>

In 1996, Renfrew formulated a [[sapient paradox]], that can be formulated as "why there was such a long gap between emergence of genetically and anatomically modern humans and the development of complex behaviors?"<ref>{{cite journal |last1=Donald |first1=Merlin |title=The sapient paradox: can cognitive neuroscience solve it? |journal=Brain |date=21 January 2009 |volume=132 |issue=3 |pages=820–824 |doi=10.1093/brain/awn290 |url=https://academic.oup.com/brain/article/132/3/820/337382 |access-date=19 June 2022 |quote=The paradox is that there was a gap of well over 50 000 years between the speciation and tectonic phases.|doi-access=free}}</ref><ref>{{cite journal |last1=Renfrew |first1=Colin |title=Solving the "Sapient Paradox" |journal=BioScience |date=1 February 2008 |volume=58 |issue=2 |pages=171–172 |doi=10.1641/B580212 |quote=called the "sapient paradox," that some of the complex behaviors now associated with humans took a long time to develop even after the emergence in Africa of humans who were fully modern in the anatomical and genetic senses.|doi-access=free}}</ref>

Renfrew served as [[List of Masters of Jesus College, Cambridge|Master]] of [[Jesus College, Cambridge]] from 1986 until 1997. In 2004, he retired from the Disney Professorship and was a Senior Fellow at the McDonald Institute. From 2006 to 2008 he directed new excavations on the Cycladic Island of [[Keros]] and was recently co-director of the Keros Island Survey. He died on 24 November 2024, at the age of 87.<ref>[https://www.ekathimerini.com/news/1254364/colin-renfrew-renown-scholar-of-cycladic-civilisation-dies/ Colin Renfrew, renowned scholar of Cycladic civilisation dies]</ref>