Research

Negash has long remained at the margins of Ethiopian and international scholarship. The NeGaSh Project addresses this gap through an integrated programme of archaeological and ethnographic research, conducted in close partnership with local institutions and the community of Negash. This page presents each research season and shows how successive stages of the project build a coherent understanding of place, memory and heritage.

An interdisciplinary study of Negash as a landscape shaped by people, memory and place.
Despite its exceptional significance in the early history of Islam, Negash has received little systematic scholarly attention. The material traces of the First Hijra settlement remain largely undocumented, and the relationship between the historical landscape and the living memory of the community has never been studied in depth. The NeGaSh Project was designed to address these gaps – combining archaeological documentation with ethnographic research in a framework where both approaches carry equal weight and inform one another.
Research is conducted in close cooperation with Mekelle University, the Tigray Culture and Tourism Bureau and the Ethiopian Heritage Authority. These partnerships are not merely institutional formalities: they provide access to local knowledge, support the recovery of cultural institutions in a region still emerging from the impact of war, and ensure that the research remains grounded in the realities and needs of the community.
Each season builds on the last. The questions we ask, the methods we apply and the directions we pursue all evolve as the project deepens its engagement with the landscape of Negash. The pages below present the individual research seasons and show how this cumulative process is gradually revealing the layers – material, historical and human – of a place unlike any other.