Megan B. Gatton is a field archaeologist and art historian, studying sacred contexts of the Early Iron Age and Archaic Mediterranean world. She is a Ph.D. candidate at New York University's Institute of Fine Arts. For her Fulbright project, she will study ancient objects carved from ivory and animal bone that were ritually deposited in the sanctuaries of Artemis Orthia, Sparta, and Athena Alea, Tegea, in the Peloponnese. Her work offers a new framework for understanding the movement of people, goods, and knowledge through the region during a period of increased mobility and cultural entanglement. Her dissertation provides critical insight into the agency of animals in ancient Greek art and religion. As a Fulbright-IKY Awardee, Megan will additionally perform lab work related to zooarchaeology and environmental archaeology, and conduct experimental archaeological research on ancient bone working techniques.

Megan is the Environmental Archaeology Coordinator for the Selinunte Main Urban Sanctuary Project (Sicily) and a Research Associate for the Quirinal Project (Rome). She has analyzed archaeological faunal assemblages in Greece and the United States. Her published work has appeared in the Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology and the Journal of Ancient Architecture. She earned an M.St. in Classical Archaeology from the University of Oxford (2021) and a B.A. in Classics-Art History from New York University (2020).