Shipwrecks, Porcelain and Maritime Networks: China and the Medieval Maritime World
Event: Shipwrecks, Porcelain and Maritime Networks: China and the Medieval Maritime World
Date: Friday 30 October 2026
Time: 17:00-19:00
Venue: Archaeology Farmhouse (Car Park 6), University of Malta
Public lecture by Prof. Xu Wenpeng (Xiamen University, China)
Wenpeng Xu is an Associate Professor in the School of History and Cultural Heritage at Xiamen University. He received his BA from Jilin University, his MA from Peking University, and his PhD from the University of Illinois at Chicago. His research lies at the intersection of ceramic archaeology, maritime archaeology, and archaeological science, with a particular focus on the production, circulation, and consumption of Chinese ceramics.
He is especially interested in issues of provenance, craft production systems, and the role of ceramics in long-distance maritime exchange within global networks of trade and interaction. Xu has participated in major excavations at kiln sites in China and has investigated assemblages of Chinese ceramics recovered from shipwrecks and overseas contexts. His work has appeared in leading journals such as Antiquity, Journal of Archaeological Science, and Archaeological Research in Asia. He also serves as an editor of Open Archaeology.
