Lea Rees

Lea Rees is Lady Wallis Budge Junior Research Fellow in Egyptology at University College, Oxford, and an Associate Member of the University’s Faculty of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies. She leads and collaborates on fieldwork at Dahshur with the German Archaeological Institute in Cairo and on conservation and publication in the tomb of Ramesses III (KV 11).

Research interests span Egyptian settlement and landscape archaeology, cultural interactions, archaeological theory, and the history of Egyptology. She employs phenomenological, sociological, and archival perspectives to investigate ancient lived environments and their modern reception.

• Egyptian settlement archaeology
• Landscape biography and phenomenology
• Cross-cultural iconography (e.g., Bes in the Achaemenid Empire)
• Archaeological theory and spatial sociology
• Conservation and epigraphy in the Valley of the Kings

Her recent publications concentrate on two major arenas: the Valley of the Kings, where multi-year conservation and documentation campaigns in KV 11 have yielded richly illustrated reports and new insights into Ramesside burial equipment; and Dahshur, where she interrogates long-term landscape transformations from Early Dynastic encampments to Old Kingdom pyramid towns and their subsequent deconstruction.

Scientific recognition includes the competitive Lady Wallis Budge Junior Research Fellowship and ongoing collaboration with the German Archaeological Institute, the Ramesses III Conservation Project, and international scholarly networks.

Current projects & teams:

• Post-doctoral project ‘Historicising phenomenology: A landscape biography of Dahshur’ at Oxford
• Field director, Dahshur excavations (German Archaeological Institute Cairo)
• Research collaborator, Ramesses III (KV 11) Publication and Conservation Project