Saba Farès

Saba Farès is a Professor of Ancient Arabic Languages and Cultures at Université Toulouse - Jean Jaurès, affiliated with the Patrimoine Littérature Histoire (PLH) research unit and the ERASMUS Research Team on the Reception of Antiquity. She specializes in pre-Islamic Arabia, North Arabian epigraphy, and cultural heritage studies, conducting extensive fieldwork in Jordan's Wadi Ramm and Saudi Arabia's Kilwa.

Her research focuses on the religious landscape and sacred territories of Arabian tribes, linguistic analysis of ancient Arabic inscriptions, and environmental archaeology. She integrates historical linguistics with archaeological fieldwork to understand ancient Arabian societies, particularly examining how climate and environment influenced cultural development and population movements. Her work bridges traditional epigraphy with modern digital documentation techniques.

Professor Farès' publications demonstrate a consistent focus on pre-Islamic Arabian Peninsula studies, with particular emphasis on North Arabian inscriptions, Christian monasticism in Arabia, and traditional water management systems. Her recent work shows increasing interdisciplinary collaboration, combining archaeological, linguistic, environmental, and zoological approaches to understand ancient desert societies.

Scientific Recognition:

• HCERES Expert since 2018
• Member of National Universities Committee (2015-2017)
• Principal Investigator for MIRCAP project (€60,000 from PACA region, 2017-2020)
• Principal Investigator for STORMER project (€8,000 from LabexMed, 2017-2018)

Professor Farès actively supervises doctoral theses and has directed significant archaeological projects for over two decades. She co-founded the Cairn-Rujm consulting startup (2009-2015) and serves as scientific advisor to the al-Disseh Museum in Jordan. Her MirCap project has created an open-access archaeological information system for data from Jordan and Saudi Arabia.

She leads ongoing excavations at Kilwa, Saudi Arabia, where her team discovered a unique Christian monastery complex dating to the 7th-11th centuries, challenging previous assumptions about Christianity's presence in pre-Islamic Arabia. Her work at Wadi Ramm, Jordan, spans more than 20 years and focuses on ancient tribal territories and epigraphic documentation.