Second Edition of Khaled al-Asaad Award Announced at Paestum

The second edition of the Khaled al-Asaad Award, promoted by the Borsa Mediterranea del Turismo Archeologico and Archeo magazine, will be presented on October 28 in Paestum during the 19th Borsa. The award honors the memory of Khaled al-Asaad, the Syrian archaeologist and former director of the Palmyra Museum, who was beheaded by ISIS in August 2015 at age 81. The shortlist of five international archaeological discoveries from 2015 has been announced in collaboration with partner publications: Current Archaeology (UK), Antike Welt (Germany), Dossiers d'Archéologie (France), and Archäologie der Schweiz (Switzerland). The nominees include a Gallic tomb in Lavau, France; 22 underwater shipwrecks in Greece; an underground monument near Stonehenge, England; tombs of the Khalet al-Jam'a necropolis in Palestine; and an Etruscan tomb in Città della Pieve, Italy. The partner magazines will select the winner, while a public vote runs on Facebook until July 30. The article also notes a crowdfunding campaign for excavations at Pietrabbondante in Molise, Italy, led by young archaeologists from INASA, which has raised only 26% of its €30,000 goal.