Dr Karen Wicks

Associate Director

Responsibilities

Both my higher education and employment careers have been dedicated to the University of Reading since 1994. I currently hold a position as Associate Director, Technical Services, managing the technical staff based in SAGES, SAPD and SMPCS. I previously held a role for 8-years as post-doctoral research assistant to the Deputy Vice Chancellor, Professor Steven Mithen. During this time, I acquired a broad understanding of north European and north Chinese prehistory, Pleistocene palaeoenvironments and climate change having directed major research-driven fieldwork campaigns in western Scotland and the Chinese Haidai region - this building upon my PhD research reconstructing vegetation and landscape histories using Quaternary science techniques. These campaigns have resulted in the publication of several peer-reviewed papers concerned with the colonisation and earliest prehistory of northern Britain and northern China that have established my international reputation as a leading expert in Bayesian chronological modelling. Prior to this, I was Enterprise Manager based in SAGES, managing the commercial services within the school. In this role, I provided academic and practical expertise as a forensic palynologist at crime scenes, post-mortem examinations and during legal proceedings in the UK. This included the use of the cribriform approach to recover trace particulates from cadavers.

Areas of interest

• Hunter-gatherer landscape archaeology and the Mesolithic of western Scotland
• Bayesian chronological modelling
• Multi-proxy palaeoenvironmental reconstruction (using palynological, sedimentological, geochemical and anthracological techniques)
• Holocene human impacts and climate change
• The Mesolithic-Neolithic transition
• Forensic palynology

Research

Publications

2021

• Mithen, S. and Wicks, K. (2021) Population level models for testing hunter-gatherer resilience and settlement response to the combined impact of abrupt climatic events and sea level change: a case study from the Holocene of northern Britain. Quaternary Science Reviews, 265. 107027. ISSN 0277-3791 doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.quascirev.2021.107027

2020

• Mithen, S., Wicks, K. and Berg-Hansen, I. (2020) The Mesolithic coastal exploitation of western Scotland The impacts of climate change and use of favoured locations. In: Schülke, A. (ed.) Coastal Landscapes of the Mesolithic Human Engagement with the Coast from the Atlantic to the Baltic Sea. Routledge, London, pp. 147-178. ISBN 9780203730942 doi: https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203730942

2019

• Berg-Hansen, I., Wicks, K. and Mithen, S. (2019) A tanged point and two blade technologies from Rubha Port an t-Seilich, Isle of Islay, western Scotland. Journal of Lithic Studies, 6 (1). ISSN 2055-0472 doi: https://doi.org/10.2218/jls.2892

2018

• Mithen, S. and Wicks, K. (2018) The interpretation of Mesolithic structures in Britain: new evidence from Criet Dubh, Isle of Mull, and alternative approaches to chronological analysis for inferring occupation tempos and settlement patterns. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, 84. pp. 77-110. ISSN 0079-797X doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2018.13

2017

• Waddington, C. and Wicks, K. (2017) Resilience or wipe out? Evaluating the convergent impacts of the 8.2 ka event and Storegga tsunami on the Mesolithic of northeast Britain. Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 14. pp. 692-714. ISSN 2352-409X doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jasrep.2017.04.015

2016

• Wicks, K., Finlayson, B., Maricevic, D., Smith, S., Jenkins, E. and Mithen, S. (2016) Dating WF16: exploring the chronology of a Pre-Pottery Neolithic A settlement in the Southern Levant. Proceedings of the Prehistoric Society, 82. pp. 73-123. ISSN 0079-797X doi: https://doi.org/10.1017/ppr.2015.21

2015

• Mithen, S., Wicks, K., Pirie, A., Riede, F., Lane, C., Banerjea, R., Cullen, V., Gittins, M. and Pankhurst, N. (2015) A Lateglacial archaeological site in the far north-west of Europe at Rubha Port an t-Seilich, Isle of Islay, western Scotland: Ahrensburgian-style artefacts, absolute dating and geoarchaeology. Journal of Quaternary Science, 30 (5). pp. 396-416. ISSN 0267-8179 doi: https://doi.org/10.1002/jqs.2781

2014

• Wicks, K., Pirie, A. and Mithen, S. (2014) Settlement patterns in the late Mesolithic of western Scotland: the implications of Bayesian analysis of radiocarbon dates and inter-site technological comparisons. Journal of Archaeological Science, 41. pp. 406-422. ISSN 0305-4403 doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2013.07.003
• Wicks, K. and Mithen, S. (2014) The impact of the abrupt 8.2 ka cold event on the Mesolithic population of western Scotland: a Bayesian chronological analysis using ‘activity events’ as a population proxy. Journal of Archaeological Science, 45. pp. 240-269. ISSN 0305-4403 doi: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2014.02.003

2012

• Mithen, S., Wicks, K., Austin, P., Black, S., Cowie, T., Elliott, S., Ingrem, C. and Smith, S. (2012) Croig Cave: a late Bronze Age ornament deposition and 3,500 years of coastal foraging in NW Mull, Scotland. Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, 142. pp. 63-132. ISSN 0081-1564
• Wicks, K. (2012) Vegetation history, human impact and climate change during prehistory: an island perspective of the isles of Tiree, Coll and north-west Mull. PhD thesis, University of Reading.

Other publications

• Wicks, K. In press. Radiocarbon dating and Bayesian chronological analysis. In Mithen, S.J. & Finlayson, B. (eds.) Pre-Pottery Neolithic Settlement at Wadi Feynan, Jordan, Southern Levant. Council for British Research in the Levant publication.
• Wicks, K. & Mithen, S.J. In press. Economy and environment during the early Mesolithic of western Scotland: repeated visits to a fishing locality on a small island in the Inner Hebrides. In, Persson, P., Skar, B., Breivik, H., Riede, F., Simpson, D. & Jonsson, L. (eds.) Early Settlement in North-Western Europe: Climate, Human Ecology, and Subsistence. Sheffield: Equinox Publishing.
• Wicks, K. & Mithen, S.J. 2018. The chronology of Longshan Culture: Preliminary results of geoarchaeological fieldwork and ¹⁴C dating at Neolithic settlements in the Haidai Region, northern China. Proceedings of the Satellite Symposium on Longshan Culture, 22^nd International Congress of Historical Sciences, Jinan, China, 23-25 August 2015, 231-246.