Franz Humer
The scientific director of the Roman City Carnuntum Franz Humer studied classical archaeology, ancient history and history of art at the Paris-Lodron-University of Salzburg. During his academic training he worked as an assistant at the Institute of Classical Archaeology at the University of Salzburg. In 1988, he completed his master's degree in archaeology with the thesis "Hypostyle halls in Greek architecture".
In addition to excavation and research activities in Austria, Franz Humer undertook extensive archaeological study tours to Albania, Algeria, Belgium, Bulgaria, Colombia, Croatia, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Egypt, France, Germany, Greece, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Italy, Jordan, Macedonia, Malta, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia, Spain, Syria, Tunisia, Turkey and UK.
He has now been cooperating closely with Carnuntum for nearly 30 years. Next to the implementation of scientific research and excavations since 1987 and administrative functions, he played a vital role in the organization of the opening of the Archaeological Park Carnuntum on 9 June 1996. Franz Humer is director of excavations and scientific director at the Roman City Carnuntum.
In 2001, he was appointed scientific director of the Province of Lower Austria’s branch office in Carnuntum (Museum Carnuntinum, Open Air Museum Petronell-Carnuntum, Kulturfabrik Hainburg). In addition, he was entrusted with the financial and administrative agenda of the entire Roman archaeology affairs of the Province of Lower Austria. In 2013, Franz Humer was conferred the honorary title “Hofrat”.
The improvement and large-scale new presentation concept of Carnuntum (reconstructions of ancient Roman buildings on top of their original location based on archaeological evidence found in excavations; modern museum exhibitions) are focal points of his activities. Furthermore, he is always keen to introduce cutting-edge scientific technologies for both excavations and the processing of findings in Carnuntum. One of his career highlights was the organisation of the Province of Lower Austria’s Exhibition "Conquests and Discoveries – emperors, traders, researchers" in 2011.
Franz Humer has given a great number of lectures at the Vienna University and the Graz University of Technology. He has established co-operations with many national and international partners (e.g. in Germany, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, UK) which perform interdisciplinary research in Carnuntum. As an author and editor, he was involved in more than 250 national and international scientific publications on Carnuntum and beyond.
Franz Humer is a member of the Society of Friends of Carnuntum, the ICOM Austria, the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Archaeological Prospection and Virtual Archaeology, the German Archaeologists’ Association or the Museum Association Asparn/Zaya.
