Charles R. Ewen, THCAS Distinguished Professor
Office: 267 Flanagan Building
Telephone: 252-328-9454
E-mail: ewenc@ecu.edu
About Me
I received my PhD at the University of Florida in 1987 (Go Gators) and immediately went to work for the Bureau of Archaeological Research in Tallahassee. After excavating Hernando de Soto’s winter encampment, I moved to Arkansas to run contracts for the Arkansas Archeological Survey for the next several years. I joined the faculty at ECU in 1994 and am currently the Harriot College Distinguished Professor of Anthropology as well as Director of the Phelps Archaeology Laboratory.
My research interests focus mostly on historical archaeology (specifically the contact and colonial periods). While at ECU I have focused my research on the archaeology of piracy, the Lost Colony and mortuary studies. While at ECU, I have directed several projects at Tryon Palace Historic Sites & Gardens in New Bern, Ft. Macon State Park, Hope Plantation, Somerset Place, several African American cemeteries, and long-term archaeological studies of Historic Bath and Brunswick Town.
For the past three decades at East Carolina I have enjoyed the opportunity to teach at both the undergraduate and graduate level. Teaching is something I enjoy and I believe that it enables rather than hinders scholarly research. In fact, my research agenda for the historical archaeology of the North Carolina coastal plain would be seriously hampered without the assistance of graduate and undergraduate students by their participation in field schools and thesis research.
I am a past president of the Society for Historical Archaeology, and continue to work with students and the profession. The ethical issues that we are grappling with concerning repatriation and how archaeology is portrayed in the popular media have provided great material for lectures for my classes.
I live happily in an empty nest near the university with my wife. Our two daughters have flown on to good careers that have nothing to do with archaeology!
Selected Publications
Books
Ewen, C.R. & Shields, E.T. (2024). Becoming the Lost Colony: The History Lore and Popular Culture of the Roanoke Mystery. Jefferson, NC: McFarland Press.
Skowronek, R.K. & Ewen, C.R. (2023) Dead Man’s Chest: Exploring the Archaeology of Piracy. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida
Ewen, C.R. & Skowronek, R.K. (2016) Pieces of Eight: More Archaeology of Piracy. Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida.
Ewen, C. R. (2008). 25 Years and Counting: Archaeological Research in the North Carolina Coastal Plain.
Skowronek, R. K. & Ewen, C. R. (2006). X Marks the Spot: The Archaeology of Piracy. , Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida.
Shields, E. T. & Ewen, C. R. (2004). Searching for the Roanoke Colonies: An Interdisciplinary Collection., Raleigh: North Carolina Office of Archives and History.
Ewen, C. R. (2003). Artifacts, Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.
Ewen, C. R. & Hann, J. H. (1998). Hernando de Soto Among the Apalachee: The Archaeology of the First Winter Encampment, Gainesville, FL: University Press of Florida.
Ewen, C. (1993). From Spaniard to Creole, Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press.
Book Chapters
Ewen, C. R. (2007). “A Pirate’s Life for Me! But What Did That Really Mean?,” In Julie M. Schablitsky (Ed.) Box Office Archaeology, (pp. 51-69). Walnut Creek, CA: Left Coast Press.
Ewen, C. (2001). “Historical Archaeology in the Colonial Spanish Caribbean.,” In Paul Farnsworth (Ed.) Island Lives: Historical Archaeologies of the Caribbean, (pp. 3-20). Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press.
Articles
Bailey, E. & C.R. Ewen (2021) A Community Activist, a Cultural Anthropologist, and an Archaeologist Walk into a Cemetery: Re-establishing Community Pride After a Jim Crow Atrocity, Journal of African Diaspora Archaeology & Heritage, 9 (3), 239-254.
Ewen, C.R. & Farrell, E. (2019) “All That Glitters”: A Reassessment of a “Lost Colony” artifact North Carolina Historical Review, XCVI (4), 408-425.
Ewen, C.R. (2016) The Role of GPR in Archaeology: A Beginning Not an End, North Carolina Archaeology 65, 92-99.
Wilde-Ramsing, M. & Ewen, C.R. Beyond Reasonable Doubt: A Case for Queen Anne’s Revenge, Historical Archaeology 46 (2), 110-133
Ewen, C. R. (2007). Tying Up Loose Ends: Visions and Revisions of Stanley South’s Archaeology. Reviews in Anthropology, 35 (3), 281-295.
Ewen, C. & Samford, P. (2003). The Sauthier Maps and the Formal Gardens at Tryon Palace: Myth or Reality? The North Carolina Historical Review, 79 (3), 327-346.
Ewen, C. (2001). From Colonist to Creole: Archaeological Patterns of Spanish Colonization in the New World. Historical Archaeology, 34(3), 36-45.