Over the years, a competence centre for archaeological sciences has been created at the Austrian Academy of Archaeology (OeAI) of the Austrian Academy of Sciences (OeAW) in response to the dynamic developments in archaeology. With the establishment of the new Postsparkasse site (Dominikanerbastei 16) in 2023/2024, the spatial requirements for this were also realised. The staff with their proven expertise in specialist areas are a particular strength and also an international unique selling point. These include lithics and marble research, ceramic/clay/mortar and colour archaeometry, archaeo-geochemistry as well as archaeoichthyology, archaeothanatology and histotaphonomy, archaeobotany and expertise in the field of food archaeology.

Our activities have an impact on many research groups in the three departments, as well as on transfer research, in that we actively contribute to the OeAI's research agenda and are actively involved in project development, collaboration and coordination. We also work closely with the Heritage Sciences unit, particularly in the field of materials analysis.

We act as independent researchers in our respective specialist areas and address cross-laboratory issues. We design independent projects and thus actively contribute to the promotion of young talent by supervising academic work.

Initially founded in 2021 as a purely infrastructural unit, Archaeological Sciences was completely restructured in May 2024 and upgraded to a separate, cross-departmental research unit. To this end, the entire former research groups »Human-Environment Relationship in Historical Societies« were separated from the Department of Historical Archaeology as the Bioarchaeology Lab and »Colours Archaeometry« as the Geochemistry Lab and part of the research group »Objectitineraria« as the Ceramic Lab, while the existing research agendas of the original Archaeometry unit were upgraded to the Lithic Lab.

The structural basis for scientific research is provided by specialised laboratories equipped with state-of-the-art analytical methods, while others are available through cooperation with national and international partners.

Another important element is the collections, which are primarily used for comparative studies. They therefore have more of a research than an archive character. Specifically, reference should be made to the stone collection (lithics) as well as marbles, pigments, animal remains, seeds and ceramics/clay/mortar in the form of raw samples and thin sections.

The Archaeological Sciences of the OeAI are organised by the following laboratories (in alphabetical order):