archaeologist
Americannoun
-
archaeologists
plural
Other Word Forms
Noun Inflected Forms
Etymology
Origin of archaeologist
Explanation
An archaeologist is a scientist who studies human history by digging up human remains and artifacts. Lucy, the oldest human known to man — nearly 3.2 million years old — was dug up in Ethiopia by archaeologist. We know about the history of the human species thanks to archaeologists who spend countless hours sifting through dirt and digging through ruins to find evidence of human life from across time. The word archaeologist can also be spelled archeologist. It comes from the Greek root archaeo-, for "ancient, primitive."
Vocabulary lists containing archaeologist
Play by the Rules: Arch
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Occupations
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The Origins of Civilization, Lessons 1–2
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
Angus Wainwright, regional archaeologist for the National Trust's East of England region, said the structure had always intrigued him.
From BBC ● Sep. 22, 2026
Sudan is hardly the first war-ravaged Middle Eastern nation to have its heritage stolen and sold, said Amr Al-Azm, a Syrian archaeologist and co-director of the Antiquities Trafficking and Heritage Anthropology Research Project.
From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 8, 2026
"The discoveries from the excavations, especially coins bearing Homer's likeness, show us that the inhabitants of ancient Smyrna considered the poet to be one of their own," archaeologist Mehmet Akif Erdem said.
From Barron's ● Aug. 17, 2026
In his new book, First Dogs: Hunter-Gatherers and their Canine Companions from Prehistory to the Present, archaeologist Professor Peter Mitchell explores dog domestication as a complicated and gradual process.
From Science Daily ● Aug. 10, 2026
Then, as fortune would have it, in May 1902 a museum worker brought it to the attention of archaeologist Valerios Stais, a nephew of Spyridon Stais.
From "Shipwrecked!" by Martin W. Sandler
For decades, archaeologists have disagreed about what happened to the people living near the eruption.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 18, 2026
During an excavation last month, archaeologists and volunteers uncovered an 18th Century culvert that appeared to have been partly made using stone from the torn down monastery.
From BBC ● Oct. 11, 2026
What archaeologists once regarded primarily as prehistoric glue may also have been a useful substance for protecting wounds, offering another intriguing possibility about the origins of human medical knowledge.
From Science Daily ● Oct. 11, 2026
Excavation by archaeologists further revealed an ancient stone cairn.
From BBC ● Oct. 7, 2026
Despite the nineteenth-century fascination with the mounds, archaeologists did not begin to examine Cahokia thoroughly until the 1960s.
From "1491" by Charles C. Mann
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Get a wordDefinitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
