Welcome to the TRAC website, home of the annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference, and its affiliated events.

TRAC is a voluntary association that has developed from the annual Theoretical Roman Archaeology Conference series held since 1991. TRAC, organised initially by Eleanor Scott, was held for the first time in the Department of Archaeology at the University of Newcastle on 23–24 March 1991. The first TRAC conference was held to widen the range of perspectives offered, and voices heard in Roman archaeology. TRAC was originally established as a one-off event. The interest that this conference led to it becoming an annual fixture. After the initial meeting in Newcastle, TRAC has been run at many of the major archaeology departments in the UK and has even been organised at institutions in Europe and America. TRAC was joined with RAC (the Roman Archaeology Conference), organised by the Roman Society, at Reading University in 1995.

Our community since its inception has been dedicated to fostering cutting-edge theoretical approaches to Roman archaeology. In 2023, in the aftermath of Covid-19 pandemic, we held our first fully remote conference using GatherTown technology in collaboration with the University of Exeter. 

TRAC has made a major contribution to research in Roman archaeology over the past 30+ years.  We continue to organise annual conferences and workshops in addition to producing publications in the form of a themed series as well as its own open access journal, TRAJ (Theoretical Roman Archaeology Journal). 

In response to the Covid-19 pandemic we developed a TRAC Webinar series, which has been running since 2019. This allows our community members to participate in international networking and for remote engagement across UK, Europe, US, Canada, Asia and African countries. 

Many of our participants in TRAC are early career scholars or postgraduates who use the conference to outline their own original research and attempt to re-define existing models about the Roman past. We aim to provide a supportive community for ECR scholars, providing them with opportunities to network, share their perspectives and work on their research. 

Individual conferences are organised by a Local Organising Committee with the support of the TRAC Standing Committee and a number of sponsoring organisations. Since the mid-1990s, TRAC has been held in alternate years alongside the Roman Archaeology Conference (RAC) organised by the Archaeology Committee of the Society for the Promotion of Roman Studies (The Roman Society).

We look forward to hearing from you and hope you join our activities.