Birgitta Linderoth Wallace (born 1944) is a Swedish–Canadian

archaeologist Archaeology or archeology is the scientific study of human activity through the recovery and analysis of material culture. The archaeological record consists of artifacts, architecture, biofacts or ecofacts, sites, and cultural landscap ...

specialising in Norse archaeology in North America. She spent most of her career as an archaeologist with

Parks Canada Parks Canada (PC; french: Parcs Canada),Parks Canada is the applied title under the Federal Identity Program; the legal title is Parks Canada Agency (). is the agency of the Government of Canada which manages the country's 48 National Parks, th ...

and is best known for her work on

L'Anse aux Meadows L'Anse aux Meadows ( lit. Meadows Cove) is an archaeological site, first excavated in the 1960s, of a Norse settlement dating to approximately 1,000 years ago. The site is located on the northernmost tip of the island of Newfoundland in the Ca ...

, currently the only widely accepted Norse site in North America. She received a Smith-Wintemberg Award from the

Canadian Archaeological Association The Canadian Archeological Association (CAA) is the primary archaeological organization in Canada. The CAA was founded in 1968 by a group of archaeologists that included William E. Taylor, the head of the Archaeology Division at the National Museum ...

in 2015.

Education and career

Wallace was born in Sweden to Swedish and Danish parents. She studied at

Uppsala University Uppsala University ( sv, Uppsala universitet) is a public university, public research university in Uppsala, Sweden. Founded in 1477, it is the List of universities in Sweden, oldest university in Sweden and the Nordic countries still in opera ...

and trained on archaeological sites in Sweden and Norway. After receiving her master's degree, she spent some time as a curator at the

Carnegie Museum of Natural History The Carnegie Museum of Natural History (abbreviated as CMNH) is a natural history museum in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was founded by Pittsburgh-based industrialist Andrew Carnegie in 1896. Housing some 22 millio ...

Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Wester ...

. In 1975, she moved to Canada to take a position as an archaeologist with

, where she remained until her retirement. The focus of Wallace's career has been Norse archaeology in North America, which she began working on at the Carnegie Museum. However, she has also worked on Native American,

Aboriginal Canadian In Canada, Indigenous groups comprise the First Nations, Inuit and Métis. Although ''Indian'' is a term still commonly used in legal documents, the descriptors ''Indian'' and '' Eskimo'' have fallen into disuse in Canada, and most consider the ...

, and early

French Canadian French Canadians (referred to as Canadiens mainly before the twentieth century; french: Canadiens français, ; feminine form: , ), or Franco-Canadians (french: Franco-Canadiens), refers to either an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to Fren ...

sites in North America, as well as in Scandinavia and Israel.

Selected publications

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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Wallace, Birgitta Linderoth 1944 births Living people Swedish archaeologists Canadian archaeologists Swedish women archaeologists Canadian women archaeologists Uppsala University alumni 20th-century archaeologists 21st-century archaeologists 21st-century Swedish women writers 20th-century Swedish women writers 20th-century Canadian women writers 21st-century Canadian women writers