Anna Marguerite McCann facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Anna Marguerite McCann
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At Populonia (Tuscany, Italy) in 1974
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| Born | May 11, 1933 |
| Died | February 12, 2017 (aged 83) |
| Nationality | American |
| Occupation | Underwater archaeologist, art historian |
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Anna Marguerite McCann (born May 11, 1933 – died February 12, 2017) was an American art historian and archaeologist. She is famous for being a pioneer in underwater archaeology. She was also the first American woman to work in this exciting field, starting in the 1960s.
McCann wrote many books about Roman art and Classical archaeology. She also taught art history and archaeology at different universities in the United States. She was an important member of the Archaeological Institute of America. In 1998, she received their highest honor, the Gold Medal Award. She sometimes published her work under the name Anna McCann Taggart.
Becoming an Archaeologist
Anna McCann went to the Rye Country Day School in New York. In 1954, she earned a degree in art history from Wellesley College. She also studied ancient Greek.
She then received a special award called a Fulbright Scholarship. This allowed her to study in Athens, Greece, for a year. After that, she went to New York University. In 1957, she earned her Master's degree. Her main project was about Greek statues in Roman art. This started her interest in Roman sculpture and Classical archaeology.
In 1965, McCann earned her Ph.D. from Indiana University. She studied both art history and classics. She also spent time in Rome, Italy, as a Rome Prize Fellow. There, she continued her studies in ancient history and archaeology.
Exploring Under the Sea
Anna McCann started scuba diving in the early 1960s. She even explored ancient Roman shipwrecks with the famous diver Jacques Cousteau near France. At that time, underwater archaeology was a very new field. It was mostly done by men.
Between 1961 and 1962, she helped dig up a 7th-century shipwreck. This was the Yassi Ada shipwreck near Turkey. She worked with the National Geographic Society. While in Rome, she turned her Master's project into a book. It was about the portraits of a Roman emperor named Septimius Severus. Her colleagues said it was still the most important book on his portraits in 2017.
After her time in Rome, McCann taught at the University of Missouri. She also taught at the University of California, Berkeley.
She was very active in a group that studied Roman pottery. She became interested in pottery from her underwater digs. In 1974, McCann joined the Metropolitan Museum of Art. She led a program about archaeology there. She published her research on Roman sculptures in a book. This book won an award for being an outstanding art book.
McCann also led excavations at Cosa in Italy from 1965 to 1987. This was an ancient Roman port. Her work there led to another award-winning book in 1987. It was called The Roman Port and Fishery of Cosa: A Center of Ancient Trade.
In 1985, McCann started a special committee for underwater archaeology. It was part of the Archaeological Institute of America. In 1989, she became the archaeology director for the JASON Project. She worked with oceanographer Robert Ballard. They explored many shipwrecks in the Strait of Sicily. This project helped inspire students. Their work led to a book in 1994. It was one of the first books to describe archaeology in very deep waters. McCann and Ballard found even more shipwrecks when they went back in 1997.
In 1998, Anna McCann received the Gold Medal Award. This is a very high honor in archaeology. She taught at Boston University from 1997 to 2001. She was also a visiting scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
Sharing Her Discoveries
Anna McCann married Robert Dorsett Taggart in 1973. They lived in New York City. They also spent time at their farm in Vermont. In 1985, McCann and Taggart started a special fund for lectures in underwater archaeology.
McCann loved to share her research with many people. She even helped write a children's book. She also wrote a guide about her research. She wanted everyone to learn about archaeology.
Selected works
