Miriam Astruc

Miriam Astruc, also spelled Myriam Astruc, (born 12 November 1904 – 8 April 1963) was a French archaeologist who specialized in the study of the Phoenician and Punic presence in Spain.

Biography Miriam Astruc was born in Bordeaux, France, into a Jewish banking family. From 1927 to 1932, Astruc studied Oriental Archaeology and Semitic epigraphy in Paris at the École du Louvre under René Dussaud.

Career She went to Spain for the first time as a student at the École des hautes études hispaniques et ibérique with a scholarship from the French government. During the academic years 1931–32, 1932–33 and 1933–34 she worked as an assistant at the School of Advanced Hispanic Studies in Madrid, Spain (Casa de Velázquez) and began her research on the Punians with Luis Siret in the necropolis of Villaricos in the province of Almería. In 1932, together with Pelayo Quintero, she took part in excavations near the Cerro de los Mártires near San Fernando in the province of Cádiz. In 1935 she was appointed head of excavations in Jijel, Algeria by the Algerian Antiquities Administration and discovered around twenty new tombs. She then continued her scientific training in London, Brussels and Amsterdam.

Some of their records and material on Punic scarabs were evaluated by the British archaeologist John Boardman in 1984 for his publication Escarabeos de piedra procedentes de Ibiza.

Selected publications New Excavations in Djidjalli (Algeria). Soc. historical Algerian, Algier 1937 (French). The necropolis of Villaricos Ministry of National Education, Madrid 1951 (French). Funerary traditions of Carthage. Lavigerie Museum, Carthage 1956 (French). Memories of Siret Ferdinand the Catholic Institution, Zaragoza 1956 (Spanish). Exoticism and localism: A study of decorated ostrich eggshells from Ibiza. Prehistoric Research Service, Valencia 1957 (French).