Digging up the past

Dr Chen Shen is the Bishop White Curator of Far Eastern Archaeology at the Royal Ontario Museum (ROM).

When he was young, he accompanied his geologist father on field trips and developed an interest in field-work. He studied archaeology at Wuhan University in 1982.

After graduating, he realized he needed to learn contemporary scientific techniques to analyze ancient relics. As a result, he decided to study with one of the leading authorities on use-wear analysis at the University of Tulsa. There he studied the scratches and polishes on stone tools and learned to tell the roles of the tools in ancient economic and social development from the wear patterns.