Uni Ibadan Alumnus Dr Babalola wins $300,000 Dan David Prize
Olaolu Bilau
Dr Abidemi Babatunde Babalola, a research archaeologist at the British Museum in the United Kingdom and an alumnus of the University of Ibadan, has won the 2025 Dan David Prize.
The Dan David Prize founded in 2001 by entrepreneur and philanthropist Dan David, rewards and supports outstanding interdisciplinary research in historical disciplines and is the world’s largest financial reward for excellence in the historical discipline, with a $300,000 cash prize.
Based at Tel Aviv University, the prize is awarded each year to early and mid-career academics who are conducting “innovative research on the human past”.
Alongside eight other award winners, Dr Babalola received the prize at a ceremony in Italy recently.
Dr Babalola, who is an anthropological archaeologist, is currently the lead archaeologist on the Museum of West African Art (MOWAA) Archaeology Project, in Benin City, Nigeria, within the British Museum’s Department of Africa, Oceania, and the Americas (AOA).
According to the Dan David Prize, “Abidemi’s work focuses on the intersection between the archaeology of pyrotechnologies and the history of science, technology, and invention in pre-modern West Africa.
“His research has transformed the global understanding of the primary production of glass and challenged the Eurocentric notion of a non-inventive Africa. It explores themes of creativity, resilience, specialization, experimentation, survival, political economy, indigenous knowledge systems, science, and techno-identity in pre-colonial West Africa.”
He holds a PhD from Rice University in Houston, Texas, USA, and an MA and BA degrees from the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology at the University of Ibadan.
