1961 in archaeology

	… 1951; 1952; 1953; 1954; 1955; 1956; 1957; ; 1958; 1959; 1960; 1961; 1962; 1963; 1964; ; 1965; 1966; 1967; 1968; 1969; 1970; 1971 …;
	In science 1958 1959 1960 1961 1962 1963 1964
	Art; Archaeology; Architecture; Literature; Music; Philosophy; Science +...;

The year 1961 in archaeology involved some significant events.

Explorations[]

April 24 - Swedish warship Vasa, sunk on her maiden voyage in 1628, is recovered from Stockholm harbor.
November - Start of one-year excavation of Malik by Iranian archaeologists.
First excavations at Anshan in Iran by Fereidoon Tavallali.
Helge Ingstad and Anne Stine Ingstad begin excavation of Viking artifacts at L'Anse aux Meadows in Newfoundland, first archaeologically confirmed evidence of Pre-Columbian trans-oceanic contact.
INAH project dredges artifacts from the Sacred Cenote at Chichen Itza.
Start of excavations at Çatalhöyük by James Mellaart.
First underwater archaeology at Alexandria carried out by Kamal Abu el-Saadat.
Re-excavation of the causewayed enclosure at Knap Hill in Wiltshire, England, by Graham Connah.^[1]

January 5 - Italian sculptor Alfredo Fioravanti signs a confession in the United States consulate in Rome stating that he was part of the team that forged the Etruscan terracotta warriors in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Chemical tests performed in 1960 had already proven that the statues were forgeries.^[4]

^ Connah, Graham; Smith, I. F. (1965). "Excavations at Knap Hill, Alton Priors". Wiltshire Archaeological and Natural History Magazine. 60: 1–23.
^ Egypt of the Pharaohs: an introduction. 1961. OCLC 300350.
^ "Taj Mahal Sunken Treasure 1702". Cannon Beach Treasure Co. Retrieved 2022-01-01.
^ "The history of fraud". www.theguardian.com. Retrieved 4 June 2017.