Below are notable events in archaeology that occurred in 1949.

• November 21–23 - First Internationales Sachsensymposion held.
• University of New Mexico transfers lands to the National Park Service and expands Chaco Canyon National Monument, with the proviso that the university may continue scientific research.

• February 15 - Gerald Lankester Harding and Roland de Vaux begin excavations at Cave 1 of the Qumran Caves in the West Bank region of Jordan, the location of the first seven Dead Sea Scrolls.
• Excavation work recommences at the Peking Man Site in Zhoukoudian, China.
• Alberto Ruz Lhuillier begins excavations of the Temple of the Inscriptions, Palenque.
• Seton Lloyd begins excavations at Sakçagözü.
• Grahame Clark begins excavations at Star Carr, North Yorkshire (continues to 1951).
• Conclusion of excavations in the Vatican Necropolis.

• Radiocarbon dating technique discovered by Willard Libby and his colleagues during his tenure as a professor at the University of Chicago.
• Anak Tomb No. 3 (dated 357 CE) found in North Korea.
• New excavations at Peking Man Site in Zhoukoudian, China unearth 5 teeth and fragments of thigh and shin bone.
• First new discoveries of Nimrud ivories by British School of Archaeology in Iraq led by Max Mallowan. ^[1]
• 12th century murals discovered in Coombes Church, West Sussex, England.

• ' C. W. Ceram' - Götter, Gräber und Gelehrte ( Gods, Graves and Scholars: the story of archaeology).
• T. D. Kendrick - Late Saxon and Viking Art.

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• Dolores Piperno - American archaeologist ^[2]

• 23 April - Percy Newberry, English archaeologist (b. 1869)