In this paper I seek to understand antiquarian practices in a colonial context in the Indian sub-continent with reference to J.H. Rivett-Carnac who was a member of the Bengal Civil Service. Covering varied subjects like ‘ancient cup marks on rocks,’ spindle whorls, votive seals or a solitary Buddha figure, Rivett-Carnac’s writings reflect an imagining of a native landscape with wide-ranging connections

This paper challenges the oft-repeated conventional story of the beginning of ‘modern’ Australian archaeology, seen as the era of the professional archaeologist that succeeded an undisciplined phase of indiscriminate collecting of skulls and stone artefacts by ‘amateurs’ who, on the whole, believed that Indigenous Australians had arrived on the continent so recently that any excavation of archaeological

Amedeo Maiuri (1886–1963) is rightly considered one of the greatest Italian archaeologists of the twentieth century and his scientific archaeological work at Herculaneum has been much studied. Yet while Maiuri’s work flourished under the patronage of Mussolini’s fascist regime, the nature of his relationship with the party has received less attention. This paper, based both on archival sources and

Gerald Lankester Harding (1901–1979) was an influential archaeologist and epigrapher whose field career began in 1926, when he set out to work for Flinders Petrie at Tell Jemmeh in British Mandate Palestine. Harding’s experiences on this, his first dig, were captured through his personal diary and photographs, which form part of a larger archive now housed in the UCL Institute of Archaeology Collections

University Departments employing prehistoric archaeologists have a long history in the United States and the United Kingdom, going back to the end of the nineteenth century and the beginning of the twentieth. Developments in prehistoric archaeology in Australia and New Zealand, however, began only in the 1950s, generally within Anthropology or History Departments. The initial appointments of prehistoric

Arthur Posnansky was the illustrious pioneer of Tiwanaku archaeology, remembered as a quixotic, flamboyant, and swashbuckling character. He was a naval officer, a businessman, and a scholar. He dedicated nearly fifty years of his life to the study of the Andean past, which resonates through the history of Bolivian archaeology. While clearly not the field’s father, his commanding presence and outsized

The international and multidisciplinary Keban Dam Rescue Project, which took place between 1966 and 1975 in Eastern Turkey, brought scientists together to document and study the past of a landscape about to be submerged. The archaeological teams at Keban each constituted separate groups united around what they were to do in the field. This article examines the manner in which members of these archaeological

After the Pandora's partly unsuccessful pursuit of the Bounty mutineers through the Pacific islands in 1791, the ship ran aground on a submerged reef and sank 140km east of Cape York, Queensland. Archaeological excavations revealed that the Pandora crew, in addition to their primary objective, made ethnographic material collections during their voyage, including 25 stone adzes and 5 stone pounders

This paper discusses the background to and consequences of a collecting expedition into the Darling River area of western New South Wales, Australia. The expedition was funded by the Museum of Victoria and was undertaken to expand the Museum’s collections from this significant area of Aboriginal occupation that had only recently been supplanted by European settlement. The paper focuses on the practices

From the late 1930s to his death in 2002, Norwegian adventurer and amateur ethnologist Thor Heyerdahl struggled to find academic acceptance for his Pacific Islands settlement theory. He even went as far as using the biblical story of David and Goliath as a metaphor for his struggle against academia. However, there are numerous reasons to question the accuracy of Heyerdahl’s description of his relationship

This paper examines the pivotal role of the Ecole francaise d’Extreme-Oriente in the excavation, delineation, and interpretation of Champa sites in Vietnam. It further suggests the significance of this work in laying the groundwork for further archaeological efforts by the EFEO in Cambodia, Laos, and Northeast Thailand. The paper examines in detail the range of Champa sites, their relation to French

One need only point to the destruction caused to the archaeological sites of Iraq and Syria by Islamic State to see an example of the role heritage plays in the construction of identities, and of a past serving a contemporary agenda. Credit for the ‘discovery’ of the antiquities of Mesopotamia goes to Paul-Emile Botta (1802–1870), and Austen Henry Layard (1817–1894). Most British scholars had long

Histories of archaeology traditionally traced the progress of the modern discipline as the triumph of secular disenchanted science over pre-modern, enchanted, world-views. In this article I complicate and qualify the themes of disenchantment and enchantment in archaeological histories, presenting an analysis of how both contributed to the development of scientific theory and method in the earliest

The paper introduces a recently commenced five-year research project on the history of Pacific archaeology, the Collective Biography of Archaeology in the Pacific (CBAP) Project. The justification for the project, the background to it, its aims and some discussion of its initial stages and anticipated outcomes are given. At time of writing CBAP has been going for barely a year and so only a brief mention

This paper is on international scholarly discussion on the Bronze Age of Russia from 1908 until 1939, and in particular on the related role of the internationally renowned Finnish archaeologist Aarne Michael Tallgren (1885–1945). How did a social network of researchers produce new interpretations and what were the key factors that distinguished the participants in the discussion? Was it a continuous

Margarete Gutschow is not well-known in the history of archaeology, but she should be included among the first women who played a prominent role in the development of the discipline. Gutschow’s life story, found partly within her correspondence, has allowed us to understand the personality and the role of this scholar as part of the German Archaeological Institute in Rome, where she worked for many

This article examines the American tour of the Egyptologist, novelist and travel writer Amelia Edwards in 1889–1890. Edwards’s lecture tour was a critical and largely overlooked event in the evolution of modern archaeology. Edwards rejected the dominant male-centric culture of ‘heroic archaeology’ along with its trophies and myths. She told the story of Egypt with an emphasis on everyday life, including

In 1917 the romantic novelist Jeffery Farnol interviewed an anonymous Major in Ypres who was passionate about archaeology. This interview is reprinted with an introduction in which it is argued that the anonymous Major may very well be Mortimer Wheeler.

Gary Stockton Vescelius (1930–1982) was an extremely active archaeologist who conducted extensive surveys and numerous excavations in North America, the Caribbean, and Peru. Although he was influential while alive, his almost complete failure to publish the results of his work has caused him to fade into obscurity. The interventions that he made at many important sites have been largely forgotten.

Inaugural lectures (ILs) are often overlooked as academic ephemera, but I believe that they can be used as a powerful historiographical tool, locating the public presentation of academic output with its social and institutional setting. My broader research uses them as a lens through which to examine the development and contingencies of British Egyptology, its self-positioning, and its perception and

Why do archaeologists excavate? What should we expect from archaeological archives? OGS Crawford’s discovery and excavation of the course of the Stonehenge Avenue in the summer of 1923 – perhaps the first time that a cropmark was identified on an aerial photograph and the first such site to be excavated, and moreover a discovery that had considerable impact on the understanding of Stonehenge’s construction

This paper examines the permeation of scientific racism in classical archaeology during the 1920s and 1930s. In particular, it investigates the anthropological studies of graves from the Swedish ex ...

This essay deals with an episode in the career of classical archaeologist Rodolfo Lanciani (1845–1929), director of excavations of the Roman Forum from c. 1877 to 1886. Despite his success as a scholar and excavator, the Italian government dismissed him from the archaeological service for improprieties in 1890. The major charges against Lanciani reveal the tensions between the city of Rome and the

Kytherian Valerios Stais is widely recognised for his efforts as a curator of the National Archaeological Museum in Athens and as the first excavator of the temple of Poseidon at Sounio, Attica, Greece. Even though there are two published biographies of Stais, one appearing after his death 1923 and the other in 1992, the rest of his work on the Antikythera mechanism and the prehistory of Thessaly is