I live in Sussex, got into archaeology at a very early age courtesy of my father who was an archaeologist. First went onto a site at 3 months old where I apparently screamed my head off and wasn’t allowed back until I was about nine when I was allowed to help dig out a 18th century cellar full of beer and wine bottles which probably had a lasting influence on my present lifestyle. (health and safety regs were a little less stringent in those days) In a desperate attempt to avoid archaeology I went into catering for six years but was dragged back into digging in 1986 after being made redundant. After three years of digging in and around West Sussex I finally realised that I liked archaeology after all and did a degree at Sheffield University. I’ve spent the last few years working for various units around the country and trying not to get too depressed at the state of contract archaeology in Britain.
I’ve always enjoyed Time Team since it started, but I suppose that like most people who work in the profession I watch it with a critical eye. The best thing about it is that it has given the general public a much clearer picture of the process of archaeology than other programs have done while still managing to emphasise that its not actually how things are done in the profession day to day which is a point that many of its more strident critics tend to miss
My hobbies are, in order of preference… cooking and eating curries, real ale, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Tomb Raider and er…archaeology. My best find on a archaeological dig was a rather grotty mosaic and the most annoying near miss was a complete Roman gladius which was found 10cms underneath where I’d stopped digging the day before. (The words `Oh` and `Bugger` were used a lot`)
Special Interest Areas
Late Iron Age-Late Roman