Timothy Darvill

Timothy Darvill is an English archaeologist and author, best known for his publications on prehistoric Britain and his excavations in England, Wales, and the Isle of Man. He is Professor of Archaeology in the School of Applied Sciences at Bournemouth University in England. Timothy Darvill is recognized as one of the leading authorities on Stonehenge and the British Neolithic. In April 2008 he co-directed excavations within Stonehenge, together with Professor Geoffrey Wainwright, to examine the early stone structures on the site. The work featured heavily in a BBC Timewatch programme which examined the theory that Stonehenge was a prehistoric centre of healing. He was appointed OBE in the 2010 Queen’s Birthday Honours.

Career

Darvill is Professor of Archaeology in the School of Applied Sciences at Bournemouth University. After completing a PhD at Southampton University on the Neolithic of Wales and the west of England, he worked for the Western Archaeological Trust and the Council for British Archaeology before establishing a private practice offering consultancy services in the field of archaeological resource management. He was appointed to the Chair of Archaeology in the newly-established archaeology group at Bournemouth Polytechnic (now Bournemouth University) in October 1991 and between 2007 and 2010 was Director of the Centre for Archaeology, Anthropology and Heritage. The author of over twenty books and more than 200 papers and articles, he has served as Chairman of the Institute of Field Archaeologists, Vice-President of the Society of Antiquaries of London, and was a Member of the Council of the National Trust. He is currently chairman of the board of directors of Cotswold Archaeology and a Vice-President of the Royal Archaeological Institute. His current research interests focus on archaeological resource management and the Neolithic of northwest Europe.

Personal life

Darvill was born and raised in the Cotswolds and has continued to contribute to the local archaeology scene including being chairman of Cotswold Archaeology. He is a keen guitarist and plays lead guitar in a band consisting of himself and several other archaeologists.

Select bibliography

• New Approaches to our Past: an archaeological forum (edited with M. Parker Pearson, R. Smith and R. Thomas. Southampton University Archaeological Society, 1978)
• Megalithic Chambered Tombs of the Cotswold Severn Region (Vorda, 1982)
• Prehistoric Gloucestershire (Alan Sutton, 1987)
• Ancient Monuments in the Countryside (English Heritage, 1987)
• Prehistoric Britain (Batsford, 1987; Yale University Press 1987; Routledge 1996)
• Cirencester: town and landscape (with Christopher Gerrard. Cotswold Archaeological Trust, 1994)
• Planning for the Past: an assessment of archaeological assessments 1982-91 (with Stephen Burrow and Deborah-Anne Wildgust. English Heritage, 1995)
• Prehistoric Britain from the Air (Cambridge University Press, 1996)
• Neolithic Houses in Northwest Europe and Beyond (edited with Julian Thomas. Oxbow Books, 1996)
• Making English Landscapes (edited with Katherine Barker. Oxbow Books, 1997)
• MARS: The Monuments at Risk Survey of England 1995 (with Andrew Fulton. Bournemouth University and English Heritage 1998)
• The Cerne Giant: an antiquity on trial (with Katherine Barker, Barbara Bender, and Ronald Hutton. Oxbow Books, 1999)
• Prehistory: a teacher’s guide (with Mike Corbishley and Peter Stone. English Heritage, 2000)
• Anglo-Russian Archaeology Seminar: recording systems for archaeological projects (edited with Gennadii Afanas’ev and Eileen Wilkes. Bournemouth University and the Institute of Archaeology, Russian Academy of Sciences, Moscow, 2000) ISBN 1858991048
• One Land, Many Landscapes (edited with Martin Gojda. British Archaeological Reports International Series, 2001)
• Neolithic Enclosures in Atlantic Northwest Europe (edited with Julian Thomas. Oxbow Books, 2001)

The archaeology of the Uplands (CBA and Royal Commission on the Historic Monuments of England, 1986)

• Concise Oxford Dictionary of Archaeology (Oxford University Press, 2002)
  • --do.-- Second edition. 2008

Oxford Guide to Archaeological Sites in England (with Paul Stamper and Jane Timby. Oxford University Press, 2002)

• Megaliths from Antiquity (Antiquity Papers 3. Edited with Caroline Malone. Antiquity Publications, Cambridge, 2003)

The Long Barrows of the Cotswolds and Surrounding Areas (Tempus, 2004)

• Heritage of Value: archaeology of renoun (edited with Clay Mathers and Barbara Little. University Press of Florida, 2005)
• Stonehenge World Heritage Site: an archaeological research framework (English Heritage and Bournemouth University, 2005)
• Stonehenge: the biography of a landscape (Tempus, 2006) [1]
• Prehistoric Britain (Routledge, 2010) [2]

Links

Recent interviews and reports on current research projects include: Paul Devereaux on the meaning of Preseli bluestones [3]

Mike Pitts in British Archaeology big dig at Stonehenge [4]

Andrew Selkirk in Current Archaeology on work at Stonehenge in spring 2008 [5]

Chris Catling in the Society of Antiquaries’ newsletter Salon [6]

Darvill’s theories on the use of Stonehenge as a healing site and his excavations there with professor Geoffey Wainwright have attracted a lot of attention in the press, including Simon Jenkins in the Guardian in September 2008 [7] and earlier in December 2006 [8]; Richard Alleyne and Jon Swaine in the Daily Telegraph [9]; and Simon de Bruxelles in The Times [10]

Download Darvill’s lecture entitled ‘Merlin’s Magic Circles: Stonehenge and the Bluestones’ that was delivered in Otago University, Dunedin, New Zealand, on 23 May 2008 from iUniversity [11]. There is further information on the BBC-funded excavations at Stonehenge by Darvill and Wainwright and the Timewatch website includes clips [12]