Stuart Piggott

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Stuart Piggott

CBE FBA FSA FSA Scot

Born 28 May 1910

Petersfield, Hampshire

Died 23 September 1996 (aged 86)

Wantage, Oxfordshire
Nati British
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Citiz British

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Peggy Piggott
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(m. 1936; div. 1956)

Scientific career

Field Archaeology

Influ Mortimer Wheeler

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Stuart Ernest Piggott, CBE, FBA, FSA, FRSE FSA Scot (28 May 1910 – 23 September 1996) was a
s
British archaeologist, best known for his work on prehistoric Wessex.

Contents

• 1Early life
• 2Career
• 3Family
• 4Excavations
• 5Honours
• 6Reception and legacy
• 7Publications
• 8References
• 9Sources

Early life[edit]
Piggott was born in Petersfield, Hampshire, the son of G. H. O. Piggott, and was educated there

at Churcher's College.[1]

Career[edit]
On leaving school in 1927 Piggott took up a post as assistant at Reading Museum, where he developed an

expertise in Neolithic pottery.

In 1928 he joined the Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historical Monuments of Wales and spent the

next five years producing a revolutionary study of the site of Butser Hill, near Petersfield. He also worked

with Eliot Cecil Curwen on their excavations at The Trundle causewayed enclosure in Sussex.

In the 1930s he began working for Alexander Keiller, an amateur archaeologist who funded his work from

the profits of his Dundee Marmalade business. The two dug numerous sites in Wessex

including Avebury and Kennet Avenue. In 1933, he joined his friend Grahame Clark in writing the highly

significant paper, "The age of the British flint mines" (Antiquity, 1933): the resultant controversy led to the

foundation of the Prehistoric Society. Still without any formal archaeological qualification, Piggott enrolled

at Mortimer Wheeler's Institute of Archaeology, London, taking his diploma in 1936. It was also here that he

met his wife, Peggy (Margaret Guido). In 1937 he published another seminal paper, "The early Bronze Age

in Wessex", and with his wife went on in June 1939 to join the burial chamber excavations at Sutton Hoo at

the invitation of Charles Phillips.

During the Second World War Piggott worked as an air photo interpreter. He was posted to India, where he

spent time studying the archaeology of the sub-continent, eventually leading him to write the books Some

Ancient Cities of India (1946) and Prehistoric India (1950). These experiences provided him with a valuable

external view of European prehistory, which was to prove useful on his return to Britain.

After the war he went to Oxford to study the work of William Stukeley, but in 1946 was offered

the Abercromby Chair of Archaeology at Edinburgh University (now part of the School of History, Classics
and Archaeology), in succession to Gordon Childe. Piggott succeeded in making Edinburgh an archaeology

department of international standing. He continued to publish widely. His book Neolithic Cultures of the

British Isles (1954) was highly influential, until radiocarbon dating tests exposed flaws in its chronology.

Piggott considered that radiocarbon dating was "archaeologically unacceptable", because every other shred

of evidence pointed towards his dates being correct. Ancient Europe (1965) remained a popular survey of

Old World prehistory for more than twenty years, demonstrating his view of the solidarity and continuity of

the past in Europe. In 1956 his childless marriage ended.

In 1958 Piggott published a survey of Scottish prehistory, Scotland before History, and in 1959 a popular
introductory volume, Approach to Archaeology. He was president of the Prehistoric Society from 1960 to
1963, president of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland from 1963 to 1967, president of the Council for

British Archaeology from 1967 to 1970, and a trustee of the British Museum between 1968 and 1974). In

1963, he produced a thorough analysis of the Beaker culture in Britain, published as part of

a Festschrift dedicated to Cyril Fox. Piggott's interest in the early history of the practice of archaeology led to

him writing The Druids in 1968; other books included Prehistoric Societies (with Grahame Clark), The

Earliest Wheeled Transport (1983), followed by its sequel, Wagon, Chariot and Carriage (1992). His final

book was Ancient Britain and the Antiquarian Imagination (1989).

He died of a heart attack at his home near Wantage in Oxfordshire on 23 September 1996. His remains were

cremated on 30 September at Oxford crematorium.

Family[edit]
On 12 November 1936, he married Celia Margaret Preston, an archaeologist and finds specialist; they had

met while students at the Institute of Archaeology in London. By 1954, their relationship was over, and they

divorced in 1956.[1] She became better known under her second married name, Margaret Guido.

Excavations[edit]
Sites he excavated (often with Richard Atkinson) included Cairnpapple Hill in West Lothian; Wayland's

Smithy in Oxfordshire; and West Kennet Long Barrow and Stonehenge in Wiltshire.

Honours[edit]
In 1957 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Robert

Schlapp, David Whitteridge, Sidney Newman, and James Ritchie.[1]

He received the CBE in 1972, and was awarded numerous academic awards from scholarly institutions in

Britain and abroad. He retired from the Abercromby Chair in 1977 and was awarded the gold medal of

the Society of Antiquaries of London in 1983 and the Grahame Clark Medal of the British Academy in 1992.

Reception and legacy[edit]

Vincent Megaw commented that "as [Piggott] himself has said, although he has done his fair share of field

work and excavation, his prime concern has been to produce works of synthesis and

interpretation".[2] Megaw added that Piggott viewed "archaeology as an oyster to be savoured whole and not

simply to be subjected to the minutiae of macrofaunal and calorific analyses."[2] The historian Ronald

Hutton stated that it was "one aspect of his greatness that he fostered the study of early modern antiquaries as

an integral part of the self-awareness of his profession."[3]

In 1968 a number of Piggott's former pupils and colleagues assembled a collection of essays dedicated to

him, titled Studies in Ancient Europe.[2] In 1976 Megaw published a second Festschrift, which brought in

consideration of Piggott's work on the archaeology of Asia and the Americas.[4]

In the 2021 film The Dig, which told the story of the Sutton Hoo excavations, Piggott was portrayed by Ben

Chaplin, although the film takes some creative license with its presentation of his marriage to his

wife Peggy.[5]

Publications[edit]
Marjorie Robertson compiled a list of Piggott's books up to 1975 for his festschrift.[6]

Year of Co-
Title Publisher
publication author(s)

A. and C. Black
1935 The Progress of Early Man –
(London)

Oxford University
1944 Some Ancient Cities of India –
Press (Bombay)

Oxford University
1948 Fire Among the Ruins
Press (London)

Oxford University
1949 British Prehistory
Press (London)

Penguin
1950 Prehistoric India to 1000 BC
(Harmondsworth)

William Stukeley: An Clarendon Press

1950
Eighteenth Century Antiquary (Oxford)

Cairnpapple Hill, West

1951 HMSO (Edinburgh)
Lothian
 A Picture Book of Ancient Cambridge University
1951 Glyn Daniel
British Art Press (Cambridge)

William Camden and the Oxford University

1953
Britannia Press (London)

The Neolithic Cultures of the Cambridge University

1954
British Isles Press (Cambridge)

Inventaria Archaeologica GB
25-34: Early and Middle Margaret
1958 Bronze Age Grave-Groups Stewart Garraway (London)
and Hoards from (editors)
Scotland (edited volume)

1958 Scotland Before History Nelson (London)

A. and C. Black
1959 Approach to Archaeology
(London)

The Dawn of Thames and Hudson

1961
Civilization (edited volume) (London)

The Prehistoric Peoples of Routledge and Kegan

1962
Scotland (edited volume) Paul (London)

The West Kennet Long

1962 Barrow: Excavations 1955– HMSO (London)
56

West Kennet Long Barrow:

1963 HMSO (London)
Wiltshire

Ancient Europe from the

Edinburgh University
1965 Beginnings of Agriculture to
Press (Edinburgh)
Classical Antiquity: A Survey
 Grahame
1965 Prehistoric Societies Hutchinson (London)
Clark

Celts, Saxons and the Early Edinburgh University

1967
Antiquaries Press (Edinburgh)

Thames and Hudson

1968 The Druids
(London)

Edinburgh University
Press for the Arts
1970 Early Celtic Art Derek Allen
Council of Great
Britain (Edinburgh)

References[edit]

1. ^ Jump up to: a b c Biographical Index of Former Fellows of the Royal Society of

Edinburgh 1783–2002 (PDF). The Royal Society of Edinburgh. July 2006. ISBN 0-
902-198-84-X.

2. ^ Jump up to: a b c Megaw 1976, p. 9.

3. ^ Hutton 2005, p. 382.

4. ^ Megaw 1976, pp. 9–10.

5. ^ "What Netflix 'The Dig' Gets Right And 'Slanderously' Wrong About The Sutton
Hoo Story". Forbes. Retrieved 12 March 2021.

6. ^ Robertson 1976, pp. 320–331.

Sources[edit]

• Bradley, R. (November 1996). "Obituary: Stuart Piggott". British Archaeology. 19. Archived

from the original on 9 February 1999.

• Daniel, Glyn Edmund; Chippindale, Christopher (1989). The Pastmasters: Eleven Modern

Pioneers of Archaeology: V. Gordon Childe, Stuart Piggott, Charles Phillips, Christopher

Hawkes, Seton Lloyd, Robert J. Braidwood, Gordon R. Willey, C.J. Becker, Sigfried J. De

Laet, J. Desmond Clark, D.J. Mulvaney. London: Thames and

Hudson. ISBN 9780500050514.

• Hutton, Ronald (2005). "The Religion of William Stukeley". The Antiquaries Journal. 85:

381–394. doi:10.1017/S000358150007445X. S2CID 162733894.

• Megaw, Vincent (1976). "Editorial Preface". In Megaw, J. V. S. (ed.). To Illustrate the

Monuments: essays on archaeology presented to Stuart Piggott on the occasion of his sixty-

fifth birthday. London: Thames and Hudson. pp. 9–10. ISBN 0500011494.

• Mercer, Roger J. (26 September 1996). "Obituary: Professor Stuart Piggott". The

Independent. Retrieved 17 December 2016.

• Mercer, Roger J. (2004). "Piggott, Stuart Ernest (1910–1996)". Oxford Dictionary of

National Biography (online ed.). Oxford University

Press. doi:10.1093/ref:odnb/63311. (subscription required)

• Robertson, Marjorie (1976). "Bibliography of Stuart Piggott's publications". In Megaw, J. V.

S. (ed.). To Illustrate the Monuments: essays on archaeology presented to Stuart Piggott on

the occasion of his sixty-fifth birthday. London: Thames and Hudson. pp. 320–

331. ISBN 0500011494.

show

Recipients of the Grahame Clark Medal