AASP Primary Records Program

ANTIQUITY an international journal of expert archaeology Editorial
Caroline Malone
© Antiquity Publications Ltd 2000
intarch.ac.uk/antiquity/74-286editorial.html

Geoffrey William Dimbleby
1917-2000

Professor G.W. Dimbleby was a pioneer in the study of environmental archaeology. Like many other archaeologists of his and earlier generations, he was trained as a scientist in his case in botany and brought an interdisciplinary approach to bear on his archaeological research. He moved from the Oxford Forestry Department in 1964 to the Chair of Human Environment at the London Institute of Archaeology, where he remained until his retirement in 1979.

No environmental archaeologist will dispute Geoff Dimbleby's scholarly significance, nor doubt that the influence of his work reached well beyond Britain. Nor was it limited to archaeology, being significant too in soil science and forestry. With his death on 8 April 2000 at the age of 82, the scientific community lost a pioneer in the ecological study of human environments, past and present.

Geoffrey Dimbleby's scientific career, and his lifelong concern with environmental questions, stemmed from his love of the countryside. Born in Newcastle-upon-Tyne, educated at Cheltenham Grammar School, he read Botany at Magdalen College, Oxford, before serving in the RAF in the Second World War, there contributing his botanical skills to aerial photographic interpretation. In 1945 he returned to Oxford as Demonstrator, then from 1947 as Lecturer in Forest Ecology. His research on forest soils, first reported in his D.Phil. on 'The ecology of some British podzol formations' (1950), showed that pollen could survive sufficiently well, especially in acid soils, to allow inferences to be drawn about soil develeopment and vegetation history; and he went on to resolve the question of whether British lowland heaths and upland moors had been forested in the past.

In a recent retrospective article (Dimbleby 1998/99), he recalled how this research introduced him to environmental archaeology 'in a dramatic way'. Investigating the soils of the North Yorks Moors, he faced the much debated question of whether the soil there had always been too poor for tree growth. It occurred to him that the prehistoric burial mounds on the moors might have ancient soils preserved beneath them, so 'I cut a section in one from its present surface down to the old land surface beneath'. This revealed a fertile brown soil containing pollen of deciduous trees, very different from the infertile moorland soil of today with its cover of heather and grasses a discovery that proved to be a turning point in Geoff's career. It opened his eyes to the importance of prehistoric human activity in shaping the present landscape and spurred him to examine soils buried beneath other earthworks. A series of papers followed, culminating in the appearance in 1962 of his benchmark monograph on The development of British heathlands and their soils (1962).

This research led to Dimbleby's involvement in what was, and remains, a unique field experiment: the Experimental Earthworks project. It drew together a group of archaeologists, ecologists and other specialists to build two artificial earthworks, one on chalk at Overton Down in Wiltshire and one on sandy podzolic soil at Wareham in Dorset. By burying in them a variety of organic and inorganic materials, and sectioning them at intervals over the next 100 years, it was hoped to obtain data on the movement and degradation of materials within the mounds that would aid interpretation of past human impacts on the landscape. Dimbleby chaired the Experimental Earthworks Committee from its creation in 1959 until 1972, helped design the project, co-edited the first report and, towards the end of his life, was delighted to receive the monograph that reports and synthesizes the results of the first 32 years of the project (see Bell et al. 1996 for references).

While at Oxford, Dimbleby investigated the role of deciduous trees in soil regeneration and gradually refined the technique of soil-pollen analysis. Soil pollen had been avoided by most palynologists, who preferred to work on the better-preserved and more stratigraphically stable pollen found in peat deposits, and it is largely through his perseverance that soil-pollen analysis has come to be more widely accepted by palaeoecologists (Dimbleby 1985). With hindsight, it is easy to regard Dimbleby's move to the Institute of Archaeology in 1964 as a natural progression, but in the context of British archaeology at that time it was a novel step. Pioneering work in environmental archaeology had already been carried out at the Institute by Professor F.E. Zeuner, and it was his death in 1964 that led to the creation of the newly named Chair of Human Environment to which Dimbleby was appointed. Zeuner had approached the subject from a geological and zoological perspective, and with Dimbleby's arrival the role of plants and plant ecology in the human past took centre stage. His textbooks Plants and archaeology (1967) and Ecology and archaeology (1977a) had a wide influence on generations of students. He introduced both theoretical and practical courses into the syllabus of the newly established BSc in Archaeology, ran a summer field course and added two zooarchaeologists (Don Brothwell and Ken Thomas) to the academic staff of the Institute's Department of Human Environment. He also helped to build the future of environmental archaeology by supervising, or less directly assisting, the postgraduate research of such future leaders of the subject as Martin Bell, John G. Evans, Susan Limbrey, Terry O'Connor and Ian Simmons. Dimbleby's base at the Institute brought him into close contact with colleagues in London, especially at University College. In 1968 he teamed up with Peter Ucko (who was then on the staff of the UCL Anthropology Department) to organize a highly successful international conference at the Institute on 'The domestication and exploitation of plants and animals' (Ucko & Dimbleby 1969). There soon followed another, even more ambitious one on 'Man, settlement and urbanism' (Ucko et al. 1972). These volumes are a lasting testament to the value of a broad, multidisciplinary approach to study of the human past, of which Dimbleby's own work in ecology and archaeology is an outstanding example.

While at the Institute, Dimbleby served on several important national committees, notably the Science-based Archaeology Committee of the Science Research Council and the Committee for Rescue Archaeology of the Ancient Monuments Board of England. He was a founding editor in 1974 of the Journal of Archaeological Science and, four years later, strongly supported the inititive taken by his colleague Don Brothwell to form the Association for Environmental Archaeology. Indeed, it would be hard to overestimate Geoff's contribution to the establishment of environmental archaeology in Britain as a sub-discipline in its own right as exemplified by both his inaugural lecture at the Institute (Dimbleby 1966) and his presidential address to the Anthropology and Archaeology Section of the British Association for the Advancement of Science (Dimbleby 1977b). In 1977 his scientific work was fittingly recognized when the University of St Andrews awarded him an Honorary DSc.

Geoff Dimbleby was the very antithesis of the narrowly specialized scientist. Not only did he set his scientific research in a broad interdisciplinary context, he also became actively involved in wider public issues of conservation, world poverty and the handicapped. Inspired by his Christian belief and membership of the Congregational/United Reformed Church, he gave much of his time and energy to helping others. In 1997 he published Testing the foundations, a thoughtful and courageous attempt to 'think through some of the inconsistencies which arise between Christian faith as traditionally presented and the knowledge which I have acquired as an environmental scientist'. It reflects the breadth of vision, open-mindedness and integrity that informed Geoff's academic career and his personal life.

David Harris

References

Bell, M., P.J. Fowler & S.W. Hillson (ed.) 1996. The experimental earthwork project, 1960-1992. York: Council for British Archaeology. CBA Research Report 100.

Dimbleby, G.W. 1962. The development of British heathlands and their soils. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

1966. Environmental studies and archaeology, Bulletin of the Institute of Archaeology, University of London 6: 1-14.

1967. Plants and archaeology. London: John Baker.

1977a. Ecology and archaeology. London: Edward Arnold.

1977b. Training the environmental archaeologist, Bulletin of the Institute of Archaeology, University of London 14: 1-12.

1985. The palynology of archaeological sites. London: Academic Press.

1997. Testing the foundations. St Albans (published by the author).

1998/99. Human environment at the Institute of Archaeology, 1964-1979, Archaeology International. Institute of Archaeology, University College London.

Ucko, P.J. & G.W. Dimbleby (ed.). 1969. The domestication and exploitation of plants and animals. London: Gerald Duckworth.

Ucko, P.J., R. Tringham & G.W. Dimbleby (ed.). 1972. Man, settlement and urbanism. London: Gerald Duckworth.