Garbology
Obviously everyone here’s familiar with ‘The Rock’ and his great work ‘Doom’. You all know the story – a rooky Space Cop gets sent to a distant Martian colony (for crimes he didn’t commit) and finds that a team of hapless scientists have accidentally opened an inter-dimensional portal leading straight to the gates of hell. Some demons escape, people get eaten – it’s all very unsavoury. Read more
Archaeology staff get the Axe
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This work of extraordinary beauty is called the Rathcosgrieve Axehead, and was found by Simon Moylan whilst ploughing a field near Galway in 1980. It’s 24.2 cm long, 9.8 cm wide and 4.6 cm deep. It’s also the most amazing axe I’ve ever seen, and that includes every museum I’ve ever been in. Thanks to Colm O’Doherety, one of our computer trainers, for bringinging it in to the office to show us (it usually lives on his Dad’s mantlepiece!).
In other news, archaeological jobs are being lost by their thousand. But while there’s music, and moonlight, and Neolithic-stone-axes-visually-identified-as-mudstone-with-flattish-oval-cross-sections-and-slightly-asymmetrical-cutting-edges-due-to-some-chipping, and love and romance, lets face the music and dance!
Email posted round the office this morning:
Hello:
During my absence my coffee mug seems to have gone walkies. If anyone has seen or is in possession of a retro print mug with the text “I need more money and power and less shit from you people” on it, please give me a shout.
Thanks
The ragged trousered archaeologist
I once worked with a Project Manager whose stock response to all requests for more resources was uncompromising.
‘People live, people die, get over it,’ he’d grumble in his thick Scottish accent, like a Yorkshire man with all the generosity squeezed out of him. Read more
Conference Papers
Wilkins, B. 2010. Recently reported road deaths on the N6: 3500 BC to 1500 AD. Awards for the Presentation of Heritage Research. British Museum. (Watch here)
Wilkins, B. 2008. The Newford Pyre: fiery debates at the trowels edge. World Archaeology Congress 6. Dublin. (View paper here)
Wilkins, B. 2008. Knowledge, value and the Celtic Tiger. World Archaeology Congress 6. Dublin. (View paper here)
Wilkins, B. 2008. The spatial segregation of children in an early medieval cemetery settlement at Carrowkeel, Co. Galway. Theoretical Archaeology Group, Columbia University, New York. (View paper here) (View slides here)
Wilkins, B. 2008. Known knowns, known unknowns and unknown unknowns: Rumsfeldian Archaeology on the Irish Road Schemes. Archaeology ’08. Current Archaeology Magazine and the Department of Portable Antiquities and Treasure. British Museum, London, UK. (Watch presentation here)
Wilkins, B. 2007. Borderline archaeology: quantity and quality in the commercial sector. Theoretical Archaeology Group. York, UK.
Wilkins, B. 2007. Time and Tide. Awards for the Presentation of Heritage Research. British Association Festival of Science, York, UK. (View abstract here)
Wilkins, B. 2007. Where the rubber hits the road: a critical evaluation of archaeological decision making on highways projects in Ireland. 13th Annual EAA meeting, Zadar, Croatia. (View session abstract here)
Wilkins, B. 2006. Time and Tide: five thousand years of human activity on the banks of the river Suir. New Routes to the Past: NRA Seminar on recent work on Irish Road Schemes. Dublin. (View slides here)
Wilkins, B. 2005. Excavations at Newrath, Co. Kilkenny: Developing a landscape at the waters edge. 11th Annual International WARP conference, Edinburgh. Alluvial and Estuarine Session. (View abstract here)
Wilkins, B. 2005. Deciphering social practice in an estuarine landscape: proposing an interpretive framework for excavations at Newrath, Co. Kilkenny. 11th Annual EAA meeting, Cork, Ireland. (View session abstract here)
Wilkins, B. 2005. Excavations at Newrath, Co. Kilkenny as part of the N25 Waterford Bypass project. NRA/UCD Seminar: Towards Best Practice in Alluvial and Estuarine Archaeology. (View slides here)
Book Sections
Wilkins, B. 2010. Knoweldge, value and the Celtic tiger. In Jameson, J., Aitcheson, K and Eogan, J. (eds.) Archaeologists of the world: globalizing archaeological practice. (forthcoming)
Wilkins, B. 2010. Where the rubber hits the road: a critical analysis of archaeological decision making on highways projects in Ireland. In Harris, O., Jones, C., and Richardson, P., (eds) Fieldwork in an interpretive world: reconsidering the on-site relationship between subject, object, theory and practice. Springer. (forthcoming)
Wilkins, B. 2010. Death. In O’Sullivan (ed.) The Quiet Landscape: Archaeological Investigations on the N6 Galway to Ballinasloe Scheme. Dublin: National Roads Authority (forthcoming)
O’Sullivan, J, Tierney, J. and Wilkins, B. 2009. Two vernacular industrial sites in rural County Galway: a water powered forge or ‘spade mill’ at Coololla and a brick making site at Brusk. In ‘Archaeology of Irish Industry Recent Excavations’ IHAI, 35-43 (View here)
Wilkins, B. 2007. Time and tide: five millennia of environmental change and human activity on the banks of the Suir. In O’Sullivan, J and Stanley, M. (eds.) New Routes to the Past: Archaeology and the National Roads Authority Monograph Series No. 4. Dublin: National Roads Authority. 61-73. (View here)
Peer-review Journals
Wilkins, B. and Lalonde, S. 2008. An early medieval settlement/cemetery at Carrowkeel, Co. Galway. The Journal of Irish Archaeology. Vol XVII, 57-83. (View here)
Non-specialist Publications
Wilkins, B. 2009. Rumsfeldian Archaeology. Current Archaeology. 231: 43. (View here)
Wilkins, B. 2010. Celtic Tiger archaeology: the view from afar. Seanda. (View here)
Wilkins, B. 2010. Excavating Death. Current Archaeology. (View here)
Wilkins, B. 2010. Top Ten Sites of the Celtic Tiger. Current Archaeology. (forthcoming)
