Richard J. C. Atkinson | |
|---|---|
| Born | (1920-01-22)22 January 1920 Evershot, Dorset |
| Died | 10 October 1994(1994-10-10) (aged 74) |
| Known for | Stonehenge excavations |
| Academic background | |
| Education | Sherborne School |
| Alma mater | Magdalen College, Oxford |
| Academic work | |
| Discipline | Archaeologist |
| Sub-discipline | Prehistory |
| Institutions | University College, Cardiff |
Richard John Copland AtkinsonCBE (22 January 1920 – 10 October 1994) was a Britishprehistorian andarchaeologist.
Atkinson was born inEvershot, Dorset, and went toSherborne School and thenMagdalen College, Oxford, readingPhilosophy, Politics and Economics. During theSecond World War, hisQuaker beliefs meant that he was aconscientious objector. In 1944, he became Assistant Keeper of Archaeology at theAshmolean Museum. In 1949, he was appointed a lecturer at theUniversity of Edinburgh.
Atkinson directed excavations atStonehenge for theMinistry of Works between 1950 and 1964. During this period he helped to bring theories about the origins and construction of Stonehenge to a wider audience: for example, through the BBC television programme,Buried Treasure (1954), which, among other things, sought to demonstrate, using teams of schoolboys, how the stones might have been transported by water or over land. He also produced a theory on the creation of Stonehenge.
He also investigated sites atSilbury Hill,West Kennet Long Barrow, andWayland's Smithy and was a friend and collaborator of Peggy Piggott,Stuart Piggott andJohn F.S. Stone. His Silbury work was part of aBBC documentary seriesChronicle on the monument. In 1958, he moved toUniversity College, Cardiff, to become its first professor of archaeology. He remained at Cardiff until he retired in 1983. He served on theUniversity Grants Committee. He received theCBE in 1979. Atkinson worked tirelessly to promote and develop science-based British archaeology, and was famous for his practical contributions to archaeological technique and his pragmatic solutions to on-site problems, which were listed in the handbook he wrote calledField Archaeology.
English Heritage holds Atkinson's collection of over 2,000 record photographs in the publicEnglish Heritage Archive. A selection of around 200 photographs can be viewed online on the ViewFinder website.[1] The Wessex Gallery of Archaeology, which opened at theSalisbury Museum in summer 2014, displays Bronze Age artefacts discovered by Atkinson in July 1953.
Because of a heavy administrative burden arising from service on many committees throughout his career, including a period as Deputy Principal of University College, Cardiff, Atkinson's written reports of the excavations at Stonehenge were not complete before serious illness, mainly caused by overwork, forced total retirement.
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