ANNE TEATHER

Executive Director

Anne had an interest in the past from being a young child, but only came into archaeology though starting an undergraduate degree in her late 20s at the University of Southampton. This was followed by studies at Manchester University and Sheffield University where she finished her PhD in 2009. During this time, she was fortunate to supervise on the excavations of the Stonehenge Riverside Project, training students in field techniques from 2004-9.

Fascinated with the Neolithic period and monuments, she has always focussed on British and northern European prehistory and their cultural similarities. She taught at the University of Chester 2007-12, and has worked on a variety of projects since, from excavation through to museum exhibition development. She supervised at The Ness of Brodgar, Orkney (2015-7) and assists in The Stones of Stonehenge Project, which is investigating the Welsh origins of Stonehenge; and volunteers on the Between the Monuments Project, which seeks to establish the character of human settlement in the Avebury landscape during the Neolithic and Early Bronze Age. With a passion for archives and artefacts, she continues to research material culture of later prehistory (with specialisms in chalk artefacts and art).

The monuments of West Dorset are amongst the most important and underexplored resource of later British prehistory and Past Participate are delighted to be leading their community archaeology in such a rich archaeological landscape.

MOST FUN I'VE HAD IN A FIELD

Excavating the floors of Neolithic houses at the village of Durrington Walls, Wiltshire.

HARDEST PROJECT TO DATE

Supervising on the Stonehenge Riverside Project in 2008, when our campsite was under more mud than Glastonbury!

FAVOURITE ARCHAEOLOGICAL LANDSCAPE

Avebury. Not only is the site itself stupendous, but the area around it is just stuffed with monuments. https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/avebury/features/avebury-stone-circles-and-henge

MOST IMPORTANT DISCOVERY

knee holes in the earthen floor by the hearth, in a house at Durrington Walls.

MOST DIFFICULT ARCHAEOLOGY ENCOUNTERED

The Ness of Brodgar. I was excavating a trench down the side of the site where the deposits at one end of the trench were later than those at the other end of the trench. It was hard to try to tease out where and how these boundaries manifested archaeologically (there were at least 5).

BEST ARTEFACTS DISCOVERED

Can’t tell you yet, haven’t published it!

OLDEST ARTEFACT DISCOVERED

I re-found this in archives - early chalk art from Cissbury flint mine at the Ashmolean Museum. https://antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/teather347

MOST IMPORTANT THING I HAVE LEARNT IN ARCHAEOLOGY

The difference between water resistant and waterproof.

MOTTO

“Archaeology is a skill, you can learn it.”

ASPIRATIONS FOR PAST PARTICIPATE

I want us to continue to provide stimulating ways for people of all ages and abilities to access an understanding of the past.

Links to interesting and accessible websites, reports, and videos about projects that Anne has been involved with

The Ness of Brodgar

https://www.nessofbrodgar.co.uk/

A video lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KMiSYUVp8I8&t=1s&ab_channel=SocietyofAntiquariesofScotland

Stonehenge Riverside Project and The Stones of Stonehenge Project

https://www.archaeology.co.uk/articles/news/bluestonehenge.htm

http://www.bbc.com/travel/story/20170713-why-stonehenge-was-built

A short summary video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RvScpdMhQNk&ab_channel=UCL

And a longer video lecture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ2lR5_N0vc&ab_channel=CouncilforBritishArchaeology

Selected publications written or co-authored by Anne

Selected publications written or co-authored by me

Magazine articles and free content

Teather, A., Chamberlain, A. and Parker Pearson, M. 2019. Getting the Measure of Stonehenge. British Archaeology 165:48-51.

Teather, A. 2015. The first British Neolithic representational art? The chalk engravings at Cissbury flint mine. Antiquity Project Gallery http://www.antiquity.ac.uk/projgall/teather347

Kenny, J. and Teather, A. 2016. New insights into the Neolithic chalk drums from Folkton (North Yorkshire) and Lavant (West Sussex), PAST 83:55-6.

http://www.prehistoricsociety.org/publications/publication/past_83_june_2016/

Books

Gebauer, A., Sørensen. L., Teather, A. and Valera, A. (eds). 2020. Monumentalizing life in Neolithic Europe: Narratives of change and continuity. Oxford: Oxbow.

Teather, A., Topping, P. and Baczkowski J. (eds) 2019. Mining and Quarrying in Neolithic Europe. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Series 16, Oxford: Oxbow.

Teather, A. 2016. Mining and materiality: Neolithic chalk artefacts and their depositional contexts in southern Britain. Oxford: Archaeopress

Papers

On Artefacts

Teather, A., Chamberlain, A.T. and Parker Pearson, M. 2019. The Chalk Drums from Folkton and Lavant: Measuring Devices from the Time of Stonehenge. Journal of the British Society for the History of Mathematics. 34:1:1-11 https://doi.org/10.1080/17498430.2018.1555927

Teather, A. 2017. More than 'Other Stone' - new methods to analyse prehistoric chalk artefacts. In Shaffrey, R. (ed.) Written in Stone: Function, form, and provenancing of a range of Prehistoric Stone Objects. Southampton: Highfield Press: 303-321.

Teather, A. and Chamberlain, A.T. 2016. Dying embers: fire-lighting technology and mortuary practice in early Bronze Age Britain. The Archaeological Journal 173:2:188-205. DOI: 10.1080/00665983.2016.1177258

On Prehistory and Theory

Frieman, C., Teather, A. and Morgan, C. 2019. Bodies in motion: Narratives and counter narratives about gendered mobility in European later prehistory. Norwegian Archaeological Review https://doi.org/10.1080/00293652.2019.1697355

Teather, A. 2018. Revealing a Prehistoric Past: Evidence for the Deliberate Construction of a Historic Narrative in the British Neolithic, Journal of Social Archaeology 18:2:193-211. https://doi.org/10.1177/1469605318765517

Teather, A. 2016. Building new Neolithic connections through artefacts: the archaeological collections of John Pull and James Park Harrison. World Archaeology 48:2:296-310. DOI: 10.1080/00438243.2016.1207559

Teather, A. 2007. Neolithic Phallacies: a discussion of some southern British artefacts, in M. Larsson and M. Parker Pearson (ed.) From Stonehenge to the Baltic: Living with cultural diversity in the third millennium BC. Oxford: Archaeopress: 205-11. Available through ResearchGate

On Neolithic Flint Mines

Edinborough, K., Shennan, S., Teather, A., Baczkowski, J., Bevan, A., Bradley, R., Cook, G. Kerig, T., Parker Pearson, M., Pope, A., Schauer, P. 2019. New radiocarbon dates show Early Neolithic date of flint-mining and stone quarrying in Britain. Radiocarbon 61, 1-31.

Teather, A. 2019. Radiocarbon dating on flint mining shaft deposits at Blackpatch, Cissbury and Church Hill, Sussex. In Teather, A., Topping, P. and Baczkowski, J. (eds). Mining and Quarrying in Neolithic Europe. Neolithic Studies Group Seminar Series. Oxford: Oxbow: 37-48.

Teather, A. 2011. Interpreting hidden chalk art in southern British Neolithic flint mines. World Archaeology 43:2:230-251. DOI:10.1080/00438243.2011.579496