Archaeology Update

White feathered: The archaeologist who refused to dig that year.

One of the results of the credit crunch is that the slump in the construction industry has resulted in layoffs among British archaeologists, who get most of their work these days from watching briefs and rescue excavations in the trail of new buildings. In practical terms that means that the archaeological unemployment rate has skyrocketed from 99.9% to 99.99%.

The truth is, anyone who tries to get a job in archaeology has to have his head examined. Though it's the most fun you can have with your trousers on, it's also the best way to starve or, at best, be trapped indefinitely in a lowly position under those above who regard your every qualification as less of an asset than a threat to their security. That's because during the Great Archaeology Boom of the 1970s, so many would-be Indiana Jones' went into the field that there was an impossible glut for the few paying slots that were available. You could dig if you were willing to roam what was then called The Circuit for sub-subsistence wages, but anything better than that was the stuff of dreams. I recall working for one unit in the '80s where a member of staff died and the day after his obituary hit the papers we were swamped with 3000 applications for his job. If that wasn't enough, there was the famous advice of that time for the best way to get a paying job in archaeology was to wait until 2017 when those with jobs start dying off. And they weren't joking.

That was when things were going good and even then, there were all sorts of closed shops and cliques under what were called the Units that divyed up Great Britain into archaeological fiefdoms never to compete with one another. When the Unit system broke down in the late '80s and the Circuit fell apart it was like the academic version of The Grapes of Wrath as archaeologists scattered far and wide in search of a wage packet.

Small wonder I switched to teaching in the '90s before hanging up my trowel for good in favour of the pen.

I particularly liked the BBC report that included this gem from Mike Pitts, editor of British Archaeology:

No one becomes an archaeologist because they want to get rich.They become archaeologists because they want to be archaeologists.

The first part is true, if hopelessly ungrammatical; the second is absolute bollocks. People become archaeologists because, like Fringe theatre, it's a great excuse to drink huge amounts of beer and get laid–though the latter was often theoretical due to an ongoing lack of female personnel.

But that's another story.