Mortimer Wheeler

Brigadier Sir Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler Kt, CH, CIE, MC (September 10, 1890 Glasgow – July 22, 1976), was one of the best-known British archaeologists of the twentieth century.

He was educated at Bradford Grammar School and London University where he won the Augustus Wollaston Franks scholarship for archaeology in 1913. In late autumn 1913 he began to work for the Royal Commission on Historical Monuments (England). In 1920, he became director of the National Museum of Wales, Cardiff, and was later keeper of the London Museum from 1926 to 1944. During his career he carried out many major excavations within Britain, including that of Verulamium St Albans and Stanwick Iron Age Fortifications. The excavation methods he used, for example, the grid system (later developed further by Kathleen Kenyon, and known as the Wheeler-Kenyon method), represented significant advances in archaeological method, but are now not generally appropriate on modern scientific excavations. He was greatly influenced by the work of the archaeologist Lieutenant General Augustus Pitt Rivers (1827–1900).

In 1944, he became director-general of archaeology in India, exploring in detail the remains of the Indus Valley Civilization. On his return in 1948, he was made a professor at the Institute of Archaeology, and became known through his books and appearances on television and radio, helping to bring archaeology to a mass audience. He was knighted in 1952 for his services to archaeology.

Wheeler believed strongly that archaeology needed public support, and he was assiduous in appearing on radio and television to promote it. He hosted three television series that aimed to bring archaeology to the public. These were: 'Animal, Vegetable, Mineral?' (1952–60), 'Buried Treasure' (1954–59), and 'Chronicle' (1966); he was named British 'TV Personality of the Year' in 1954.

Family

In 1914 he married Tessa Verney, their son Michael was born 1915. Tessa died in 1936. In 1946 he married his second wife, Margaret.

Works

• The excavation of Maiden Castle, Dorset : second interim report (1936).
• Archaeology from the earth (1954).
• Five thousand years of Pakistan; an archaeological outline (1950).
• Roman art and architecture (1964).
• Civilizations of the Indus Valley and beyond (1966).

References

ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

• Wheeler, Sir Mortimer Still Digging (Michael Joseph Ltd., 1955)
• Clark, Ronald William Sir Mortimer Wheeler (Roy Publishers, New York, 1960)
• Wheeler, Sir Mortimer The Indus Civilization (Cambridge, 1962)
• American Anthropologist 79.4 (1977)

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