Paula Gardiner
Dr Paula Gardiner
BA, PhD (Bristol)
Research FellowDepartment of Archaeology and Anthropology |
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Research interests include the Mesolithic in Britain and Europe. My field research has been based in south west England and has focused on the evidence for late Mesolithic activity in Somerset at the time of the transition to agriculture around 5500BP. This has resulted in the excavation of three late Mesolithic sites in Somerset: Birdcombe, Wraxall; Totty Pot swallet hole, Cheddar and Hawkcombe Head, Exmoor. The data and radiocarbon dates from these sites has shown that there is a late Mesolithic presence in south west England, with hunter-gatheres lingering into the early Neolithic period. Hunter-gatherers appear to have specific territorial movement between upland and lowland environments. Sites are not always chosen for the availability of raw material and Hawkcombe Head should be considered as a frequently used locale that held particular significance within a functional landscape. Hawkcombe Head has evidence of the earliest human activity on Exmoor. An unpublished Interim Report of the Hawkcombe Head excavation is held at the Department of Archaeology, with the Somerset County Council and the County Museum, Taunton.
The Exmoor Field School:
I am a joint Director with Rob Wilson-North of the Exmoor National Park Authority (ENPA). This Field School is run at Hawkcombe Head, Exmoor and is funded by the Widening Participation Office , University of Bristol, the Department of Archaeology and Anthropology and the ENPA. The Field School gives 'A' Level students from schools and Sixth Form colleges the opportunity for "hands-on" experience in excavation and fieldwork prior to making their UCAS applications. The majority of students who come to Bristol to take archaeology at degree level have not normally had any previous archaeological experience or of an excavation site environment. Students stay at a Youth Hostel and are taken to the site each day. The Field School provides an opportunity for students to socially integrate within a team environment as well as gain an excellent grounding in all aspects of excavation techniques and fieldwork and to be responsible for a major excavation site.
My other research interest is in dendrochronology, having been given a Haury fellowship from the Laboratory of Tree Ring Research at the University of Arizona in Tucson, USA. I have since worked with the Tree Ring Lab on bristlecone pines in California and am collecting data from the submerged forests in the Severn Estuary in an attempt to understand relative sea level changes and environmental reconstruction in the late Mesolithic period.
Publications
Gardiner, P.J. 2000. "Excavations at Birdcombe, Somerset: Mesolithic Settlement, Subsistence and Landscape Use in the South West of England", in R. Young (ed) Mesolithic Lifeways. Current Research from Britain and Ireland. Leicester Archaeology Monographs No.7, University of Leicester, 119-207.
Gardiner, P.J. 2003. "Caught in the act – where is this transition?", in L. Bevan & J. Moore, (eds) Peopling the Mesolithic in a Northern Environment, BAR International Series 1157, 103-112.
Forthcoming
Gardiner, P.J. The Mesolithic-Neolithic Transition in South West England. PhD Thesis BAR Report.
Unpublished
Gardiner, P. 2004, Interim Report: Excavations at Hawkcombe Head, Exmoor Somerset.