Festival of Archaeology 2025 Talks ~ Saturday 26 July

Saturday 26 July

10.30 – 11.30

David Dawson, Director, The Wiltshire Museum.

‘Gold from the time of Stonehenge’

David has been the director of the award winning Wiltshire Museum in Devizes since 2008. He is an archaeologist who has worked in museums in Sussex, Canterbury and Oxfordshire, as well as in cultural policy at a national level.

Wiltshire Museum contains many fascinating finds from the area, including the Bush Barrow Burial, close to Stonehenge, which is Britain’s richest Bronze Age burial, dated around 1950 BC. A ‘stout and tall man’ was buried with objects that symbolised his power and authority in life. On his chest was a gold lozenge that fastened his cloak and would have glinted in the sun.

Saturday 26 July

12.00 – 13.00

Phil Harding in conversation with Richard Osgood.

Two archaeologists with faces familiar on TV and media through their much varied archaeological work, Richard Osgood, Senior Archaeologist Defence Infrastructure Organisation is in conversation with Wessex Archaeology’s Phil Harding. This combination is sure to provide a fascinating, and entertaining event.

Saturday 26 July

13.30 – 14.30

English Heritage Sue Martindale with English Heritage Stonehenge Volunteers

‘From String to Stonehenge’

Sue and team bring their first-hand knowledge of Stonehenge technology to the festival. This is an opportunity to find out in a hands-on way how Neolithic people made string, thereby creating a key tool which influenced not only the aesthetic of the age, but then made massive construction possible.  Don’t miss this one to take home your own replica Neolithic chord.

Saturday 26 July

15.00 – 16.00

Richard Osgood,

‘Operation Nightingale in 5 Objects’

As Senior Archaeologist Defence Infrastructure Organisation, Richard has been working on this incredible project since 2011. An initiative to assist the recovery of wounded, injured and sick military personnel and veterans by getting them involved in archaeological investigations, it has undertaken fieldwork in the UK and overseas, with hundreds of military personnel having worked on projects.