This book is about how the author became an archaeologist at a time when
opportunities for employment were rare and how he worked as a field
researcher in West Africa and wrote about his work there. It traces his
archaeological training and employment at Cambridge and his practical
experience on British excavations and explains how he became one of the
pioneers of Nigerian archaeology during a decade in that country. It is
not so much a study of the archaeology that was done, as an account of
how it was done; its circumstances, organization, and economic and
social and cultural context. As a result, it is both a professional and
personal account, for these two aspects of life were inseparably
intertwined, his wife Beryl becoming an integral part of the story.
Other archaeologists and many non-archaeologists also feature in the
account. The period in Nigeria from 1961 to 1971 included the Nigerian
Civil War from 1967 to 1970, when archaeological work continued with
difficulty. Both circumstances and preference meant that the author
always worked with a labour team of Nigerians and with Nigerian
assistants, of whom few had any experience in archaeology and none had
any formal training; there were no postgraduates or others from outside
the country. Success in excavations in Benin City, in the south of the
country, and in Borno, in its far north-east, was as much the
achievement of those Nigerians as it was the author's.