AN OUTLINE FOR THE FUTURE OF THE SOCIETY
Draft outline by Mick Aston June 2012
PREAMBLE
Arguably there has never been greater interest in the past
than there is today with many people visiting museums, English Heritage and
National Trust sites, other archaeological sites, historic towns and large
country houses. The popularity of television programmes about these topics, as
well as local history, genealogy and ecology is also evident with large
audiences of up to five million people watching some series.
With all this interest the numbers of people joining the
society, staying in it and participating in its activities should never have
been greater. And yet we are faced with falling membership, declining income
and apparent greater interest elsewhere in such organisations as local
archaeological and historical societies, the RSPB and the county Wildlife
Trusts, let alone the membership of metal detecting clubs.
It is the sole purpose of this paper to ask what can be done
about this state of affairs, if anything. It is about nothing less than whether
the society will survive into the future and what it will be engaged in, if it
does.
(This is very much a first thoughts draft; it would benefit
from the ideas and constructive criticism of others. It does not seek to deal
with Natural History matters.)
THE PROBLEMS
I run a field archaeology and landscape history project in
the parish of Winscombe in north Somerset in which around fifteen people take
part in field work, mainly test-pitting in the village, while others deal with
documentary sources, early maps and air photographs. The Somerset Vernacular
Buildings Research Group is carrying out one of their parish studies of
Winscombe recording all the 1840 and earlier buildings.
A few of these people are members of SANHS, rather more are
members of local societies, particularly Bridgwater, Shipham and Winscombe and
Sandford, but most are not members of any archaeological society at all. I
would like to be able to say to them that they should be members of SANHS
because of the lectures, workshops, activities or publications that are
provided. But many of the aspects of archaeology that would interest them and
indeed activities that would help them with their interests are not at present
provided by SANHS. The promise of an annual symposium, an associated societies
day and the Proceedings is not enough for them to subscribe. This seems to me
to highlight a microcosm of what is inadequate with SANHS at present and some
of the things that need to be done to develop the Society.
MEMBERSHIP
Declining numbers of Members
At present the Society has 00 individual members and 00
corporate members (other societies, universities, museums, archaeological
units! companies etc). This compares with Devon (00), Cornwall (00), Dorset
(00), Wiltshire (OO) and Gloucestershire (00).
Everyone seems to agree that we need more members, partly to
cover the next item (below). It is often said that if everyone recruited
another member this would help. But this rather depends on what is being
offered to members. It is no longer adequate to accept new members as if it was
a privilege for them to belong to SANHS (which was certainly the attitude of
SANHS some thirty years ago). There are many more calls on people's time and
resources these days and being a member of SANHS is only one among many
different choices and considerations. Levels of individual interest in people
will also vary and so it may be appropriate to offer different types of
membership to reflect a range of interest from minor passive interest through
to full scale involvement.
I would suggest a variety of membership categories. These
might consist of a basic nominal membership, a young people’s membership (say
under 21), main membership which would cover most of the existing members,
corporate membership for schools and businesses, and perhaps a fuller
membership with all publications (see below). There should probably also be
life membership, joint membership/household membership, retired membership and
possibly family membership. The differences in these membership categories
would reflect different levels of access to services and activities provided by
the Society. These will be discussed later on in this document.
Declining income
With declining membership comes declining income. So if we
can increase the membership as outlined above there should be more income for
the activities of the society. The single membership fee on offer at the
moment, which includes the Proceedings, needs to be supplemented by other forms
and levels of membership. For example corporate membership might include a
colour magazine but not the Proceedings and young people's membership might
include the national YAC publications or a local version.
In modem society, perhaps unfortunately, SANHS will have to
'sell' what it has to offer every bit as much as any other commodity or service
that is available to the public. What do we do, where and when do we do it and
why anyone should be interested are all aspects we need to address. Why should
people become members of SANHS and engage in its activities, rather than
anything else they might be doing.
Associated/Local Societies
The level of membership of SANHS in Somerset is lower than
might be expected, in a county of the size of Somerset. I think this may be
partly because of the existence of a large number of other, more local
societies. These are usually cheaper to join, offer less in the form of
publications but provide, what apparently most local society members want,
talks on often very local topics. In neighbouring Devon, Dorset and Wiltshire
there are far fewer local societies and the county societies' are
correspondingly larger with more resources. SANHS is probably weakened in what
it can achieve, with members and funds siphoned off to these local societies in
the county, and a way must be found of retaining the interest of members of
local societies while at the same time building up the resources and membership
of SANHS. Perhaps a special form of membership is needed. Another course might
be for SANHS to provide altogether better value for anyone interested in
archaeology, history, and architecture in the county. They might decide to
invest their membership funds only in SANHS but this will depend on the
activities on offer by SANHS for them to be involved in.
A related matter is the existence of other societies with
similar or overlapping interests. In some counties the Record Society is part
of the county society and we should perhaps explore co-operation, shared
membership, discounted subscriptions and so on, with the Somerset Record
Society. My guess is that the membership of both is roughly the same and that
many members of SANHS who are not at present members of SRS might still want
its publications. The same is true of the Somerset Industrial Archaeology
Society and the Somerset Vernacular Building Research Group. Why is this latter
group separate from the Historic Buildings section of SANHS? I can guess at a
rift and differences of opinion in the past but we are now all in a very small
pool and need to co-operate. Discussions need to take place to the mutual
advantage of both groups.
Limited Activities
At the moment, despite the various sub-sections of the
society, the activities on offer to members are somewhat limited. They do not reflect
all of the studies and fieldwork being undertaken by members of the Society and
they don't cover what could be done. At present they will not teach and train
more part-time people to get involved in practical fieldwork and they do not
cover the wider aspects of the subjects covered by the society.
A great deal of thought needs to be given to what the
society does, what it provides for its members.
Many members will only want to be passively involved,
attending lectures and field trips and the like, and this is fine since SANHS
needs their support. Others will want to have their own project or piece of
research. Yet others may want to get actively involved in fieldwork,
excavation, building recording, industrial archaeology and so on. For this they
will need teaching, instruction and practical training. This should be one of
the prime roles of the Society but little is available at the moment.
These 'activities' in the widest sense are what the Society
'sells', this is why new people might join; this is how SANHS will be seen as
an active group carrying out useful and interesting research in the county.
Below are offered some first thoughts on what we might undertake.
ACTIVITIES OF THE SOCIETY
Traditionally members of SANHS collected objects by excavation
and other activities, including collections of documents, and kept these in a
Castle it had bought where they were put on display in its Museum. Today some
of these activities are covered by the county authority Heritage Service (what
is the correct term?), which maintains the museum, record office and other
facilities, and employs the staff to run them. It is vital that the links
between SANHS and the Heritage Service are maintained and developed to each
organisation's mutual benefit, especially in these times when the forces of
darkness and evil are stalking the land again. SANHS needs the involvement of
the county services and their staff; the days when it its core activities might
have been conducted as an independent volunteer run outfit are long gone. The
importance of me heritage, in all its forms, to the economy of the county means
that the county council needs a we1I- structured, dynamic and active SANHS
membership to enhance our knowledge and use of the historic environment.
The Castle, Museum. Wyndham Hall and the Heritage Centre
The Castle and Museum are major assets to SANHS and the
county, and following major refurbishment should be developed as a focus for
any activities of SANHS. The same is true of the Heritage Centre, with the
County Record Office, though there is a problem with the SANHS library at the
moment that will need to be resolved. The potentially major asset of the
Wyndham Hall could be of great importance as a meeting place for Society
activities such as workshops, study groups, YAC activities and so on, but at
present the facilities are poor.
Traditionally members of SANHS have carried out fieldwork,
given and attended lectures and published material about the county of Somerset
in an annual magazine. Broadly these should still be the main areas of activity
of SANHS members. But the involvement of members of the county's Heritage
Service also covers many of the same activities, so mutually supportive
co-operation makes most sense and should be reinforced and developed.
Fieldwork
Despite the existence of so-called professional
archaeologists and commercial archaeology units/companies there is probably
more fieldwork needing to be done now that at any time in the past. Our
knowledge of not only what any particular area contains and even more so how
the historic landscape has evolved to its present form is generally woefully
inadequate. More research and study is needed for every period in every area.
Nowhere in the county is fully researched and fully understood at the moment.
Work on all topics is needed everywhere.
It is a pity then that the Somerset countryside is being
systematically looted for valuable goodies by metal-detectorists and that the
context for many of their finds is entirely unknown. For every field cleared of
finds there is a need for a landscape assessment as well as the recording of
any surface features. Any earthworks will only make sense if a landscape survey
is carried out. SANHS could provide the instruction for much of the
fieldwork that should be undertaken in association with the Heritage service.
Even without the looting by metal-detectorists there would
still be a need for a great increase in field survey and checking of known
monuments so that disturbance and degradation of historic features could be
avoided.
Workshops (see Appendix)
Workshops about various aspects of fieldwork including field
survey should be annual events of the society as part of a wider educational
programme put on by SANHS. Now that the extra-mural departments of the surrounding
universities have ceased to provide any practical teaching sessions, lecture
courses or day schools at weekends, there is a clear role for SANHS in
association with the HES to provide these.
Community Archaeology projects
The same is true for fieldwork that might which involve
excavation. Ideally annual community archaeology projects, such as the project
run at Muchelney, need to be run by HER and SANHS. Many of the general public
associate archaeology with excavation and we should work towards the society
supporting one or more larger excavation projects, not only to provide the
training and experience of an excavation to SANHS members but also to further
our knowledge of aspects of the county's history. It is now a full generation
since the great series of excavations by Philip Rahtz and few big projects have
been undertaken since and SANHS has not initiated any.
Where longer term community archaeology projects are
undertaken fieldwork involving test pits can be developed such as those at
Winscombe, East Lyng and elsewhere. Instruction in methods, recording and finds
analysis with frequent workshops will need to be developed alongside. This is
often a good way of introducing the various techniques and methods of
archaeology to the public and members of SANHS; unfortunately the equally
important role of writing up the results is not usually explained. SANHS
members could undertake many other fieldwork tasks with some basic training, in
particular watching briefs on developments within the 'parishes' of Area
Representatives (see below).
Lectures
County societies like SANHS have often seen the provision of
Lectures and Day Schools as one of the main services they can provide for their
members. In recent times much of this provision has been provided by the
extra-mural departments of local universities. This is no longer the case and
some county societies, such as Cornwall, Devon, Dorset and Wiltshire are
attempting to fill void themselves. SANHS has its own venue at the Wyndham Hall
in Taunton though it is not big enough for most of the events which could be
held and it is not geographically in the centre of the county. It would however
be ideal for specialised sessions, workshops and YAC meetings.
Other suitable meeting places which hold more people and are
more central to Somerset include the Strode Theatre and Millfield School. There
are also centres in Bath, one of the largest centres of population in the
county, and part of historic Somerset.
The society already puts on a few of the sort of events which
its members might attend. Five types of events can be instanced.
Big lectures with famous speakers. These would be designed
to attract well known people to the county and to attract more members of the
general public to become members of the society. Speakers might include Michael
Wood, Alice Roberts and so on. Large venues and considerable outlays, but good
returns in the form of subscriptions and new members would probably be the
format.
Other big lectures could feature people well known in the
subject area but perhaps not so generally known to the general public, such as
John Blair, Stephen Rippon, Neil Holbrook and James Gerrard.
Specialised Day Conferences. These should have a group of
speakers and be designed to revue a subject of relevance to the county. The
'Islands' day was a good example of the type. Annual reviews of work in the
county could form other days. There probably needs to be several such days in
the year with the use of regularly used venues with good parking and
coffee/food facilities.
Workshops and teaching sessions.
If SANHS is to encourage its members to get involved in
practical activities, of all types (fieldwork, test pits, community archaeology
projects, parish studies, landscape studies, building surveys) then workshops to
cover the many different aspects will need to be provided, and probably on a
regular and repeatable basis. These might include flint and pottery
identification, coins and tokens, and clay pipes, but also methodology sessions
such as earthwork surveying, basic recording, use of maps, documents and so on.
In the past such days might have been conducted at very
little expense to the Society or to its members but since the Thatcher
philosophy took hold no one seems prepared to give their time and expertise for
nothing any more, and so there will be inevitable costs to many of these
activities.
Open Days and visits to the Museum and Heritage Centre could
feature regularly, but so could supervised visits to the many famous and not so
famous monuments of the county. The Area Representatives could become the focus
of such visits.
Finds 'surgeries' provided regularly for the general public
at the above centres would generate public and press interest and potentially
more members, as well as indicating the existence of previously unknown sites.
Young Archaeologists Club
Interest in and membership of SANHS should begin with a
branch of the Young Archaeologists Club. This could be based at the new museum,
perhaps as a 'Saturday club', cover new Somerset, as there is already a branch
for Bristol and Bath, and be run by a group of parents, teachers, SANHS and HER
personnel. The National YAC at York advises on setting up and running such club
branches.
Older children and students probably need a separate
organisation, though if the society becomes active with a lot of fieldwork and
practical projects underway many young adults could probably join such schemes
and there would be no need for any additional provision.
Publications - The Proceedings
The society has always published articles and material on
the history etc of the county. This is now called the Proceedings and appears
as an annual set of academic articles about aspects of the county. It is well
respected, is like almost every other county society journal and forms the
backbone of any research undertaken in the county. It is however debatable
whether it is the best single publication for most of the SANHS members. It
needs to be supplemented by other publications (see below), kept as the main
SANHS outlet for research but be made available, along with much else the
society does, on a web site through the Internet.
Publications - Newsletter
A Newsletter to inform members of events, discoveries and so
on is clearly needed, though for many people an internet version would probably
be enough.
Publications - A Somerset 'Current Archaeology' (Annual)
Some counties for example Yorkshire and Durham (Northern
Archaeology Today, a magazine published by the York Archaeological Trust)
publish what is in effect a county version of the popular monthly archaeology
magazine Current Archaeology. This is in full colour and includes summaries of
work undertaken, air photographs, plans and so on. It is suggested that this
could form the main publication for most members, For many members it would be
more accessible than the Proceedings, and would be especially appropriate for
YAC members, schools and corporate members, and could even be sold at the
Museum, Heritage Centre and elsewhere (as in Durham). As much of the material that
might be used already comes in to the HER (to Chris Webster) anyway it could be
produced with or by members of the HES working with SANHS.
Publications - Occasional Series
Over the last thirty years or so a large number of very
important seminal reports have been produced about aspects of the archaeology
of Somerset It is very noticeable that none of them have involved SANHS in any
direct way. There seem to have been no 'launches', press coverage, discount
copies to members and so on. Examples include reports on Cannington, Henley
Wood, Ilchester, Shepton Mallet, Cadbury Congresbury, South Cadbury, Cheddar,
Chew Valley Lake, Wells, and Shapwick. The society should have been involved in
these publications in some way and members should have had access to discounted
copies.
The various levels of membership suggested above could be
reflected in which publications are included. The most basic might only receive
the 'Somerset Current Archaeology' and the newsletters, the main membership
receive these and the Proceedings and discounted Special volumes.
In some counties the Record Society volumes are part of the
main county society publications, even if separately accounted for. It would
probably be in the interest of both societies interest, SRS and SANHS if some
mutually advantageous arrangements about membership and publications could be
made. The same is true of the publications of the Vernacular Buildings Research
Group and probably those of SIAS.
ACTIVITIES OF INDIVIDUAL MEMBERS
Within this scheme it can be seen that individual members of
SANHS will have access to lectures and workshops, publications and various
events. But there are other activities that have not been exploited or
developed so far where individual members can contribute greatly to the care
and management of the archaeology and landscape history of their area within
Somerset. Area Representatives, as have been developed in Com-wall, act as
archaeological watchdogs for groups of parishes. There they have informal
spring and autumn meetings and they work; work with the Historic Environment
Service, National Trust and so on. Included in this is a scheme called
'Monument Watch' where society members 'look after' known monuments and
items/areas of historic interest.
The role of such a group of representatives could be
developed in Somerset to include its members acting as guides to their local
monuments, with advice on parking, access, footpaths, and liaison with farmers
and landowners. Any society member visiting an area which had a local representative
would then have a local contact. Again the internet could provide important
links here. Published guides to areas could also be made available.
MAIN RECOMMENDATIONS
This document is about the historic county of Somerset. The
society should have no truck with meaningless entities like BANES and North
Somerset. The historic county existed for over a thousand years and most of
SANHS activities and interests relate to the time it was this single entity.
At some stage, as with most charities and trusts the
appointment of a Chief Executive who is used to raising funds, management at
the highest levels, has personnel skills, and is interested in Somerset and its
history and archaeology, will probably be needed (A ‘Max Davies’ figure). We
need to be actively searching for such a person; in Somerset with its retired
population there must be many such people coming to the County each year (eg Dr
James Latham (Australia), Martin Heighton (Historic Ships)).
Most of the suggestions here will only work with a
partnership with SCC, HES. The co-operation of Tom Mayberry with Bob Croft and
his team and Steve Minnitt, in particular, will be essential if any of these
ideas are to work. A partnership between the professional people in SCC and the
part time/amateur component in SANHS will best serve the county in future.
Many of the suggestions will need the society to adopt fully
the modem technology - the Internet with the SANHS website. This is now how
people, particularly young people, get their information and the society needs
to embrace it fully. A web master should be one of the main officers of the
society.
The Heritage Lottery has funds for some of the projects
mentioned in this document. It is tedious and time-consuming extracting money
from them but we should probably develop the expertise to enable us to do this.
The Heritage Centre and the new Museum can form the focus of
most of what is suggested here, though a venue geographically in the centre of
the historic county needs to be identified and cultivated for lectures and
meetings. Bath is the largest centre of the historic county with a big
population which is likely to be interested in SANHS. We need to develop a
regular presence there as well.
The model of the Isle of Man with its integrated county
museum, field monuments, sign posting, parking bays, guidebooks, parish
churches, etc is a useful one to eventually emulate. The importance of tourism
in the county and the role of area representatives (as suggested above) would
comfortably fit into such a scheme.
(How many civil parishes are there in historic Somerset?
(Kain and Oliver (1995) 482 tithe maps for Somerset; how many representatives
are needed to cover such an area?)
This is very much a series of first thoughts put into a very
rough first draft. It will need the comments, ideas and experience of many
other people to be incorporated into it before we have a blueprint for the
future development of the Society. It will then need the commitment and hard
work of many people to make it work. We should probably give ourselves five
years or so to see if SANHS can do this.
When, and only when, the Society is really active with a
number of projects underway and members engaged in various activities, we can
think of publicity like the Bath and West County Show etc as a way of
recruiting more members. We can then also think of an 'Archaeodrome' for the
county (with many other organisations) and various Trusts to cover other
aspects of the history of the county (Gardens, Buildings, Archaeological Monuments,
Industrial sites etc).
