Mortimer Wheeler, Sean Riordain, Gordon Childe, BBC Pictures, above.
13th September “Animal, Vegetable or Mineral?”
I’ve just watched an episode from the 1950’s of “Animal, Vegetable or Mineral” on the BBC website. It was a programme in which archaeological experts were shown objects and had to guess what they were and the time from which they came. Regulars were Glyn Daniel, Sir Mortimer Wheeler and Gordon Childe, the biggest names in archaeology probably of the 20th century. I’m sure i remember seeing this programme as a repeat when i was a child.
I enjoyed watching this today, seeing the wonderful accuracy of their dating, including a quip about radio-carbon dating from Childe, who had a lot to lose from it! Objects included a female figurine from Dolni Vestonice, and a Neolithic pot-“you could tell it was Neolithic because it was so bad”. It had feminine features. It was interesting that the “goddess” interpretation of the figurine was not mentioned, and there were various jokes about the pottery vessel, i.e. not seeing a woman ever looking like that. Of course the “goddess” interpretations are not without problems, given that there are various figurines in different contexts, and not all female. The jokes are of the time, and i wondered if they would be made now? Possibly. Still, it was lovely to see these icons in action.
The objects came from a Museum in Prague and were to be displayed the coming week in the British Museum. What a shame we do not have such a programme on television now, telling us of what is due to be shown. It was also great to see the figurine, and realise how small it was!
Here is a link to the programme http://bbc.in/1wUdfmC
Here is the figurine from Getty Images
Cullen Archaeology 