Dominic Tweddle, FSA FSA Scot , is an English archaeologist specialising in Anglo-Saxon studies. and the former director general of the National Museum of the Royal Navy. [1] [2] [3] Previously he spent time as a research assistant at the British Museum and as the assistant director of the York Archaeological Trust, where he helped develop the Jorvik Viking Centre. [1] [2] [4] He is also an honorary professor at the UCL Institute of Archaeology and the University of Portsmouth. [2] [5] [4]
Tweddle is known for his 1992 book on the Coppergate Helmet, which built on the work of Greta Arwidsson and Heiko Steuer to provide a typology of European helmets from the end of the Western Roman Empire to the end of the Viking Age. [6]
Tweddle enrolled at Southampton University around 1972, and studied under Colin Renfrew for his first degree, a first class honours degree in archaeology and history. [1] [2] [4] He then spent a year at Emmanuel College, Cambridge, where he researched Anglo-Saxon and Viking art, before enrolling at the Department of Scandinavian Studies at University College London. [1] [2] [4] In 1986 he was awarded a doctorate; [2] [4] his Ph.D. topic was on Anglo-Saxon sculpture of South-East England. [1] There he studied under Sir David M. Wilson, thereafter the director of the British Museum, a fact which Tweddle credits with helping him obtain his first job. [1]
In 1978 or 1979, while still a student, Tweddle was appointed as a research assistant in the then department of medieval and later antiquities at the British Museum. [1] [2] He worked there with, among others, Wilson, James Graham-Campbell and Leslie Webster. [1] After nine months he left because, according to him, "I didn't want to spend the rest of my life in an institution, even one as nice as the BM." [1]
From the British Museum Tweddle went to the York Archaeological Trust in 1979, where he served as assistant director. [1] [2] [4] At the Trust he was responsible for research, publication and public presentation, as well as the care and curation of the collections. [2] [4] He was among those who led the development of the Jorvik Viking Centre in the early 1980s, and directed the creation of the Archaeological Resource Centre, a hands-on visitors' experience. [1] [2] [4] He also directed the restoration and furnishing of Barley Hall, a merchant's house built around 1360. [2] [4]
In 1982 Tweddle was involved in the excavation of the eighth-century Anglo-Saxon Coppergate Helmet, found in York during excavations for the Jorvik Center. [7] He served as part of the artefact research and administration team during the watching brief, and was on hand to assess and record objects as they were found. [7] His resulting 1992 book on the helmet and associated materials, The Anglian Helmet from 16–22 Coppergate, [8] was termed "a major piece of archaeological research" and "a definitive work of undoubted importance". [9] The chapters "Dating" and "Discussion", in particular, were called "without doubt, the strongest and most informative parts of a book with few weak points", [10] and built on the work of previous authors, including Heiko Steuer and Greta Arwidsson, [11] to offer "a wide-ranging survey, from Pictland to Kiev, of post-Roman helmet types, their distributions and their dating." [10]
Tweddle left the York Archaeological Trust in 1995, after 16 years. [1] [2] [4] As the Trust had decided to concentrate on its academic mission, it sold Tweddle a design and a multimedia business for £2. [1] [2] [4] Over the next 13 years Tweddle thus ran Past Forward Ltd., which provided consultancy work on the design of heritage projects, and merged it with another business to become the Continuum Group, for which he served as CEO; as described by Tweddle, "the merged business basically designed, built, owned and operated visitor attractions in the cultural field." [1] By the time of his departure, the business had developed more than 200 cultural heritage projects and owned five visitor attractions, and had annual revenue of £9.5 million and profit of £500,000. [2]
From January 2009 until November 2023, Tweddle served as the Director-General of the National Museum of the Royal Navy. [1] [2] He is also on the board of trustees of the museum ship HMS Warrior (1860), [12] and is a visiting professor at University College London and an honorary professor of history at the University of Portsmouth. [2] [4] [5] He has previously taught courses at the University of York and Durham University, and has lectured for the British Council in India, China, Poland, Hungary, Romania, Estonia, Russia and Turkey, about the development of cultural attractions. [2]
Tweddle has published five academic books, a children's book, and more than 100 academic and popular articles. [2] Most of his publications came before 2000, as he has since then focused his time on business and museum directorship. [1]
Scandinavian York or Viking York is a term used by historians for what is now Yorkshire during the period of Scandinavian domination from late 9th century until it was annexed and integrated into England after the Norman Conquest; in particular, it is used to refer to York, the city controlled by these kings and earls. The Kingdom of Jórvík was closely associated with the longer-lived Kingdom of Dublin throughout this period.
The Benty Grange helmet is an Anglo-Saxon boar-crested helmet from the seventh century AD. It was excavated by Thomas Bateman in 1848 from a tumulus at the Benty Grange farm in Monyash in western Derbyshire. The grave had probably been looted by the time of Bateman's excavation, but still contained other high-status objects suggestive of a richly furnished burial, such as the fragmentary remains of a hanging bowl. The helmet is displayed at Sheffield's Weston Park Museum, which purchased it from Bateman's estate in 1893.
The York Archaeological Trust for Excavation and Research Limited (YAT) is an educational charity, established in 1972 in the city of York, England, and trading under the York Archaeology brand. The charity presents archaeology to the public through visitor attractions and events, and its commercial arm carries out archaeological investigations, fieldwork, excavation and research in York and throughout Britain and beyond.
The Coppergate Helmet is an eighth-century Anglo-Saxon helmet found in York, England. It was discovered in May 1982 during excavations for the Jorvik Viking Centre at the bottom of a pit that is thought to have once been a well.
The Jorvik Viking Centre is a museum and visitor attraction in York, England, containing lifelike mannequins and life-size dioramas depicting Viking life in the city. Visitors are taken through the dioramas in small carriages equipped with speakers. It was created by the York Archaeological Trust and opened in 1984. Its name is derived from Jórvík, the Old Norse name for York and the surrounding Viking Kingdom of Yorkshire.
The Sutton Hoo helmet is a decorated Anglo-Saxon helmet found during a 1939 excavation of the Sutton Hoo ship-burial. It was buried around the years c. 620–625 AD and is widely associated with an Anglo-Saxon leader, King Rædwald of East Anglia; its elaborate decoration may have given it a secondary function akin to a crown. The helmet was both a functional piece of armour and a decorative piece of metalwork. An iconic object from an archaeological find hailed as the "British Tutankhamen", it has become a symbol of the Early Middle Ages, "of Archaeology in general", and of England.
The Pioneer Helmet is an Anglo-Saxon boar-crested helmet from the late seventh century found in Wollaston, Northamptonshire, United Kingdom. It was discovered during a March 1997 excavation before the land was to be mined for gravel and was part of the grave of a young man. Other objects in the grave, such as a hanging bowl and a pattern welded sword, suggest that it was the burial mound of a high-status warrior.
The Shorwell helmet is an Anglo-Saxon helmet from the early to mid-sixth century AD found near Shorwell on the Isle of Wight in southern England. It was one of the grave goods of a high-status Anglo-Saxon warrior, and was found with other objects such as a pattern-welded sword and hanging bowl. One of only six known Anglo-Saxon helmets, alongside those found at Benty Grange (1848), Sutton Hoo (1939), Coppergate (1982), Wollaston (1997), and Staffordshire (2009), it is the sole example to derive from the continental Frankish style rather than the contemporaneous Northern "crested helmets" used in England and Scandinavia.
Peter Vincent Addyman,, known as P. V. Addyman, is a British archaeologist who was Director of the York Archaeological Trust from 1972 to 2002. Addyman obtained a degree in archaeology at Cambridge University, after which he lectured at Queen's University Belfast and the University of Southampton, while also conducting excavations. In 1972 he was offered the directorship of the newly founded York Archaeological Trust, the creation of which he had proposed; along with excavation work in York, he oversaw the development of the Jorvik Viking Centre, the Archaeological Resource Centre, and Barley Hall. In 2000 he was appointed a Commander of the Order of the British Empire.
The Gjermundbu helmet is a Viking Age helmet.
Julian Daryl Richards is a British archaeologist and academic. He works at the University of York where he is Professor of Archaeology, director of its Centre for Digital Heritage, and director of the Archaeology Data Service (ADS). He is also co-director of the academic journal Internet Archaeology, and contributed to the founding of The White Rose College of the Arts & Humanities. His work focuses on the archaeological applications of information technology. He has participated in excavations at Cottam, Cowlam, Burdale, Wharram Percy, and Heath Wood barrow cemetery.
Elizabeth Grayson Hartley, was an American archaeologist and curator. She spent most of her career as the Keeper of Archaeology at the Yorkshire Museum in York.
The Tjele helmet fragment is a Viking Age fragment of iron and bronze, originally comprising the eyebrows and noseguard of a helmet. It was discovered in 1850 with a large assortment of smith's tools in Denmark, and though the find was sent to the National Museum of Denmark, for 134 years the fragment was mistaken for a saddle mount. In 1984 it was properly identified by an assistant keeper at the museum as the remainder of one of only five known helmets from the Viking era.
The Gevninge helmet fragment is the dexter eyepiece of a helmet from the Viking Age or end of the Nordic Iron Age. It was found in 2000 during the excavation of a Viking farmstead in Gevninge, near Lejre, Denmark. The fragment is moulded from bronze and gilded, and consists of a stylised eyebrow with eyelashes above an oval opening. There are three holes at the top and bottom of the fragment to affix the eyepiece to a helmet. The fragment is significant as rare evidence of contemporaneous helmets, and also for its discovery in Gevninge, an outpost that is possibly connected to the Anglo-Saxon epic Beowulf. It has been in the collection of the Lejre Museum since its discovery, and has been exhibited internationally as part of a travelling exhibition on Vikings.
Elisabeth Munksgaard was a Danish historian and from 1962 until retiring in 1990, the assistant Keeper in the Department of the Prehistory of Denmark at the National Museum of Denmark.} She was "Denmark's acknowledged expert" on art from the late Iron Age and Viking Age.
The Lokrume helmet fragment is a decorated eyebrow piece from a Viking Age helmet. It is made of iron, the surface of which is covered with silver and features an interlace pattern in niello or wire. Discovered in Lokrume, a small settlement on the Swedish island of Gotland, the fragment was first described in print in 1907 and is in the collection of the Gotland Museum.
The Horncastle boar's head is an early seventh-century Anglo-Saxon ornament depicting a boar that probably was once part of the crest of a helmet. It was discovered in 2002 by a metal detectorist searching in the town of Horncastle, Lincolnshire. It was reported as found treasure and acquired for £15,000 by the Lincoln City and County Museum—now Lincoln Museum—where it is on permanent display.
The Broe helmet is a decorated iron helmet from around the Vendel Period. Discovered around 1904 in a cremation grave in Broe, a farm on the Swedish island Gotland, it was located alongside other items including fragments of shields, weapons, bridles, and game pieces. Due to its extremely fragmented condition, only an incomplete reconstruction of the helmet is possible, but it appears to have been an example of the "crested helmets" that flourished in England and Scandinavia from the sixth through eleventh centuries.
The Hellvi helmet eyebrow is a decorative eyebrow from a Vendel Period helmet. It comprises two fragments; the arch is made of iron decorated with strips of silver, and terminates in a bronze animal head that was cast on. The eyebrow was donated to the Statens historiska museum in November 1880 along with several other objects, all said to be from a grave find in Gotland, Sweden.
Penelope Walton Rogers was a British archaeologist and expert in archaeological textiles.