Dungannon, Northern Ireland
First screened 2 March 2008

Q & A

Time Team digger Raksha Dave answers our questions.

What's your favourite Time Team dig?
Oh gosh, so many have been good and for different reasons! Green Island because it was my first Time Team shoot, it was sunny and in a stunning location – digging on a privately owned island isn't bad going eh? The Isle of Man due to the brilliant archaeology. And Goldcliffe just for the pure hilarity of trying to dig in oodles of mud in waders and then trying to transport metre squares of archaeology to marquees to excavate there – utterly bonkers but great fun!

What's your favourite Time Team find?
Uncovering the plait in the Isle of Man was pretty much up there – it was amazing that something organic could have survived in such conditions. Also I thoroughly enjoyed digging up the A-26 US bomber at Preston; it was just perfect.

What's the most important Time Team discovery?
The prize would have to go to my fellow field archaeologist Matt Williams for finding Ogham script on a lump of rock. I'm not bitter – I'll get you next time Williams!

What's your best Time Team moment?
It would have to be in Islip in Oxfordshire, where on the second day Jonathan Foyle and I were convinced that we'd found the foundations of Edward the Confessor's chapel in a back garden. We soon swallowed our pride and wild theories when it turned out to be a great stinking cess-filled lav. The programme ended with a great Victor Ambrus picture of a peasant sat on the loo – that has to be my defining moment!

What's your favourite archaeological site in the UK?
Too many! I have, however, great affection for the city sites in London that I worked on at the start of my career. One was the Gresham Street site, which was covered by a Time Team Special. It's the one where Roman water-lifting devices were uncovered on site.

And abroad?
I have been extremely lucky to work on some cracking sites abroad and I am proud enough to say that I have worked on Catal Hoyuk in Turkey. The site is so rich in archaeological material. The craft and workmanship in the artefacts and structures excavated are stunning and the complexity of the society that lived there is mind blowing.

Who's your archaeological hero?
I think all professional field/unit-based archaeologists are heroes for pursuing their careers with dogged determination. This is in spite of not being recognised for their skilled profession with little or no career progression and being extremely underpaid for the excellent work they do!

What's your favourite archaeology book?
Still Digging by Mortimer Wheeler. It just shows that the social side of archaeology hasn't changed since its glorious inception!

If you could travel to one moment in time, where to and when?
Wrangel Island in the Late Pleistocene to see the dwarf mammoths frolicking on the Siberian tundra! If you don't believe me, Google it! I'm not going mad!

If you could dig one site, what would it be?
Ha, how long is a piece of string! Over the years I have been pretty lucky. I still have, however, to cross off the list digging up a bog body; and I wouldn't mind excavating a chariot with horses – well a girl's gotta dream, eh?

If you could make one find, what would it be?
I have had a turn at making things but excavating them is just so much better!

«The O'Neills and the troubled history of Ulster :Previous    Next: Find out more »

Back to top^