Brigid Gallagher

Not scared to argue
Brigid Gallagher is one of the regular group of Time Team diggers. Popular with the team, she's also highly qualified as an archaeologist and not scared to argue her theories with the most eminent of specialists. When it comes to interpreting sites or complicated features Brigid knows her stuff. She can also turn her hand to conservation, having recently qualified as a conservator at Cardiff University. Among her non-Time Team interests, she is the project conservator, with Ian Hodder, for the Catalhoyuk site in Turkey, a project on which she works every year.

'I was born in New Zealand and became very interested in anthropology and archaeology at an early age,' she says. 'I ended up going to Auckland University to study it and actually did my degree in geomorphology (soil science) and archaeology.' After that, she worked as a field archaeologist and became an archaeological technician at the Auckland Museum.

'I then wanted to get going on my career in archaeology, but found at that time that it was going to be difficult to find the right job in New Zealand. I came to Britain to do field archaeology, with a mind to specialise in something within that process. I worked as a field archaeologist for three years, digging all over the country, and during this time I got to know Kate Edwards, the Time Team post-excavation officer. Last year they were looking for some new people to get involved in Time Team and Kate suggested me to the producers.'

From digging to report writing
Brigid's job within the team entails everything that a field archaeologist has to do: guiding machines, digging by hand, identifying and recording discoveries, and much more. Between the programmes she freelances as an archaeological report writer and is currently involved in writing up some of the Time Team sites from last year.

'I've just finished a second degree (in archaeological conservation) at Cardiff University, so I do some onsite conservation for the programme too,' continues Brigid. 'The best part of doing Time Team has to be the general comradeship between the archaeologists and the crew. Then there are the places that you get to dig and all of the travelling. It's great fun to do. I also like being involved in a television programme that does so much to help educate people about archaeology. That's really important.'

Favourite Time Team
'My favourite Time Team was probably Sedgefield, in County Durham,' says Brigid. 'It was really exciting and I found the only structure on site and got to do the end-of-day scene. After that it has to be Dinnington in Somerset. Finding those Roman mosaics was just amazing.'

She also says she likes long walks on the beach, has an adventurous spirit and is fun to be with ...

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