Charles Green

Charles Green (1901–1972) was an English archaeologist noted for his excavations in East Anglia, and his work on the Sutton Hoo ship-burial. His "signal achievements" were his East Anglian excavations, including four years spent by Caister-on-Sea and Burgh Castle, and several weeks in 1961 as Director of excavations at Walsingham Priory. Green additionally brought his "long experience of boat-handling" to bear in writing his 1963 book, Sutton Hoo: The Excavation of a Royal Ship-Burial, a major work that combined a popular account of the Anglo-Saxon burial with Green's contributions about ship-construction and seafaring. Green began his career in archaeology as an assistant at the Salford Royal Museum, and in 1932 was named curator of The Museum of Gloucester. Much of his East Anglian work was carried out in the 1950s and 1960s on behalf of the Ministry of Works. Green was also a member of the National Executive of the Council for British Archaeology, a one time President of the Norfolk Research Committee, and, at his death, the President of the Great Yarmouth Archaeological Society and Vice-President of the Norfolk and Norwich Archaeological Society. Career Charles Green was born in Lancaster, England, in 1901. He began his archaeological career as an assistant at the Royal Museum in Salford, Greater Manchester, and in 1932 he was appointed curator of The Museum of Gloucester. There, he studied the prehistory of Gloucestershire, undertaking a study of Roman Gloucester and publishing several papers, including an important 1949 note on the burials found in Birdlip. The Royal Air Force took Green under its wing during World War II; he served in the photographic and intelligence branches, befitting his archaeological interest in air photography. During the 1950s, Green carried out many excavations for the Ministry of Works, difficult work for an understaffed department. In 1951, he arrived in East Anglia, which would become the site of his "signal achievements", to excavate the Roman town at Caister-on-Sea, close to Great Yarmouth and across from Burgh Castle. Green spent four years continuously excavating there, from the summer of 1951 to January 1955, chronicling the rise and fall of the town. This work gave him experience with the fluctuations of the North Sea, leading to his contribution to the 1960 book The Making of the Broads.