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David Clarke's 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence' (1973) 25 years after

Edited by Caroline Malone & Simon Stoddart

In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the Editor of ANTIQUITY, Glyn Daniel, invited a series of reactions to the cross-currents of archaeology at the time. The first was a conservative statement on archaeology as the servant of history by Jacquetta Hawkes (1968). This assumed the mantle of the 'Proper study of mankind', and urged that the humanistic study of archaeology be saved from the encroachment of science. Such was the reaction by archaeologists over the age of 40 to this article that Glyn Daniel was prompted offer a prize (which would still buy a student today two years of ANTIQUITY). The prize was to be awarded for the best response by a young archaeologist (presumably younger than 40) to the question 'Whither archaeology?' The winning contributions were published as two essays by Evzen Neustupny´ (1971) and Glynn Isaac (1971). The second of these particularly addressed the challenge of Jacquetta Hawkes, and introduced Clarke as a protagonist; although the more explicit statement of the new archaeology was an article by Richard Watson 'The "new archaeology" of the 1960s' published in ANTIQUITY in 1972, which drew a strong distinction between anthropological archaeology and classical archaeology. An essay Clarke had prepared to appear in the Cambridge economic history of Europe worked hard to bridge this potential divide between history and archaeology, although this important theme is only touched upon in 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence'. Unlike many North American New Archaeologists who rejected history, Clarke stressed that 'work in text-aided contexts will increasingly provide vital experiments in which purely archaeological data may be controlled by documentary data, bearing in mind the inherent biases of both' (1973: 18). this is a debate that Hawkes (1973: 177) addressed in his response to Clarke's 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence'. Hawkes was another scholar convinced of the dangers, and seduction, of equating archaeology with prehistory.

In the same issue of ANTIQUITY, Clarke was invited to review Watson et al. (1971) with a prescient realization that 'there is little reason to suppose that the positivist philosophy of physics is especially appropriate for archaeology . . .' (1972: 238). The views of Hogarth (1972), published in the following issue of ANTIQUITY, were a fresh presentation of the conservative reaction to the New Archaeology movement, concentrating more on the medium than the message. This paper, in many ways, brought the discussion to the completion of a first cycle and prepared the ground for Clarke. A more positive statement by Christopher Hawkes (1973), published after 'archaeology: the loss of innocence', marks the closure of a second cycle.

The most memorable contribution to these debates was undoubtedly the one published 25 years ago by Clarke himself, 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence' (1973) [1]. This has come to be considered, at least in Britain, one of the seminal statements of the New Archaeology, by one of its leading proponents. It is this that we commemorate here. In spite of the fame of this statement in the Anglo-American world, we should not exaggerate its impact outside Britain. Courbin (1988) chose to concentrate on other statements of Clarke. In a more global statement on recent theory in Italy, the role of Clarke is much less pronounced (Guidi 1996). A recent statement of German theory (Bernbeck 1997) gives almost no attention to Clarke at all (and much more to other New Archaeologists). This, at first, appears to be a pattern of limited recognition that could be illustrated on a more global level. Perhaps some of what follows can illustrate the foresight and creativity of Clarke in perceiving the developments that continued after his death (only three years after the publication of 'the loss of innocence'), often in the hands of his pupils.

'Archaeology: the loss of innocence' had an impact greater than its level of citation, and the current Editors [2] have invited five current practitioners of archaeological theory to comment on this seminal statement and, in turn, have asked one of David Clarke's pupils to comment on their appraisal, a form of open review. We are conscious we might be building on a genealogy of self-commentary, but nevertheless consider it to be an important academic exercise. Not all those invited felt able to accept the invitation, but there are represented here a range of views from Britain (Palaeolithic and recent prehistory), the Mediterranean and the New World. One of the authors, Bruce Trigger (1970), contributed to the Antiquity debate of the 1970s by exploring the relationship of archaeology to history and the social sciences. Three others are now older than 40, and thus would not have qualified for the Glyn Daniel challenge of 'Whither archaeology?'. The editors welcome further contributions in the spirit of Glyn Daniel's invitation: 'a free for all, new and old'. We can now add 'post-archaeology' to archaeology and its other relationships, if one follows the suggestion of Chris Tilley's last sentence!

In the Special section:

• Alessandro Guidi discusses the reaction to Clarke from an Italian and southern European perspective.
• Michael Parker Pearson describes his understanding of Clarke as an important figure in promoting social theory, and how this has changed since Clarke's original writings.
• Anthony Sinclair approaches Clarke from the perspective of a Palaeolithic archaeologist, noting the invigorating optimism of his general theory of archaeology.
• Christopher Tilley, one of Clarke's last students at Peterhouse, reflects on the impact of his work, and also on his 'innocence' and naïvety of archaeological social theory.
• Bruce Trigger assesses the historical role of Clarke, within the broader development of archaeology, both before 1973, and since the publication of 'the loss of innocence'.
• Andrew Sherratt comments on the papers and provides his own assessment of Clarke's contribution.

Footnotes
[1] The ANTIQUITY web site presents 'Archaeology: the loss of innocence' in full, together with several letters and other reactions published in Antiquity in 1973. Back to Text

[2] We are grateful to Dr James Whitley for giving us the suggestion. Back to Text

Links to complementary files:

• David Clarke: Archaeology: the loss of innocence ANTIQUITY March 1973 vol. 47: 6-18
• Editorial comment and letters of response ANTIQUITY June 1973 vol. 47: 93-95
• Editorial comment and letters of response ANTIQUITY September 1973 vol. 47: 174-175
• Christopher Hawkes: Innocence retrieval in archaeology ANTIQUITY September 1973 vol. 47: 176-178

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