Ben investigates the island forts in the Solent
The aerial archaeologist BEN ROBINSON, TV’s archaeologist in the sky, tells editor ROLY SMITH how it all began
T
wenty-two-year old Ben Robinson had just completed his computer science degree and was sitting on a tractor in a queue at a Cambridgeshire grain store, waiting to unload, when he heard a local radio interview featuring a nearby archaeological dig. “It was on Ermine Street, north of Royston, and they wanted volunteers,” recalls TV’s popular ‘flying archaeologist.’ “So when the harvest was over, I went along. Two weeks later found myself on the payroll, and they asked me if I wanted to stay on that winter.” As a child, Ely-born Ben had always been fascinated
Ben ready for another helecopter flight
16
ACID | 2022
by history, especially places and physical remains connected with the past, which would seem to lead him naturally towards archaeology. “But I didn’t think there was any possibility of working in these subject areas,” he explains. “I was always going to be a farmer or join the RAF.” And he has the RAF to thank for his passion for flying. “I was taught to fly by the RAF as a teenage air cadet,” he says. “But even during my instruction and solo flying, I spent as much time looking at the ground for archaeological features as I did concentrating on keeping the aircraft flying!” Ben started flying open-air “trike” microlights when, at six foot four inches, he could just let his legs dangle over the sides. He flies enclosed cockpit microlights now and says they are surprisingly comfortable – “better than many cars in terms of head and leg room.” He explains: “A large part of the attraction has always been spotting and photographing archaeology from the air. It is a great way to get a different perspective on the heritage which is all around us.” It was following that seminal Ermine Street dig that Ben realised that archaeology was what he really wanted to do, so he undertook a Masters degree at the University of York and then later went back to do a part-time PhD. By then he was the archaeological adviser to the newly formed Peterborough Unitary Authority, setting up a new Historic Environment Record, providing planning advice, undertaking emergency excavations, setting briefs and monitoring consultants’ and contractors’ work. “A sort of poacher turned gamekeeper,” he jokes. In 2009 he joined English Heritage (as it was then) as
