Staff Profile:Professor Martin Bell

Name:

Professor Martin Bell

Job Title:

Professor in Archaeology

Responsibilities:

Head of Department, Archaeology

Areas of Interest:

• Environmental change
• The prehistory of soil erosion
• Experimental archaeology

Postgraduate Supervision

Martin currently supervises six research students covering topics including: in situ preservation (Louise Jones); mollusc middens in Morocco (Victoria Taylor); wooduse (John Walker); experimental archaeology of soils and sediments (Chris Speed; Amy Poole); Mesolithic riverine archaeology (Abigail George). Martin is keen to discuss proposals for postgraduate research in geoarchaeology, prehistoric coastal archaeology, snail analysis in archaeology and experimental archaeology (particularly formation processes and the role of science in heritage outreach sites).

For further information, please contact m.g.bell@reading.ac.uk

Research groups / Centres:

• Scientific Archaeology Research Group
• Soil Research Centre

Key Facts

Martin teaches environmental archaeology, geoarchaeology and coastal and maritime archaeology.

His research concerns the contribution which archaeology makes to an understanding of environmental change on a wide range of timescales. Analytically he is interested in the analysis of soils, sediments and molluscs, land and marine. Topics include the prehistory of soil erosion, experimental archaeology and particularly coastal environments. Coastal research has focused on an extensive programme of fieldwork and excavations in the Severn Estuary where he has been working since 1983. This has particularly involved major excavations at Brean Down, Goldcliff and Redwick. Discoveries at these sites include several Mesolithic settlements and human and animal footprints, and many Bronze Age and Iron Age buildings and wood structures such as trackways and fish traps. Current fieldwork projects include the Peterstone palaeochannels project in the Severn Estuary (with Dr Alex Brown), investigations at various experimental archaeology sites including Butser Ancient Farm and St Fagans, National History Museum Wales as part of the Developing Experimental Approaches in Archaeology Project. He is also involved in a project on in situ monitoring of wetland sites in the Somerset Levels and a cave excavation at Taforalt, Morocco (with Prof Nick Barton, Oxford).

His publications include:

• The Mesolithic in Western Britain 2007. York: Council for British Archaeology Research Report 149
• Late Quaternary Environmental Change (with M.J.C. Walker). Second edition 2005. Harlow: Pearson / Prentice Hall
• Prehistoric Intertidal Archaeology in the Welsh Estuary 2000 (with Astrid Caseldine and Heike Neumann).
• The Experimental Earthwork Project 1960-1992. 1996 ( with Peter Fowler and Simon Hillson) York: Council for British Archaeology Research Report 100
• Past and Present Soil Erosion 1992 (edited with John Boardman). Oxford: Oxbow Monograph 22.
• Brean Down Excavations 1983-87. 1990. London: English Heritage Archaeological Report 15
• Wilsford Shaft excavations 1960-62. 1989 (with Paul Ashbee and Edwina Proudfoot). London: English Heritage Archaeological Report 11

 

Publications:

Y

Jump to: 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003

Number of items: 11.

2008

• Britton, K., Müldner, G. and Bell, M. (2008) Stable isotope evidence for salt-marsh grazing in the Bronze Age Severn Estuary, UK: implications for palaeodietary analysis at coastal sites. Journal of Archaeological Science, 35 (8). pp. 2111-2118. ISSN 0305-4403

2007

• Bell, M. and Brown, A. (2007) Prehistoric activity in Peterstone Great Wharf Palaeochannels: interim report on field survey 2007-8. Archaeology in the Severn Estuary, 18. pp. 85-101.

2006

• Bell, M. (2006) Time Tide and Society: the archaeology of coastal environments. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

2005

• Bell, M. and Walker, M.J.C. (2005) Late Quaternary Environmental Change: physical and human perspectives. Pearson, Harlow.
• Bell, M. (2005) Prehistoric Coastal Communities in Western Britain. BAA Archaeology Research Report.

2004

• Allen, J. R. L., Bell, M.G. and Scales, R.R.L. (2004) Animal and human footprint tracks in archaeology: description and significance. Archaeology in the Severn Estuary, 14. pp. 55-68.
• Bell, M. (2004) Geoarchaeology in action: studies in soil morphology and landscape evolution. Antiquity, 78 (302). pp. 955-956. ISSN 0003-598X
• Bell, M., Allen, J. R. L., Buckley, S., Dark, P. and Nayling, N. (2004) Mesolithic to Neolithic coastal environmental change: excavations at Goldcliff East, 2003 and research at Redwick. Archaeology in the Severn Estuary, 14. pp. 1-26.

2003

• Macphail, R. I., Crowther, J., Acott, T. G., Bell, M. G. and Cruise, J. M. (2003) The experimental earthwork at Wareham, Dorset after 33 years: Changes to the buried LFH and Ah horizons. Journal of Archaeological Science, 30 (1). pp. 77-93. ISSN 0305-4403
• Bell, M. and Morse, S. (2003) Measuring Sustainability. Learning by doing. Earthscan, London. ISBN 1 85383 843 8 and 1 85383 839 X
• Bell, M., Allen, J. R. L., Buckley, S., Dark, P. and Haslett, S.K. (2003) Mesolithic to Neolithic coastal environmental change: excavations at Goldcliff East, 2002. Archaeology in the Severn Estuary, 13. pp. 1-29.

This list was generated on Tue Feb 7 14:03:38 2012 GMT.

Qualifications:

BSc, PhD (London), FBA, FSA