Miss Layard excavates: a Palaeolithic site at Foxhall Road, Ipswich, 1903-1905

Abstract

Between 1903 and 1905 Miss Nina Frances Layard conducted exemplary excavations of an outstanding Palaeolithic site on plateau gravels above Ipswich. Here, Palaeolithic humans gathered around the edges of an erstwhile lake and/or river, leaving behind stone tools and manufacturing waste. Many remarkable pictures emerge from this book: of the excavator, an Edwardian lady of great determination and skill; of the site itself, which might well have been on a par with Boxgrove had it been discovered today; of the piecing together of Miss Layard's lost archive by Steven Plunkett; of the meeting of two enthusiasts and their decision to write this book - and last but by no means least - of the remarkable archaeological evidence. The authors have assembled a jigsaw of magnificent proportions: their detective work has enabled them to return a neglected but truly significant site to its rightful place in the canon of British Palaeolithic archaeology.