University of Kent and SECL alumnus Simon Elliott (who was recently a panelist on our ‘Working in Writing and Publishing’ event), stars alongside fellow alumni Fred Birkbeck and Elizabeth Blanning in ‘The Great British Dig: History in your back garden’ which airs on More4 at 21.00 on 9 April.
In the programme, Hugh Dennis and a team of archaeologists and experts descend on Maidstone, where they believe a Roman settlement is hidden under the neighbourhood’s back gardens.
Simon said: “The actual site we used, Florence Road, was directly related to my time studying for my PhD at Kent. This identified the quarries in the upper Medway Valley from which the ragstone was extracted to build Roman London, and the villas where the elites lived. This was one of those villas. The Director of the show called me last May to ask if I knew a site where there was likely a villa beneath an urban street. I suggested Florence Road immediately, and everything fell into place!”
Dr Steve Willis, Head of the Department of Classical and Archaeological Studies, says: “Fred completed his undergraduate degree in 2018 while Simon and Elizabeth both have PhD’s from our Department where they researched Roman topics. It is really exciting that Roman archaeology in Kent features in the first programme of this new series, alongside the expertise of our graduates.”