Firstly, Neil stated that he has produced an “archaeologically and anthropologically informed” military book, “Lawrence of Arabia’s War” based on a project he co-directed: The Great Arab Revolt Project (2006-14), based at Bristol University where he is a Research Fellow; his talk would be about both the project and modern conflict archaeology. Archaeologists can add information to the military sources, in this case the Arab Revolt which took place in the Middle East during WWI. As many participants in wars are illiterate, the result is that many encounters which take place go unrecorded, so archaeological traces are often the first indication that they actually happened. The archaeological investigation of the battle of the Little Big Horn in the USA added much to what was known about it.

From 1914 there was a paradigm shift in warfare, both qualitative and quantitative. Combat had become industrialised, the sheer volume of fire power forcing men underground, into trenches. Battles now lasted sometimes weeks, even months – the only comparable situation previously perhaps being prolonged sieges. In modern warfare everything is militarised, including the Home Front as this too becomes a target. So there is now the archaeology of general conflict, confrontations such as the Cold War extending across the entire planet. It is also about commemoration and about the politics of war, for example the Greenham Common women’s camp - the archaeology of popular resistance and response. So it is multi-layered.

WWI Western Front archaeology is deeply stratified, with large quantities of weapons and human remains. The Great Arab Revolt Project pioneered extending military archaeology into a new dimension: finding evidence of guerrilla warfare. The Project took place over nine seasons, each with about 30 people working in the field for two weeks. It was very successfully funded by charging people for a “working holiday” – probably the attraction was Lawrence of Arabia himself – and involved research, field reconnaissance and landscape survey, giving a sense of the distribution of sites. This was carried out in vehicles and on foot: the entire length of the Hejaz Railway was walked. They then focussed in on certain sites with GPS, metal detectors, etc., working in greater detail to identify the features found there. The War had centred on the now disused Hejaz Railway, which ran from Damascus to Medina. Originally planned as a pilgrim route extending all the way to Mecca, for various reasons it never actually reached Mecca, but became a strategic route for the ruling Ottomans (Turks) to take military force into and tighten their control over the Arab territories. Now there is a modern highway – still running along this traditional caravan route which goes back centuries, so finds date back to medieval times.

The railway cut the journey from one month to three days, so was good for communications, but it involved a lot of railway staff, huge supplies of wood (coal not being available) and large quantities of water (it was a steam railway), a problem in a desert. Securing the railway against (the frequent) attacks was a massive military commitment. All 77 stations, now in a ruinous condition, were militarised, turned into small fortresses, sometimes with other fortresses overlooking the stations from nearby high ground. It became necessary to disperse men right along the line. Ottoman Army camps are now particularly indicated by “tent rings” – rings of stones for anchoring tents. Finds typically tend to be buttons, bullets: virtually every site investigated yielded spent munitions, from both sides of the conflict, suggesting exchanges of fire (the British were supplying the Arabs with rifles). A battle at the intensively garrisoned (c6000 troops) Ma’an Station is described in Lawrence’s book The Seven Pillars of Wisdom. The Project took air photographs of the classic trench system there and metal detected along the firing line. This industrialisation of a traditional landscape transformed it, disrupting ancient patterns. The Bedouin did not like the railway because it not only put out of business the traders who had supplied travellers such as pilgrims along the traditional caravan route, but put a stop to the payments which could be charged for moving through their territories. Although the railway is now no longer in operation, the Bedouin are still there, with their herds.

The Project also investigated the wilderness beyond the Railway. For the Turkish Army it was a harsh environment and besides the tent rings their camping places are indicated by bread ovens, latrines, etc. As water was crucial, watering places also had to be guarded. Evidence of the mule trains used for conveying water to the Ottoman troops took the form of mule shoes and animal enclosures, as well as bits of uniform, boots, cutlery, food remains, matchboxes, combs, playing cards.

On the other hand the Arab insurgents were highly mobile, on camels, carrying everything they needed. Camels could go everywhere. Lawrence himself was invisible. The Ottoman Army was an alien, highly visible presence, versus Bedouin nomad guerrillas, mostly leaving no imprint; they had a relationship with the landscape. The Ottomans were fighting against the entire population (as in Viet Nam).

Yvonne Masson