It was hard work. I had been on site for almost a fortnight and I had experienced a tiny sample of just the first part, the fieldwork. It had taught me two things: a deep respect for the skill and discipline of archaeologists, their ability to read the soil with such sensitivity, and the scrupulous, painstaking way in which they arrive at even the most provisional of interpretations; and the certainty that I was in every way unsuited to this kind of work. By the end of two weeks I was exhausted, irritable, and impatient. I was sick of the taste of five thousand year old dust, and the feel of sweat and ancient grit in my boots and clothes…