BSA and Wales

There are surprisingly no students admitted to the BSA from universities in Wales in the period up to the First World War. Yet there was a growing interest in classical archaeology in the constituent colleges. George Chatterton Richards (1867-1951) was a BSA student (1889-1891), and worked with Ernest Gardner at Megalopolis. Richards was appointed professor of Greek at the University College of South Wales and Monmouthshire (1891-98). During this period he was not only ordained, but also served as Assistant Director of the British School under David Hogarth (1897).

Richards was succeeded by Ronald Montagu Burrows (1867-1920) who held the post until 1908 when he moved to Manchester. Cardiff had a succession of Greek archaeologists including Percy Neville Ure (1879-1950) who was lecturer in Greek from 1903 until moving to Leeds. Though neither Burrows nor Ure were officially admitted as students, they excavated at Rhitsona in Boeotia (though it was not an official BSA dig). It was a Cardiff student, G.E. Holding, who may hold the honour of being the first woman to work on a British field-project in Greece, Rhitsona.

Henry J.W. Tillyard held the chair of Greek at University College, Cardiff (1926-46). He had previously held the chair of Latin, University College, Johannesburg (1919-21), and the chair of Russian at Birmingham (1921-26).

The only other university in Wales that employed former BSA students as lecturers was Bangor. It had become part of the University of Wales in 1893; previously it had been the University College of North Wales awarding London degrees (1884-93). William John Woodhouse (1866-1937), who had been working in Aitolia, joined the department as assistant lecturer in 1896; he left in 1899 to become lecturer in Ancient History and Political Philosophy at St Andrews. Edward S. Forster (1879-1950), who had worked at Praesos on Crete and as part of the survey of Laconia, joined the department as assistant lecturer (1904-05). He left for to be lecturer (and later professor) of Greek at Sheffield.

(Sir) Henry Stuart-Jones (1867-1939) served as Principal for the University College of Wales at Aberystwyth (1927-34) but resigned on the grounds of ill health.