Acting archeology?


I really have enjoined most of the episodes from 1994 until recently.
Watching the 2012 series, it seems to me that the digging is mostly done in the background by anonymous diggers and not only the presenter, but all the other main 'characters' like the site director, Phil Harding and some other archeologists just play a role like actors do in a movie with previously rehearsed texts.
And is that the reason why Mick Aston quit the series?

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If Phil did all the digging they would not get much done in three days. Phil is an academic who is paid more for what he knows than what he does. You would have to ask Mick Aston for his own reasons, it is probably a clash of personalities.

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Yes, archeology students as a matter of fact, under supervision.

Some of the universities are using Time Team to to give their students practical lessons. My ex-girlfriend studied archeology and wanted to study in England. Some of the universities tells about it in the brochures.

Ashton is dead now, so I suppose the reason he left was failing health.




It`s far easier to start a war than to end one.

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He left because he felt BBC dumbed down the show and he wasn't having that.

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The BBC didn't make the show.

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Nevermind, you did enlighten us in the comment below. :D

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Professor Mick left because Channel 4 changed his team of diggers, they changed the format and pushed the archeology into the background.

To be honest i don't think he was ever the same after his brain haemorrhage, i think that's when he stopped actually doing the digging work and started being advisor / supervisor off to the side in a tent.

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Oh, so his illness that was often mentioned was brain haemorrhage? When did it happen?

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About 8 - 9 years before he died. I don't think it was the illness which killed him though.

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Oh, thank you for that. I was always wondering about his mysterious illness and google provided no answers. :)

Maybe there was something else, because even before that he never helped with the actual digging but only supervised and ran things. But then again that must've been difficult enough.

Shame the show ended, I only discovered it last year and as a non-British person learned quite a lot about the British history from it.

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It's a brilliant show, a real shame that it ended.

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Same here, WhiteTiger. Discovered Time Team early last year, and live in the US.
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