By Wendy Slaninka (Granddaughter of James Leslie Starkey & Marjorie Starkey by their daughter Mary)

This is my third article for the Filming Antiquity  blog regarding Harding’s archaeology footage and links in with my first and second articles ‘Living at Lachish – Life in Camp’ and ’Olive Starkey – Lady of Lachish’, where there is other information and photos.  There are a couple of references to James Leslie Starkey's wife Marjorie (known as Madge) in the Living at Lachish article too. All the Photos in this article are from the family collection unless otherwise stated. 
 
There is brief footage of Madge and the children on Harding films, and the official Lachish promotional film used in the 1930s, but as yet the extracts posted on the site only include shots of Leslie.
 
James Leslie Starkey was my Grandfather, my Mother Mary’s Father, but he died before I was born so I never knew him.  In fact he died while his children, John, Mary and Jane, were still very young so to a great extent neither did they.  However their Mother, Marjorie ‘Madge’ Starkey (my Grandmother) put together a scrapbook for each of them so that they should know something of him and about him and of his work when they were old enough to understand.  So it is only owing to her careful preservation of the records, photographs, publications and many, many newspaper articles etc. that I am able to reproduce some of it in my articles.  Unfortunately Grandmother also died before I was born so I never knew her either but I know lots about her from my mother Mary and my uncle John.

​Marjorie Rosaline Rice was born in 1899 in Chislehurst, Kent, a pleasant well-knit community, the daughter of Arthur Alfred Rice – a Master Cycle Maker and Garage and Hire Car owner, and his wife Jessie Eliza (nee Chatfield).  Later on Arthur was also well known for work on behalf of St. Margaret’s Philanthropic Society and was on the Board of Governors at St. John’s Hospital.

​Madge was the youngest of five siblings – four sisters and a brother. She was an intelligent, articulate young lady who wrote beautiful letters, liked to read and listen to the radio.  She had a warm, sociable and outgoing personality, and had a good sense of fun. At school she had been very athletic, earning the nickname ‘Samson’!  She enjoyed going to the cinema and liked to knit and like a lot of girls at the time had been brought up by her mother to be a good homemaker, but she definitely also had a mind of her own.

After leaving school she worked as a driver for her father in his garage business, which I presume was fairly uncommon for a lady at that time, and during WW1 was on call for local Doctors on emergency callouts, and during the blitz actually saw two zeppelins shot down in flames.  After she married Leslie she also chauffered for a local Doctor when back in England ‘out of season’.  Later, during WWII she voluntarily worked for ‘British Restaurants’ (workers’ canteens).[1]

​She met James Leslie Starkey (known as Leslie) when she was about 18.  He was in the Royal Naval Air Service at that time and happened to stroll past her father’s garage.  He spotted her in the forecourt and winked at her, and they got chatting. Later they met up as a foursome with her sister ‘Ting’ and his cousin Eddie and it wasn’t long before they were engaged (and Ting to Eddie too!) 

They had quite a long courtship and engagement, and Madge was beginning to despair they would ever be able to afford to get married on Leslie’s meagre salary as a Petrie Pup.  It wasn’t until 1925, soon after Starkey was appointed as Director of the archaeological site at Karanis, Egypt, that at last they were able to marry and moved into their first home in Walton on Thames, which they named ‘Badari’. This was after the Badari civilisation identified by Starkey while he was working with Petrie in Qau, Egypt (1922-1924).  ​

​Madge travelled out with him for the season there in 1925 and was hooked. How exotic and exciting it must have been to arrive in the Egypt after living in England all her life – with the colourful and vibrant bazaars and suks, men in turbans and headdresses, women in veils, camels, mosques, all the sights, sounds and smells.  

​However this post was not to last and Starkey rejoined Petrie in Palestine in 1926 and Madge accompanied him every year after that: Wadi Ghazzeh, Tell Jemmeh, Tell el-Fara, Tell Ajjul, and finally to Lachish, under Starkey’s directorship.  

​Their journey out every season, which typically ran from October/November to March/April, was quite epic in itself.  They went by boat and steamship across the Mediterranean, and train, ferry, car and lorry across England, Europe and the Middle East.  An old collection of postcards from that time from Leslie to Madge when they were engaged and from Madge to her parents after they married depict typical local scenes and tourist spots – others showed girls and women in costume and going about their daily life as well scenes of sites of archaeological interest. Postmarks were from ports of call and towns, from Belgium, France, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Cyprus, Aden, Egypt, and Palestine.  

​The messages from Leslie were often in diary form recounting the travels and day to day activities. He also described his passage through other places such as the Straits of Corinth where he commented the ship only just squeezed through and, on another, passing Stromboli, with lava and smoke belching out of the volcano, pretty white walled houses in villages along the shores, looking out for the lighthouse at Alexandria, and at Cyprus they couldn’t land because of troubles – the Governor’s house had just been burned down - though they did take on 240 head of cattle which were stowed in the hold bound for Jaffa.  
 
Those from Madge include ‘My dearest Mother’ or ‘Dear Ma and Pa’ from the Shepherd’s Hotel, Cairo (a fashionable hotel founded in 1845) where they honeymooned! – her first trip abroad on the way to Karanis – ‘Here we are - We arrived last night – have been round the town – its so hot – am enjoying every moment’.  Another was from Naples - ‘the weather is glorious – went to Pompeii yesterday – twas all wonderful and Naples! – well you should come and see it.  Vesuvius smokes steadily away – at night one can see the red fire’.  They were staying in Bertolini’s Palace Hotel which commanded a grand view of Vesuvius, Naples and the Bay – it is still there today.  

One after a day touring Paris ‘just had supper – not frogs! – charabang round the shops – Oh! The exquisite handbags here! Another from Rome ‘had a good day sightseeing – Oh what a lot I’ve seen – all beautiful’. Another from Switzerland written on board the train ‘just passing through Switzerland – finished breakfast – excellent coffee’¸and from Tel Aviv ‘we are in a hotel right on the seafront – bathe and make sandpies all day – rather hot but very lovely – all very brown already’.  Many ended with her customery sign-off ‘Luck and Love’

​The cards describe the sights en route as well gales and choppy seas with bad crossings, the food they ate, travelling companions, the lack of sleep owing to crowded carriages in trains and the views from the window, people they met and places and hotels in which they stayed. Son John particularly remembers the journey out on the steamship ‘RMS Strathmore’ in 1935  They had gone tourist class, Madge, Jane and Mary in one cabin, he and his father and two other men in another.  There were several Australian families on board and when they disembarked at Port Said he remembers with embarrassment the boys ribbing him about his sailor suit that Madge had dressed him in which was all the rage at the time.

Madge had three children with Leslie -  John in 1928, Mary in 1931 and Jane in 1935 and the expanding family travelled out with Leslie every season they could.  She bore up well in the desert heat as an expectant mother with John in 1928 at Tell Fara and travelled out again with him at 5 months old the next season later that year.

​She would have missed the October 1931 season as that was when Mary was born so she and the children would not have gone out til the October 1932 season, with Mary aged 1 year. 

Leslie missed his family that season and sent Mary a pretty little string of beads for her bonnet made by one of young girls working on the dig together with some money for sweets ’which she was to share with her brother’ with a charming note‘from your loving Daddy’telling her he would be home ‘when the bluebells are just about to blossom’. Many of his cards and letters to Madge contained cartoons drawn by him and little quips and fun-filled comments and terms of endearment. His Christmas card to Madge, contained real pressed flowers from the Holy Land, and also had a little verse at the back and a cute sketch aimed at Madge:  ‘When gloating over the Xmas fare – Don’t Forget!! The more you eat the fatter you’ll get !!!

And Jane too was only 5 months old when they sailed out after she was born in 1935. Travelling with young children and babies on the journeys they undertook to get to the digs could not have been easy, although once at the dig sites Madge had a willing supply of nannies to help with the children.

​Madge was a very organised and capable person and her son John remembers her taking charge of all the necessary packing and planning, and the shutting up of the house in England for the season.  The only times she didn’t accompany Leslie was if she had just had - or was about to have - a new baby.  

​In 1937 they moved to their second home in St.Margaret’s, Twickenham, to be nearer to Madge’s family home  - a lovely settlement of homes, the back gardens of which encircled their own private lake with woods and gardens (Madge’s father lived the other side of the lake and the children would cross the little bridge on the lake to visit him).  Leslie also arranged for a daily maid to help Madge with the upkeep of the much bigger house and the three children.
 
Whilst Madge’s role was as a Wife and Mother, and did not have any particular interest in the archaeology side of things, she did support Leslie in his work as the Director’s wife and would help out where she could; and also had the rather gruesome task of packing away skulls at Lachish for despatch to England, after they had been cleaned and waxed!  Madge loved the Bedouins too, immersing herself in their culture and language, which she learnt, and their dress and music, even learning how to drum.  One season Madge taught everyone how to knit, men and women alike, both the members of the team and the Bedouins, who begged to be taught – it was quite a craze and everyone was at it, knitting stockings and jumpers.  Olga commented that it was so funny watching the houseboys with their big hands trying to weald the needles  [see also ‘Camp Capers’ photo in ‘Life in Camp’ article with Madge in Fancy Dress]. All the time Madge was in Palestine she collected folk costumes, embroideries, jewellery, fabrics, textiles,  etc.  After her death Olga Tufnell arranged for Madge’s collection to be donated to the Palestine Heritage Museum in Jerusalem, where it is on display today.  

 
She also helped Leslie in the preparations that had to be planned for camp visitors, and the stream of people who undertook field work and helped out in many ways over the years.  As I mentioned earlier, her mother had made sure all her daughters were well groomed in homemaking skills and Madge was an excellent cook and hostess, as well as a wonderful, generous and loving wife to Leslie and mother to her children.   

Madge did not accompany Leslie on that last tragic season in 1938 because they both decided the childrens’ education was suffering and it was about time they attended school properly.  She and the children were never to see their beloved Leslie again.
 
TO BE CONTINUED, with a further article on the tragedy and its aftermath.

Guest post by Caitlin R. O’Grady (UCL Institute of Archaeology)
 
Document, document, document.  That is the conservator’s mantra.
 
Often, documentation takes the form of before and after treatment photos, and/or staging images that describe active intervention. However, in the early decades of the profession, documentation was not a carefully followed tenant.
 
Where early records exist, they often are cursory and limited to brief paper notes. Therefore, it is the unexpected inclusion of active preservation in films digitised through Filming Antiquity which makes them extraordinary. In addition to documenting all aspects of archaeology, these films provide a snapshot of conservation and preservation of archaeological artefacts as practised in the field and laboratory between the 1930s and the 1960s.

Conservation in the field

Gerald Lankester Harding, James Leslie Starkey, Marjorie Rice and Olga Tufnell led excavations at Tell ed-Duweir as part of the Wellcome-Marston Expedition to the Near East between 1932 and 1938. During this period excavation photographer Ralph Richmond Brown produced a film, “Lachish – City of Judah”, to document the site and the process of excavation for a public audience.
 
Conservation activities including field consolidation (strengthening material by filling in pores), packing artefacts for transport and ceramic reconstruction are also recorded, highlighting the importance of preservation in archaeological enquiry. In this first sequence from “Lachish – City of Judah” a woman carefully applies molten wax to faunal remains (while smoking!) in order to preserve “these fragile bones for transport to England”.
 
Wax consolidation, a common practise in the field to aid transport of fragile archaeological remains, is well documented in early publications (e.g. Petrie 1904; Rathgen 1905; Droop 1915; Lucas 1924, Delougaz 1933; Plenderleith 1934). While invaluable during this early period, as supplies and chemicals were frequently impossible to procure in the field, wax causes staining and is difficult to remove, particularly when applied at excessively high temperatures.

Ione Gedye, founder of the Repair Department at the Institute of Archaeology (IoA), University of London, taught conservation from 1937 until her retirement in 1975. She discusses the use of wax and some of these very issues in the 1947 notes she prepared for Institute of Archaeology students on the treatment of archaeological artefacts in the field and laboratory.  
 
Gedye (1947: 10) writes, “in the field paraffin wax is often used to strengthen bones … in some cases the wax was put on too hot and penetrated so deeply that it could only be removed with difficulty”; she concludes “it is best to avoid the use of wax for bones, though an exception may be made in the case of paraffin wax bandages”. As conservators, we often find remnants of these treatments, but much more rarely can rely on photographic or written documentation describing the materials used for stabilisation.   
 
The film also documents reconstruction of ceramics recovered at Tell-ed Duweir. In the second sequence, a woman applies thick, dark adhesive to sherds allowing them to dry by propping them up and using gravity to aid tight joins – a technique I and many other conservators continue to use during fieldwork. After the vessel is completely reconstructed and adhesive dried, we see her making plaster fills to fill losses.
 
Despite not being able to see her face, it is likely that this is Olive Starkey, sister of James and sister-in-law of Marjorie. Olive was responsible for much of the restoration of finds on site and in London and she is directly thanked by Olga and colleagues for her work in the “repair and reconstruction of pottery since 1933” (Tufnell et al. 1940: 12). This practice was not uncommon; many wives and other female relations of archaeologists worked at “mending”, “sticking” and “restoring” artefacts in the field during this early period. The IoA hired Olive Starkey to work in the Repair Department in December 1945. In this capacity, she and Gedye taught students how to conserve recently excavated artefacts from Tell-ed Duweir as well as other sites.

An animation in “Electrolytic Treatment of Iron Objects”, an IoA film probably created in 1954/1955*, describes the chemical process by which chlorides (responsible for active corrosion) are removed from corroded metals during electrolysis. This technique is used in conservation to reduce corrosion through the application of an electric current through an ionic solution – in this case sodium hydroxide (NaOH). The resulting reaction reduces the corroded metal from an oxide and converts it back to a metal.

The animation is followed by a clip of Ione Gedye herself demonstrating this technique on iron artefacts in the laboratory. Critically, students are advised to control the treatment process by monitoring the presence of chlorides in soak water.  

Work is conducted in an open laboratory and without personal protective equipment such as gloves. As with the Lachish films, health and safety in the handling of chemicals is not a priority. While some steps utilise harsher chemicals and tools than we may use now, the approach as demonstrated is not very different from electrolytic methods used to treat metals today. 

Conservation in action

Professional photographer Maurice Cookson, former director of the IoA Photographic Department and author of the ground-breaking Photography for Archaeologists (1954), and Sheppard Frere, Professor of Archaeology of the Roman Empire at University of London created the film “Lifting a Mosaic Pavement” in 1957 to document the removal of an in situ mosaic and its subsequent treatment.  The mosaic was recovered in Building 3 of Insula XXVII at Verulamium, a Roman site in St. Albans, Hertfordshire.

All stages of the lifting and backing process are included, with intertitles discussing aspects of the treatment. In this clip from the film, we see the application of Corvic Q44/62 (a polyvinyl chloride adhesive) and cotton facing material, which are applied to safeguard mosaic tesserae during the lifting process. Following application of these materials, we see the process of undercutting and mosaic removal from its original find spot.

The film is interesting in that it documents the reflexive practice of conservation where process is assessed in real time and modified to better influence results. This is clear in the titles state that the use of solvent in removing the PVC adhesive was not as successful as removal without solvent.

We are fortunate that the mosaic lifting and backing procedure is further described in publication (Frere 1958) with specific information regarding the intervention materials using the lifting and backing processes including cement mortar recipes.

As Frere states (158: 116), discovery of the mosaic offered those involved the opportunity to develop a new method in collaboration with chemists working in industry. Treatments of this type are very destructive, and not as commonly utilised, but remain attractive to archaeologists interested in recovering coins and pottery in order to date the mosaic, as well as stratigraphic layers from earlier occupations.

However, the technique continues to have a place in salvage and rescue archaeology. For example, conservators and archaeologists used a similar approach (though with more stable conservation materials) to recover numerous Roman mosaics from Zeugma, located near Gaziantepe, Turkey, following the construction of the Birecik Dam on the Eurphrates River (Nardi & Schneider 2013).

These films offer an extraordinary glimpse into archaeological conservation as practised in the field and laboratory from the 1930s through to the 1960s. They connect the published literature and its translation into actual practice and are amazing documents of the field’s early history.  

I hope you have found these films as incredible as I have.  I would love to hear from anyone who participated in filming during this period at the IoA, or saw these films while studying or working at the Institute.  Please get in touch to share your perspective and memories!

*The film is referenced in an IoA annual report from 1956 (IoA 1956: 7).

References/Further Reading
Delougaz, P. 1915. The Treatment of Clay Tablets in the Field. The Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization, no. 7, ed. James Henry Breasted, Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, pp. 39-57.

Droop, J.P. 1915. Archaeological Excavation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Frere, S. 1958. Lifting Mosaics. Antiquity 32 (126): 116-119.

Gedye, I. 1947. Notes on the Treatment of Archaeological Objects in the Field & the Laboratory. For the Use of Students of the Institute – Not For Publication. Unpublished course notes. University of London, Institute of Archaeology.

Gedye, I. 1953. Report of the Technical Department. In Ninth Annual Report. London University of London Institute of Archaeology, pp. 6.

Lucas, A. 1924. Antiques - Their Restoration and Preservation. London: E. Arnold & Co.

Nardi, R. and Schneider, K. 2013. Site Conservation during the Rescue Excavations. In Excavations at Zeugma. Ed. W. Aylward. Los Altos, California: The Packard Humanities Institute, pp. 55-70.

O’Grady, C.R. expected 2017. Gentlewomen in the Field and Museum: Unacknowledged Pioneers in the Development of Conservation as both Profession and University Discipline – the London Case. In Engaging Conservation: Collaboration Across Disciplines. Eds. Lynn Grant, Julia Lawson, Nina Owczarek. Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Museum.

Petrie, W.M.F. 1904.  Methods & Aims in Archaeology. London: Macmillan and Co., Limited (New York: The Macmillan Company).

Plenderleith, H.J. 1934. The Preservation of Antiquities. London: The Museums Association.

Rathgen, F. 1905. The Preservation of Antiquities – A Handbook for Curators. trans. George A. Auden and Harold A. Auden, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Tufnell, O., Inge, C.H, and Harding, L. 1940. Lachish II (Tell ed Duweir). The Fosse Temple. London: Oxford University Press.

University of London Institute of Archaeology. 1956. Report of the Photographic Department. Twelfth Annual Report. London: University of London Institute of Archaeology pp 7.

University of London Institute of Archaeology. 1959. Report of the Director for the Session 1957-58. Fifteenth Annual Report. Bulletin of the Institute of Archaeology 2: 72-84.