Alexander Keiller

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Alexander Keiller (1889–1955) was an archaeologist and businessman who worked on the site at Avebury in Wiltshire. He was heir to the Dundee marmalade business of his family. James Keiller & Sons, was established in 1797 and exported marmalade and confectionery across the British Empire.

When Keiller was nine his father died, leaving him the sole heir to the great marmalade fortune. He was sent to Hazelwood preparatory school at Limpsfield in Surrey, and then went on to Eton College. When he was 17 his mother died and he returned home to administer the family business.

On 2 June 1913, Keiller married Florence Marianne Phil-Morris (1883–1955), the daughter of artist Philip Richard Morris, and they moved into Keiller's house in London. Later that year he founded the Sizaire-Berwick motor company, which produced copies of Rolls-Royces. After the outbreak of the First World War he joined the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve as a temporary lieutenant, moving to the Royal Naval Air Service in December 1914. In 1915 he was invalided out of the service but in 1918 he joined air intelligence, where he remained until the end of the war.

After the war, Keiller divorced his first wife, and began to pursue an interest in archaeology. In 1922 he and O. G. S. Crawford undertook an aerial survey of archaeological sites in south western England. This work led to the publication of Wessex from the Air in 1928, the first book of aerial archaeology to be published in the UK.

On 29 February 1924 Keiller married Veronica Mildred Liddell (1900–1964). Veronica shared his interest in archaeology, and visited Avebury in Wiltshire with him later that year. Using his wealth, he decided to buy nearby Windmill Hill and then undertake excavations there. His work proved that the site was a causewayed enclosure and it became the monument type-site for decades afterwards.

Following a separation, Keiller divorced Veronica in 1934. In that year he also began a two-year excavation of the West Kennet Avenue, which led south east from the Avebury stone circle. Buried stones were uncovered and re-erected, and stone-holes marked with pillars.

Keiller's first major excavation at Avebury was in 1937, the first of three seasons over the ensuing years. Each concentrated on a quadrant of the circle, clearing undergrowth, restoring and conserving the site. Buried stones, some up to a metre below ground, were uncovered and replaced in their original stone-holes, and as with the avenue, concrete pilons were placed to denote missing stones.

In 1938 the famous barber surgeon of Avebury skeleton was discovered in the south west quadrant A museum was also opened that year, displaying finds from the Windmill Hill, West Kennet, and Avebury excavations. On 16 November 1938 Keiller was married for a third time; his new wife was Doris Emerson Chapman (b. 1901), an artist, who had joined the Morven Institute of Archaeological Research, founded by Keiller, in 1937.

The Second World War ended excavations at Avebury. Keiller joined the special constabulary at Marlborough. His duties left little time for archaeology, and the museum was mothballed. In 1943, Keiller sold his holdings in Avebury to the National Trust for £12,000, the agricultural value of the 950 acres he had accrued and not reflecting the immense investment he had made at the site.

In 1966, the museum at Avebury and its contents were donated to the nation by his widow, Gabrielle. Avebury (together with Stonehenge and associated sites) was designated a World Heritage Site in 1986; in 2000 it received over 350,000 visitors.