Our Trustees

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Professor Martin Millett  is an archaeologist with extensive experience of fieldwork, excavation and publication of projects in the UK, Spain, Portugal and Italy. He works on the social and economic archaeology of the Roman World, and the application of survey methods in archaeology. He has also worked on landscapes and sites of a variety of periods in the UK. In addition to his academic work he has wide experience of service in the voluntary sector and in senior university management. He has previously served as secretary of the Architectural and Archaeological Society of Durham and Northumberland, assistant editor and editor for the Royal Archaeological Institute (the Archaeological Journal), chair of the publications committee for the CBA and for the British School at Rome, and as the chair of Antiquity Publications Ltd. He was the Director of the Society of Antiquaries (2001-7) and its Treasurer (2007-11). He was vice-president of the British Academy (2010-14) responsible for the overseas schools and institutes. From 2014 to 2018 he was Head of the School of Arts and Humanities at Cambridge, managing c. 250 academic staff across 8 major Departments. In this role he was part of the university’s senior management team, engaged amongst other things in the University’s £2billion fund-raising campaign.

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Dr John Cooper is an early modern historian, working mainly on Britain and Ireland with an additional interest in early colonial America.  He has published books on Tudor royal propaganda and the Elizabethan statesman Sir Francis Walsingham (the latter serialised for BBC Radio 4), and co-edited books on the arms and armour of Henry VIII and the political culture of Parliament.  Since 2013 John has been investigating the architecture and soundscape of St Stephen’s Westminster, the royal chapel which became the first permanent meeting-place of the House of Commons, in projects funded by the AHRC in collaboration with the UK Parliament.  He is an editor of the journal Parliamentary History, and co-investigator of the ‘Henry VIII on Tour’ project exploring Tudor royal progresses in collaboration with Historic Royal Palaces.  He co-curated the Society’s ‘Blood Royal’ exhibition in 2017, and was guest curator of the 2021 exhibition ‘Henry VIII: Defender of the Faith?’  John is currently Reader in Early Modern History at the University of York.  He lives in North Yorkshire.

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Dr Heather Sebire is an archaeologist with a particular interest in prehistory. She has been part of the curatorial team at English Heritage since 2007 and is currently Senior Historic Property Curator for Stonehenge working with all the sites held in guardianship in the Stonehenge and Avebury and associated sites World Heritage site. Heather is currently Honorary Secretary of the Society of Antiquaries of London of which she is a Fellow, and a former Council member of the Prehistoric Society and the Royal Archaeological Institute. She is also a member of the Scientific Committee of the ‘Paysages des mégalithes’ project to inscribe the many sites at Carnac in Brittany, France as a  World Heritage site. Current personal research interests include the Neolithic period focussing on megaliths along the Atlantic façade and the history of archaeology. Heather has published many journal papers and several books on many aspects of archaeology and heritage management.

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An experienced industrialist and financier, Carol trained as a Natural Scientist and started her career in the oil and gas industry before moving into banking where she held senior posts at UBS, Credit Suisse First Boston, JP Morgan and Chase Manhattan Bank.

Elizabeth Mary Hallam-Smith CB FSA FRHistS is an English historian and information professional who was the librarian of the House of Lords Library from 2006 to 2016. She is the first female to hold the post as well as the first to hold the post in conjunction with Director of Information Services

Dr Robert Bewley is the former Director of the Endangered Archaeology in the Middle East and North Africa project (from 2015-2020) at the University of Oxford, funded by the Arcadia Fund and the Cultural Protection Fund  http://eamena.arch.ox.ac.uk.

He has been the Co-Director of the Aerial Archaeology in Jordan project since 1998, and very recently was able to set up the Aerial Archaeology in Oman project.

For English Heritage he worked as an Inspector of Ancient Monuments, was their Head of Aerial Survey and Head of Survey; a Regional Director for the South-West from 2004-2007. He was also Director of Operations for the Heritage Lottery Fund until 2014.

He now chairs the Council for British Research in the Levant (CBRL) and is Vice-Chairman of the Mary Rose Trust. A Trustee for the International Association for the Study of Arabia and the Anglo-Jordanian Society.

His research interests include archaeology, aerial survey, field survey, heritage protection, endangered archaeology, prehistoric settlement, the Middle East and North Africa.

Victoria Bryant has worked as an archaeologist in commercial and curatorial roles for over 35 years. She is passionate about the positive social and economic effects on individuals, communities and organisations that come from engaging with history and landscape.

For ten years she led Worcestershire Archive and Archaeology Service working with partners from the public, business, academic and voluntary sectors.  She has a proven track record of the development and delivery of innovative heritage projects.

Victoria retired from this post in 2020 but continues to work as the Archaeological Advisor for the Diocese of Worcester.  She is Chair of Worcestershire Archaeological Society and a Board Member of the Chartered Institute for Archaeologists.

Dr Emily Cole is an architectural historian who since 1999 has worked at English Heritage/Historic England. She was for many years the Head of the Blue Plaques Team, and is now a Senior Architectural Investigator and (Joint) Lead Professional for Architectural Investigation, based in Cambridge. Emily has a particular interest in buildings with royal associations. She is an expert on 16^th– and early 17^th-century royal progresses and her DPhil focused on state apartments in Elizabethan and Jacobean country houses. In more recent years, Emily has also been studying 20^th-century public houses, now a highly threatened building type. Emily is the editor of A Concise History of Architectural Styles (London, 2002) and Lived in London: Blue Plaques and the Stories Behind Them (New Haven and London, 2009), and co-author of Apethorpe Hall: The Story of an English Country House (New Haven and London, 2016). She is a former committee member of the Society of Architectural Historians of Great Britain, the Attingham Society and the Society for Court Studies.

Dr Timothy Schroder is a historian and lecturer on silver and goldsmiths’ work. Previous roles include head of silver at Christie’s, Curator of Decorative Arts at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art and a Consultant Curator at the V&A. He is currently President of the Silver Society, a trustee of the Wallace Collection and a member of the Fabric Commission of Westminster Abbey. He has served two non-consecutive terms as Prime Warden of the Goldsmiths’ Company. Publications include British and Continental Gold and Silver in the Ashmolean Museum (2009) and ‘A Marvel to Behold’, Gold and Silver at the Court of Henry VIII (2020).

Roey Sweet is professor of urban history and director of the Centre for Urban History and director of research (history) at the University of Leicester.  She works on eighteenth-century social and cultural history, with a particular interest in the history of town and cities and in antiquarianism, topographical literature and the reception of the past.  She has published books on the English town in the long eighteenth century, the writing of urban histories, antiquarianism and the ‘discovery’ of the past in eighteenth century Britain, and on British engagement with Italian cities and their pasts.  She is currently working on the travels of Sir William Gell FSA in Iberia, funded by the Leverhulme Trust (RP 2020 194).  In 2018-19 she was seconded to the AHRC as Director of Partnerships and Engagement with particular responsibility for developing the AHRC’s relationship with Independent Research Organisations and for leading the preliminary survey and assessment of current and future capability in arts and humanities research infrastructure.  She has been an editor of Urban History  since 2002 and sits on the editorial board of English Historical Review, Records of Social and Economic History and Vetusta Monumenta. She is a trustee of the Marc Fitch Fund and the Historic Towns Trust and from January 2022 will be chair of the Faculty of Archaeology, History and Letters at the British School at Rome.

Ann MacSween has a unique background in archaeology and planning, having completed degrees in both.

Simon Kaner is Executive Director of the Sainsbury Institute for the Study of Japanese Arts and Cultures where he is also Head of the Centre for Archaeology and Heritage, and Director of the Centre for Japanese Studies at the University of East Anglia.

Shahina Farid is a British archaeologist who is best known for her work as Field Director and Project Coordinator at the Neolithic site of Çatalhöyük in Turkey. She is currently the scientific dating coordinator for Historic England.

Thomas Williams is a historian of the early Middle Ages and a former curator at the British Museum’s Department of Coins and Medals (2017-2018). He worked as project curator for the major international exhibition Vikings: Life and Legend (British Museum 2014) and is a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of London.