By that time, it was more like the ghost of a ship-the acidic earth had decayed the wood and the body of whoever was buried there, but the imprint of the hull and its rivets remained pressed into the dirt. It too had been explored by vandals, but thankfully, they missed the massive treasure it held: An 80-foot-long burial ship.
In 1939, the team at Sutton Hoo decided to tackle the largest mound of all. But many of the mounds had already been raided by grave robbers, and there was no larger hoard. The first three mounds that Brown and his assistants explored during the summer of 1838 revealed objects including knives and an axe head, as well as textiles, bronze fragments, and human remains. Cook // Getty Images Pretty and Brown realized that they’d made an extraordinary discovery. When Pretty hired him to begin excavating the mounds on her property, it sparked an archaeological investigation that would continue for decades.Įxcavators working on the burial ship at Sutton Hoo. By 1938, he’d already written a book about astronomy, and was working as a freelance archaeologist at the Ipswich Museum. He worked odd jobs, including as a milkman and gardener, while pursuing his less remunerative passions of astronomy and archaeology. Born to farmers in 1888, he left school at age 12 to work on the farm but taught himself Latin, French, and astronomy. She was put in touch with the local Ipswich Museum, which arranged for Basil Brown, an amateur archaeologist who worked with the institution, to begin excavations.īrown, played by Fiennes in the film, was an accomplished autodidact. The area derived its name from the nearby village of Sutton, while “hoo” is Old English for “spur of land.” After her husband’s death, Pretty, who lived on the estate with her son Robert (played in The Dig by Archie Barnes), became determined to have the mounds excavated. The property was located in southeast England and featured 18 mounds of earth that were, according to local legend, ancient burial mounds.
After she married Frank Pretty, who, as described in the film, proposed to her 15 times before she said yes, the couple bought the Sutton Hoo estate.
Pretty was born Edith Dempster in 1883 to a wealthy manufacturing family.
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