Charles Higham is a Research Professor in the Department of Anthropology, University of Otago, New Zealand. He was born and educated in England, where he studied archaeology and anthropology at Cambridge University. After completing his PhD in 1966, he was appointed to a lectureship at Otago, and two years later, he became the Foundation Professor of Anthropology and the first professor of prehistoric archaeology in Australasia.
In 1968, he was invited by Professor Wilhelm Solheim of the University of Hawaii to participate in archaeological fieldwork in Thailand, and has continued with his research in the region ever since.
After excavating in Roi et and Udorn provinces in 1969-70, he joined Chester Gorman's programme at Banyan Valley cave in 1972, and then spent two seasons working on the excavation of Ban Chiang in 1974-5. He then directed the fieldwork at the site of Ban Na Di, and has been continually active with a series of major projects, culminating with his present project, which is based in the Phimai region of Northeast Thailand, and is tracing the prehistoric origins of the civilization of Angkor.
The results of the four excavations within this programme have revolutionized our understanding of Thai and Southeast Asian prehistory. At Noen U-Loke, he has uncovered Iron Age graves of remarkable wealth, including offerings of gold, silver, carnelian, agate, bronze and glass. Ban Non Wat, a second large moated settlement in the upper Mun Valley, has yielded the burials of a princely Bronze Age elite.
Charles Higham is a Fellow of the British Academy, and a visiting scholar of St. Catharine's College, Cambridge. His research at Ban Non Wat is supported by Earthwatch and its research corps, and he welcomes volunteers to join him in his exciting and rewarding excavations.
