Anniversary Address

Abstract

The first opportunity which a President of the Society of Antiquaries has to express his gratitude to the Fellowship for the honour they have done him is the Anniversary Address in the year following his initial election. My thanks are none the less heartfelt for being thus belated. It is indeed a great privilege to be permitted to serve this distinguished Society, at once so venerable and so vigorous, in the capacity of its President. A privilege I take to be something beyond or unrelated to one's deserts, and that exactly expresses my feelings on finding myself standing as the latest in the long succession of Presidents which includes so many of the great names in the study of very various aspects of antiquity. This variety itself reflects the wide range of the Society's interests, which is one of its most valuable characteristics. It is a classic illustration of this that I, a prehistorian, should succeed as President one of our most distinguished medieval historians. Christopher Brooke was a most active and devoted President to whom the Society owes a great deal. His interest and concern extended to all fields of the Society's activity, and under his leadership a number of highly desirable reforms and innovations were introduced into our procedures. If the path of his successor has thus been made smooth by the clearance of outstanding difficulties, it is on the other hand hard to follow the brilliance and virtuosity of his Anniversary Addresses. Not for nothing did he refer last year to their ‘sonata-like form’. Though I do not feel that I can emulate such subtleties, yet I hope at any rate to avoid offering you merely a medley.