Lachish

HSW co-funded (along with Sir Charles Marston and Sir Robert Mond), work done by JL Starkey, a professional archaeologist, at Lachish (Tell ed Duweir), in Palestine, from October 1932. The project seems to have had three main phases. For the first season, 1932-1933, it took place in conjunction with H Dunscombe Colt and was known as the 'Wellcome-Colt Expedition'. The following season, after Colt had withdrawn from the undertaking, it became known as the 'Wellcome Archaeological Research Expedition to the Near East' (WARENE). After HSW's death the Wellcome Trust continued to fund the project for a few more years, jointly with Marston, at which point it became known as the 'Wellcome- Marston Archaeological Research Expedition to the Near East'. The most famous result of the excavations was the discovery of the 'Lachish Letters', potsherds inscribed with early Hebrew. After Starkey's death at the hands of Arab bandits in January 1938, the excavations continued until the end of that season under the auspices of CH Inge and were then wound up. Each year from 1932-1938 an exhibition of the findings was held in London and from 1938 to 1953, the Wellcome Trust oversaw the publication of a four-volume work on the excavations. The material in this section appears to have two distinct provenances: the majority which relates to the early work was among HSW's personal papers, but there were also several boxes of files which may have come via the Wellcome Foundation Ltd, some of this dealing with events after HSW's death and the publication of the findings, and some presumably inherited by the Trust from the previous administration of the project. These two groupings have now been amalgamated, although any original file references have also been noted.

Persons or organisations featured in this material include:

Starkey; James Leslie (1895-1938)

Marston; Sir Charles

Mond; Sir Robert

Tufnell; Olga

Colt; H Dunscombe