Diana Kirkbride facts for kids
Diana Victoria Warcup Kirkbride-Helbæk (born October 22, 1915 – died August 13, 1997) was a British archaeologist. She was an expert in the prehistory (very old history before written records) of Southwest Asia.
Her Life and Discoveries
Diana Kirkbride went to Wycombe Abbey School and served in the Women's Royal Naval Service during World War II. After the war, she studied archaeology at University College London. She focused on ancient Mesopotamia and Palestine, learning from famous archaeologists like Sir Max Mallowan and Dame Kathleen Kenyon.
From 1952 to 1955, Kirkbride worked on the important excavations at Jericho. In 1953, she started fieldwork in Jordan. This included helping to restore the Jerash Theatre and digging at Petra in 1956. She also studied the Paleolithic (Old Stone Age) and Neolithic (New Stone Age) periods in the area. She excavated a small rock shelter called Wadi Madamagh and worked at Ard Tlaili in Lebanon.
One of her biggest discoveries was a major Neolithic site at Beidha. She led the excavations there for the British School of Archaeology in Jerusalem from 1958 to 1967. While working at Beidha, she met Hans Helbæk, a Danish paleobotanist (someone who studies ancient plants). They got married in the late 1960s.
In the 1970s, Diana continued her work in Iraq. There, she found another important Neolithic site called Umm Dabaghiyah. After her husband passed away, she returned to Beidha for another season of digging in 1983. She also spent time putting together all the information from her work at Beidha and Umm Dabaghiyah. Before she died in Denmark in 1997, she was planning a new excavation of an ancient Nabataean temple at Wadi Rum.
Important Roles She Held
- Director of the British School of Archaeology in Iraq.
- Gerald Avery Wainwright Fellowship in Near Eastern Archaeology at Oxford University.
- She was a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries.
See also
In Spanish: Diana Kirkbride para niños
