Edward Benjamin Howard Cunnington (1861–1950), was a British archaeologist most famous for his work on prehistoric Wiltshire. He was the great grandson of the famous antiquarian William Cunnington and the fourth generation of his family to work recording and preserving Wiltshire's past. 1861 is a common year starting on Tuesday. ... 1950 (MCML) was a common year starting on Sunday (link will take you to calendar). ... Archaeology or sometimes in American English archeology (from the Greek words αρχαίος = ancient and λόγος = word/speech) is the study of human cultures through the recovery, documentation and analysis of material remains, including architecture, artefacts, biofacts, human remains, and landscapes. ... Wiltshire (abbreviated Wilts) is a large southern English county. ... An antiquarian or antiquary is one concerned with antiquities or things of the past. ... William Cunnington (1754–31 December 1810) was a pioneering English antiquarian and archaeologist of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. ...

The son of Henry Cunnington, a wine merchant, Benjamin was a journalist before joining his father's business. He was also for sixty years also the unpaid honorary curator of Devizes Museum. In 1889 he married Maud Pegge and the two devoted their lives to archaeology. They had one son, Edward, who was killed in the First World War Arms of Devizes Devizes is a town and civil parish in the English county of Wiltshire. ... Maud Edith Cunnington (née Pegge) (24 September 1869–28 February 1951), was a Welsh-born archaeologist, most famous for her pioneering work on the prehistoric sites of Salisbury Plain. ... Ypres, 1917, in the vicinity of the Battle of Passchendaele. ...

The Cunningtons carried out excavations at some of the most important sites in British archaeology. These included the first known Neolithic causewayed enclosure at Knap Hil, the Iron age village at All Cannings Cross, West Kennet Long Barrow, Woodhenge, (which they named) and the The Sanctuary. This last monument they rediscovered as it had been lost since William Stukeley saw it in the eighteenth century. Woodhenge and The Sanctuary were bought by the Cunningtons and given to the nation. Excavation is the best-known and most commonly used technique within the science of archaeology. ... Causewayed enclosures are a type of large prehistoric earthworks common to the early Neolithic Europe. ... Iron Age Axe found on Gotland This article is about the archaeological period known as the Iron Age, for the mythological Iron Age see Iron Age (mythology). ... All Cannings Cross is the name of farm and an archaeological site close to All Cannings near Devizes in the English county of Wiltshire. ... The West Kennet Long Barrow is a Neolithic tomb, situated on a prominent chalk ridge, near Silbury Hill, one-and-a-half miles south of Avebury in Wiltshire. ... Woodhenge Woodhenge is a Neolithic Class I henge and timber circle monument located to the North of Amesbury in Wiltshire, England, and it is closer to Amesbury than is Stonehenge. ... The Sanctuary is a prehistoric site on Overton Hill located around 5 miles west of Marlborough in the English county of Wiltshire. ... William Stukeley (November 7, 1687–March 3, 1765) was an English antiquary who pioneered the archaeological investigation of Stonehenge and Avebury. ...

He died a few months before his wife, who was suffering from Alzheimer's disease.

Source

• Rundle, P ‘'Cunnington , Maud Edith (1869-1951)’', Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, Oxford University Press, 2004 accessed 23 September 2005