A Century of Ancient Monuments Legislation 1882–1982

Abstract

In his Anniversary Address to the Fellowship on St. George's Day 1883 Lord Carnarvon commented on The Act for the Better Protection of Ancient Monuments of the previous year:Gentlemen, I am sure you will agree with me that one of the first subjects on which I ought to congratulate both this Society and the archaeological world of England is the passing into law of the Bill for the Protection of Ancient Monuments to which successive Presidents of this Society have so often, during the last ten years, wished success from this place. Perhaps I ought rather to have said a Bill than the Bill, for we all know, and so knowing we all regret—no one more than Sir John Lubbock himself—in what a mutilated condition, shorn of many of its original provisions, crippled in its powers and limited in its scope that measure finally become the law of the land. For these untoward results we must thank the supineness of the public, the prejudices of Parliament and perhaps I may add the all absorbing pressure of Irish Measures.