Gerald Clough Dunning was a pioneering scholar in the development of medieval British archaeology. His most significant contribution was in the study of post-Conquest pottery; he was largely responsible for establishing the first chronological framework by which different types of English ceramics could be dated. His work has been described as 'visionary' and 'seminal'. It has been noted that Dunning didn't achieve the profile of some of his peers due to the fact that he didn't write a text-book on either medieval pottery in particular or on medieval archaeology in general, but concentrated on writing articles for academic journals and encouraged the research interests of others, however John Hurst argued that, '...we should regard Gerald Dunning as the main founding father of medieval archaeology as we know it today in the last quarter of the 20th Century'.
At the beginning of Dunning's career there was a general ignorance regarding the chronology of later English medieval pottery, and this problem began to occupy his mind during the rescue excavations he undertook in the City of London during the early 1930s; he later recalled, '... I hastily planned Roman walls, drew sections, took photographs and scribbled notes on pieces of paper. We then left the sites, pausing for a glass of sherry at one of the very convenient pubs on the way, and returned to the Guildhall for lunch. Later in the afternoon and evening, I returned to the London Museum, there to disentangle my notes and start to draw the plans correctly and have a go at the pottery. Medieval pottery often turned up in the City and I began to draw this too. Often, in the evening Mortimer Wheeler used to come in to see what was the loot that day. He was as perplexed as I that not even a vague date could be given to the medieval pots'. In 1931 Dunning was awarded the Esher Research Studentship to study specifically medieval pottery and published his first two reports on groups of these objects in 1935. Over the following 40 years he developed the first chronology of later English medieval pottery. He was able to discern regional variations in use and production, and through research in France, the Low Countries, Scandinavia and Germany, insular from imported pottery in England, as well as English exports to the Continent. According to Hurst, 'Because of all this work, we have a basic framework on which our present knowledge of medieval pottery and many other classes of object is founded'
Anglo-Saxon archaeology
Dunning also published extensively on Anglo-Saxon pottery, most notably on Saxo-Norman wheel-thrown types from East Anglia. He also examined late Anglo-Saxon pottery imports from the Rhineland to understand the complexity of North Sea trade routes during the period. He collaborated with Sonia Chadwick Hawkes on a study of some of the ornamental migration period grave goods excavated from Anglo-Saxon cemeteries in Kent.
Other research
In all, Dunning produced 302 published articles, 188 of them were concerned with medieval or Anglo-Saxon pottery. His many other research interests included: French and English schist hones, stone mortars from Purbeck and Caen, the medieval Devon slate trade, black marble Tournai fonts in England and on the Continent, ceramic roof furniture such as chimney pots, finials and roof-tile crests, Iron-Age Swan's neck and Ring-headed pins and late Anglo-Saxon belt buckles. He carried out excavations at a stone circle and cairn in Brecknockshire, Salmonsbury Camp Hillfort, Gloucestershire, an Anglo-Saxon site at Bourton on the Water and at Roman Gloucester, amongst others.
Personal life
Dunning was a keen oarsman in his youth, and throughout his life wore a boater with his Old School rowing colours every summer. Later in life he became an expert on Academic and Ecclesiastical dress. He could distinguish all the robes from the major European universities and also collected Cardinals' hats. He married Muriel Higham in 1938; they had a son and daughter. Gerald Dunning died on 16 April 1978.
