Preface and Introduction

This book draws together a selection of findings of nearly 20 years of research by the authors into the historical archaeologies of early Sydney and Melbourne, Australia. Specifically it reports research from two major projects. The first is the Sydney-based Exploring the Archaeology of the Modern City project (EAMC) which was established in 2001 by Murray and several industry partners, to analyse and interpret the large assemblages excavated from historical archaeological sites which are held in storehouses across Sydney. The second is the Melbourne-based research into the archaeology of the Casselden Place site (popularly known as ‘Little Lon’ but also the Commonwealth Block) which began before the Sydney project and continues. Our work in Melbourne has involved the input of a significant group of historians, heritage archaeologists and managers, museum staff, undergraduate and postgraduate students, research assistants as well as a post-doctoral fellow.