The group was founded in July 2009 by Peter Denison-Edson who became the first chairman. The group’s work began under the guidance of an eminent amateur archaeologist, Tim Laurie, a Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries, and a leading expert on prehistoric landscapes in the northern dales.
Tim had previously conducted many years of extensive fieldwork. Most notably, from 1984 to 1993, he was joint director along with Professor Andrew Fleming, then at the University of Sheffield, of the Swaledale Land Boundaries Project. This was a 10-year study that recorded the visible remains of extensive Bronze-Age coaxial field systems on open moorland and of Iron-Age and Romano-British settlements within present-day pastures on the lower slopes.
Tim was appointed honorary president of SWAAG at its inception. Since then, hundreds of Tim’s surveys and observations have been entered on the SWAAG database, accessible on this web site, while members of the group have added to the study and explorations of the archaeology and history of the two dales, often with Tim’s guidance.
In 2014, SWAAG became a Charitable Incorporated Organisation (CIO), registered with the Charity Commission (no 1155775) and became managed by a board of volunteer trustees. To read our constitution and to see a list of current trustees, see the page Governance.
