Robert Varman died on 12 December 2021. Robert was born in Holland and was one of the first cohort of Historical Archaeology at Sydney University in 1974, participating in the Old Sydney Burial Ground rescue excavation that year. He would go on to excavate at Irrawang, Hill End, Regentville, Elizabeth Farm, Mamre and Bella Vista, Hyde Park Barracks and the Mint. He was the tutor in Historical Archaeology from 1978-1982. He carried out an important series of archaeological commissions on Norfolk Island in the 1980s. In 1994 he received his long-delayed doctorate with his thesis on building materials as dating criteria and continued to work as a consultant until his retirement. He was known as a particularly meticulous and assiduous researcher and his work could always be identified by the inscription R.V.J. Varman.
Links to selected reports by R V J Varman
- NSW Grey Literature online database
- Heritage NSW Library
- PhD Thesis: ‘Bricks and nails : building materials as criteria for dating in Sydney and environs from 1788 ; a documentary survey and assessment of dating potential’, University of Sydney, 1993, http://hdl.handle.net/2123/1205