Les Capon MCIFA

Project Officer

Les has been involved in archaeology since 1984, progressing to be a supervisor of trainees by 1986, and has worked in commercial archaeology for 29 years. Les has been promoted in-house since starting as a field assistant at AOC in 1996. Les is interested in all periods of archaeology, and has supervised and managed on a range of urban and rural excavations, evaluations and watching briefs in and around Greater London and southern England. He has also specialised in historic landscape archaeology and historic building recording. Significant sites include an excavation of a multi-period site at Ingress Abbey in Kent from 1997 to 2004; the internationally significant site of the East India Company’s shipyard on the Isle of Dogs, a tanning site in Waltham Abbey, Essex and industrial sites in Derbyshire and Staffordshire. More recently, Les supervised a 2-hectare excavation in Bicester, and a complex Tudor and workhouse site in Bow, East London. In 2016-17, Les worked on the deep Roman stratigraphy near the Tower of London, and most recently been excavating part of the walled Roman town of Sandy, Bedfordshire.

The HBR aspect of Les’s work ranges from timber-framed buildings to Cold War structures, from private dwellings to large public buildings and industrial sites. Recent sites range from Gas Holders to Aisled Barns, Town Houses and Factories. Much of this work has been undertaken to satisfy conditions imposed by planners under Listed Building Consent. As well as publication texts, Les contributes finds illustrations to publication standard.

Selected Bibliography

Capon, L 2005. ‘Excavations at The Ridings, Northampton’ Northamptonshire Archaeology Vol. 33, 131-142

Capon, L 2006  ‘Excavations at 97-101 & 103 Union Street, Southwark.’ London Archaeologist. Spring 2006.

Capon L 2006. 'Saxon Activity at 15-17 Long Acre, City of Westminster’. London Archaeologist, Winter 2006, Volume 11, No. 7, 171-176.

Capon, L. 2009 ‘Early Roman Features, Possibly defensive, and the modern development of the Parkland Landscape at Ingress Abbey, Greenhithe.’ Archæologia Cantiana volume CXXIX, 2009

Capon, L. ‘Medieval and Later Occupation At Highbridge Street, Waltham Abbey: Excavations 2003’ (in prep)

Capon, L. ‘Blackwall Docks: Trade, Waterfront Technology and Everyday life.’ (in prep)

Capon, L. Forthcoming ‘Medieval Activity in the Forests of Lee, Later Burnt Ash Farm’

Capon, L. Forthcoming ‘Excavations At Three Hanley (Stoke-On-Trent) Pottery Factories: Broad Street/Mason’s Ironstone Works, Kensington Pottery, And St James’ Street Pottery’

Capon, L. Forthcoming ‘A Bronze Age Settlement crossed by the Roman Road from Selsey to Chichester at Chichester Golf Course, Hunston Village, West Sussex’