Rugby Archaeological Society was founded in 1961 by a group of amateur archaeologists to excavate the site of the Roman town of Tripontium. Although only a few of the original members are still involved, the Society's objectives remain unchanged.
Until 2006 the members of RAS, under the direction of Jack Lucas, concentrated their activities on thoroughly investigating the locality of the Roman settlement of Tripontium in order to record and publish the findings of the excavation. However, sadly Jack died in March 2006.
In 2012 the Society was relaunched under the leadership of Chairman Dr Graham Morgan. Since then a programme of open meetings and activities has been organised in conjunction with Rugby Art Gallery and Museum (RAGM). Between October and June a Saturday Morning of Archaeology is hosted by RAGM, normally on the second Saturday of each month. Please see the EVENTS page for recent and future speakers.
RAS is also involved in a range of fieldwork activities often in conjunction with other local societies.
As Trustees of the valuable Tripontium Collection the secondary role of the Society is to safeguard, preserve and, where necessary, take steps to conserve all the artifacts from the site. The Collection is now on permanent display at Rugby Museum.
In December 2006 the Rugby Museum Gallery was renamed the Jack Lucas Archaeology Gallery, to commemorate the important contribution that Jack made to Archaeology in general, but particularly to the understanding of Tripontium's place in Roman Britain.
During the life of the Society many young people have worked on the site and several have chosen a career in archaeology as a result of this experience. There has been collaboration between the Society and various other organisations and institutions at different times.
In 1994 the Society received an award at the British Archaeological Awards for the work undertaken at Tripontium. An article about this appeared in Current Archaeology number 145 in November 1995.
In 2004 the Society was awarded the Pitt Rivers Award at the British Archaeological Awards.
It is not possible at present to arrange visits to the site of Tripontium, which is under private ownership. Several publications have been produced about the excavations at Tripontium. These are described in the Publictions page of this web site.