Ralph Merrifield

Ralph Merrifield
Photograph of Merrifield
Born	(1913-08-22)22 August 1913 Temple Fortune, London, England
Died	9 January 1995(1995-01-09) (aged 81) London, England
Citizenship	United Kingdom
Nationality	English
Fields	Archaeology Curator
Institutions	Brighton Museum Guildhall Museum Museum of London
Alma mater	Varndean College
Known for	Study and new interpretation of the archaeology of London and the archaeology of ritual and magic.

Ralph Merrifield (22 August 1913 – 9 January 1995) was an English museum curator and archaeologist. Described as "the father of London's modern archaeology", Merrifield was a specialist in both the archaeology of Roman London and the archaeology of magical practices, publishing six books on these subjects over the course of his life.

He was born in Temple Fortune, which was then a new suburb on the north-western edge of London. His father died when he was two years old, after the family had moved to Southend-on-Sea, Essex. His mother then moved with him to Brighton, Sussex, where they lived with her parents above a shop. Merrifield's archaeological career began in 1930 when, although still at school, he was taken on as an assistant to the curator of Brighton Museum, H. S. Toms. While working there, in 1935, he gained an external degree in anthropology from the University of London.

During the Second World War he served in the Royal Air Force, and in 1950 he became assistant keeper of the Guildhall Museum in London. From November 1956 to April 1957 he was in Accra, Ghana, organising the new National Museum of Ghana. Merrifield then returned to the Guildhall Museum, and it was while working there that he produced a synthesis of known material on the archaeology of Roman London, published as The Roman City of London in 1965.

In 1975 the Guildhall Museum was amalgamated with the London Museum, creating the new Museum of London. Merrifield was appointed senior keeper, and soon after was promoted to deputy director. He retired in 1978 but remained active within the archaeological community, publishing The Archaeology of Ritual and Magic in 1987 and further studies of Roman London, and giving public lectures across the country. He was a keen supporter of the Standing Conference on London Archaeology, a body designed to monitor the impact that English Heritage was having on the city's archaeology, which he believed to be negative.