John Sutton 1937-2023

John Sutton in Engaruka September 2011, Daryl Stump to the left.

John E.G. Sutton passed away October 2^nd 2023. He was Director of the British Institute in Eastern Africa 1983–1998. His work on the archaeological study of the agrarian history of Africa has had much influence on historical geographers at Stockholm University and we worked closely together in the project Islands of intensive agriculture in Eastern Africa financed by SIDA and FRN.

I first met John Sutton at a conference in Mombasa in 1993. I then had only limited research experience from Africa. My research had focused on field systems – morphology and dating - in Sweden.

In Mombasa my eyes first fell on a table of publications showing aerial photography of the ancient fields of Engaruka and then on the bearded man behind the stand, a stand of the British Institute in Eastern Africa. Before that I did not know of any research in Africa on the history of field systems. This meeting with John was the beginning of a series of conversations, field visits and conference sessions with John. For me personally it was decisive for the rest of my research career. What I learnt from John was the beginning of the second part of my research, moving from agrarian landscapes in Sweden to the history of agrarian landscapes in Africa and subsequently the globe. John was my mentor in this process.

I have come to look at researchers of ancient fields as fellow nerds, not unlike narrow gauge railway amateurs. We ancient-fields-nerds are obsessed with following winding collapsed stone walls, faint signs of lynchets or of irrigation canals. The understanding of such systems cannot be reached at one spot, however meticulous you observe that spot. You must understand the totality of a large system. This makes ancient-fields-nerds into fast walkers. They prefer to browse the landscape. The answers may lie kilometres away. Unlike many other archaeologists John knew that.

A colleague of mine who was more used to sitting with African farmers interviewing them last week sent me the following witness of John. He wrote that he will

“never forget our visit to Engaruka where I tried to keep up with Sutton's pace in a T-shirt, jeans and sandals, while the thorn bushes cut through the sandals and I, without a headgear, was completely burnt by the sharp sun. Sutton looked more like an alpine mountaineer in heavy khakis, heavy boots, hat and old-fashioned grey rucksack. He walked fast like an antelope and talked all the time....I had a hard time keeping up”

I know only a handful of international colleagues – in historical geography and in archaeology – who can compare with John in that respect: the skills in disentangling horizontal stratigraphy, understanding the underlying function of the once living farming system of canals, fields, cairns, settlements. And walking fast like an antelope. There are no methodology text books for the skills he had in landscape archaeology. The methods are usually learnt only by own hard work and walk.

John Sutton was clearly a leader of archaeology on African agrarian history. As pointed out by James McCann he changed the place of agrarian history within African historical studies. From having been a backdrop to history he brought the history of field systems, technology, and cropping patterns to centre stage. The special issue of Azania from 1989 under the heading History of African Agricultural Technology and Field Systems was rightly characterised by James McCann as a “something of a watershed in the historical ecology of African agriculture”. 

My first meeting with John in Mombasa in 1993 led to series of field trips, seminars, and joint sessions on conferences. We borrowed from Tim Maggs the metaphor islands of intensive agriculture, brought in a group of colleagues researching such “islands” in living landscapes or in archaeological. We published the volume Islands of Intensive Agriculture in Eastern Africa: Past & Present in 2004.

During all these meetings John was always very generous towards younger colleagues. His style of field work was inviting. Other leading researchers may take the visit to “their” site as an opportunity to give to a complete picture and convince the visitors of an elegant synthesis.  But John did not do that. Trying to keep the pace of John on these walks was not about him convincing us of his grand solutions and his interpretations. He rather invited us to be part of his laboratory.

This was especially clear on a workshop in Tanzania in 2002 when we spent time in Engaruka with John. Researchers from many different universities were then generously guided by him. In the years to come original publications on Engaruka, inspired by John´s work, were published by researchers from the universities of Oulu, Helsinki, Stockholm, Lund, York, and Cambridge.

John Sutton´s imprint on the agrarian history of Africa cannot be overestimated. We miss him.

Mats Widgren, emeritus professor in Geography, Stockholm University 

 

Readings:

McCann, James, Agriculture and African history, Journal of African History 32, 1991, 507-513

Sutton, John E.G. (ed) History of African Agricultural Technology and Field Systems (special issue), Azania, 24, 1989

Sutton, John E.G., Engaruka: an irrigation agricultural community in northern Tanzania before the Maasai, British institute in Eastern Africa, Nairobi, 2000

Widgren, Mats & Sutton, John Edward Giles (red.), Islands of intensive agriculture in Eastern Africa: past & present, Oxford: James Currey, 2004 

--- 

Read also the obituary by Matthew Davies and Daryl Stump in Azania  58:4, 485-489