ABSTRACT
The Spurlock Museum at the University of Illinois-Urbana long has possessed an important collection of Merovingian artefacts, purchased as a study collection and rarely seen by the public. In the course of her dissertation research Barbara Oehlschlaeger-Garvey discovered that it derives essentially from the excavation of a single site, by a neglected archaeological pioneer, Auguste Mouti. The sixth biennial Shifting Frontiers in Late Antiquity conference, held at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in March 2005 provided the opportunity not only to assess Mouti's work and its significance and to comment on the collection, but also to mount a special exhibit at the Spurlock Museum, entitled 'Digging Barbarians'. A University of Illinois English professor on sabbatical with his family in Paris went to bookseller J. Gamber's shop at the request of Prof. Neil Brooks, Curator of the Museum of European Culture at the University of Illinois, to examine a collection regarding 'prehistoric man' advertised for sale.
