THE CAREERS of few academics are crowned with a Festschrift; how rarely has one been the recipient of two. In honour of Norman's seventieth birthday in 1993, Jeremy Greenwood commissioned and assembled a delightful garland of tributes from his many friends, mostly in prose, but also in photographs and drawings – there is even a song, the words and music in manuscript facsimile. The book's impeccable design and its well-balanced mixture of reminiscence and sharp personal insight completely capture every age and stage of Norman's then seven fruitful decades. Now that he is approaching the next major milestone, a smaller group of historians and archaeologists has contributed to this more conventional Festschrift for their friend and colleague who is rightly referred to, increasingly often, as the doyen of Suffolk historians.

In writing this, I am resisting the temptation to mine that earlier tribute for the apt and telling phrases that there abound, but hope nevertheless to do justice to Norman and his many achievements. Others could bring longer perspectives to this appreciation. Pam and I first met Norman and Paul within weeks of arriving in Ipswich in 1972, and that one meeting was enough to seal friendships which led to many fruitful collaborations. At the time Norman was about halfway through the hundred or so summer excursions he directed for the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology over twenty years. He was looking for a new President and my fate was sealed in minutes, an instance of his talent for spotting, enthusing and recruiting people.

How is it that Norman has so much of Suffolk in his veins? His maternal grandmother, a Lambeth girl, was visiting Brigg Fair, while staying with friends in Yorkshire. There she met, and later married, a young well-engineer, and went to live at Grimsby. Their youngest daughter, Alma, became her father's secretary and book-keeper and, because of this, sometimes travelled with him in the course of his work. He had worked for the Pretyman family at Riby Grove near Grimsby, and it was natural that they should ask him to find water at Orwell Park and their other properties along the southern edges of the Deben peninsula.