Coldstream taught classics at Shrewsbury School, a public school in Shrewsbury, Shropshire from 1952 to 1956.[1][4] While there, he was also an officer of the Combined Cadet Force. He transferred his commission into the school's contingent on 29 April 1954.[6] He resigned his commission on 28 December 1956.[7] He then worked for one year as a temporary assistant keeper at the department of Greek and Roman Antiquities, British Museum.[2][4] From 1957 to 1960, he undertook research at the British School at Athens.[1] In 1958, he published his first monograph; An Etruscan Neck-Amphora.[2]
In addition to his university work, he was involved in the running of the British School at Athens. He was the editor of The Annual of the British School at Athens from 1968 to 1973. He was a member and then chairman, from 1987 to 1991, of its managing committee.[2] He was, at his death, vice-president of the School.[9]
In his obituary, The Times called Coldstream "one of the world's leading Classical archaeologists".[3]
Selected works
Greek Geometric Pottery: a Survey of Ten Local Styles and their Chronology (1968). London: Methuen. 2nd ed. with supplement: Bristol: Phoenix Press, 2008, ISBN1904675816
Kythera: Excavations and Studies Conducted by the University of Pennsylvania Museum and the British School at Athens, Park Ridge, NJ: Noyes Press (1973)
Geometric Greece (1977, revised edition 2003), London: E. Benn
Knossos Pottery Handbook: Greek and Roman (2001). London: British School at Athens.