EXCAVATING the mind of Neil Oliver is an intriguing notion, doing a little digging around his past, scraping a light trowel over his sensibility. Since arriving on our television screens in 2002, the Scottish archaeologist, writer, broadcaster and historian has been almost omnipresent, fronting shows such as A History of Scotland and Coast.

I wonder how Oliver has achieved this longevity in a business that dumps presenters like plastic in the sea? And if there’s a sense that Churchill’s borrowed quote "Those who fail to learn from history are condemned to repeat it" rings as true as a church bell, surely the opposite should apply? Given Oliver knows an awful lot about history and archaeology, could TV survival be down to the fact he’s learned what not to do?

We meet at the Stirling Smith Art Gallery and Museum, near where he lives with his wife and three children. Oliver looks way younger than 51 years on this planet would suggest, and is relaxed, yet on the clock, given one of his brood has to picked up from school in an hour.

He certainly has the energy to undertake a tour of the great theatre halls of the land with his new show, telling of the British Isles in 100 Places, (he comes to Glasgow this week) which expands upon the detail in his new book of the same title. But his is all new to him? “I’ve spoken in public before, at literary festivals, but not night after night,” he says. “I only get a couple of days off during the months and it’s quite intense and nerve wracking. Having said that, it’s a fascinating and very different way of seeing a country. And it makes you question the notion of what a country is. Once you interrogate this notion you realise the audience in the North East [of England], for example, is a very different tribe from those in the South.

"You get this throughout Scotland as well. The variety of what you find leaves you confused. At times you don’t know where you are.”

But there is a commonality, I ask. Aren't we all in the same boat – one which seems to be sinking? He doesn’t think so. “We’ve been through everything, from invasion to natural disaster to famine to religious fundamentalism,” he says. “We’ve been through civil war, wars of independence, the industrial revolution, two world wars. All of this has unfolded in the same tapestry. This is just a period in history. In a 100 years there will be different issues and a different set of politics.”

That’s a comfort. Sort of. But meantime, what do we do about Brexit, Neil? “I don’t want to deal in that,” he says, placing his coffee cup down with a slightly emphatic clump, suggesting he’s learned to avoid controversy. “I’m careful not to offer an opinion on any of that. My tour aim is to put an arm around the shoulder of someone I care about, which is this archipelago. It’s a love letter to the British Isles, a spectacular place which has looked after me, and now it’s my turn to look after him – or her.”

He offers a thought: “The motto of the Isle of Man, ‘Whichever way you throw me I will stand’, the three legged symbol, I think that’s a great motto for people to live by.”

That’s easy to say, but we’re facing confusion, polarisation of politics, right-wing extremism. You must be afraid of the divisions politics has produced and the invective that comes with it? It seems everyone wants to be angry.

“I’m sick of politics,” he admits. “I’m completely disenchanted with all of it. Politicians lack so much knowledge. If I’m honest, I don’t think there’s a politician out there worth listening to, of any creed or colour. I don’t have any truck with any of them. I’m just looking away at the moment while they do what they do, which is self-aggrandizing and performing their Punch and Judy nonsense. I cannot be bothered with it.”

He adds: “I was in that arena vaguely for a while on account of a few opinions I was invited to give.”

He certainly was. Oliver incurred the wrath of the Nationalists back in 2016 when he declared independence for Scotland a "dead dog." (At one point during our chat he refers to the FM as the “Kirk Elder”, after I’d pointed out she’d taken me to task over a column.) But does he now regret becoming involved in the independence debate?

He pauses for thought. “No, I think it’s important to say what you think is true. But I don’t like the atmosphere at the moment whereby you can’t say what you think. If you are not pleasing the social media mob you are silenced or destroyed. I was asked some questions and I gave an honest answer.”

Oliver rejects the offer of half a scone (discipline indeed?) and instead sips at his coffee cup. “How it really started for me was when I was being interviewed for Bannockburn 700 [his TV show] and a journalist asked me about the referendum. “I remember saying, ‘A referendum is like going shopping for food when you’re hungry.’ You don’t want to be making snap decisions.”

Because you come away with a packet of Hobnobs and a jar of Nutella? “Exactly. I don’t think we should have referendums to decide which side of the road we should drive on, never mind kicking the ball back to the general population to determine a nation’s destiny. That’s why we have political democracy, whereby we employ hundreds of people to read tedious paperwork, shout and bawl at each other in a room for as long as it takes. That’s why these 600-odd people have a job.”

He becomes more animated. “Referendums are a bad idea. After the Scottish referendum there were immediate cries for another one. ‘That disnae count’. Now there’s been Europe. And that was seen to be wrong. And so you claim for another one. What do you do? Go for best of three? Or best of five?”

Oliver smiles. “I’ve never been a card-carrying member of a political party. I used to scoff at university friends who were. In the same way I couldn’t understand why anyone would get excited about football. I’m not minded that way.”

Yet, but he is minded to recognise how politics overlaps into culture and issues of identity, which he loves to wax lyrical about on his TV shows. But there are those who don’t countenance his passion for explaining the likes of Iona and the coming of Christianity. Some, such as Professor Tom Devine, see Oliver as an irritant.

The historian once attacked the fact Oliver had been asked to front a History of Scotland – given he didn’t have a degree in history. (It was rather like if Paul McCartney had laughed at John Lennon because Lennon’s first instrument wasn’t the bass guitar.) Oliver didn’t take Devine’s comment laying down however, describing the historian as being like of the old grumps from The Muppets.

More recently, Oliver got it in the neck when appointed president of the National Trust for Scotland, and many Nationalists demanded his removal, which seemed odd given the TV presenter’s passion for this space we live in.

But the writer/presenter took it on broad shoulders. Did his personal history prepare him for the future strife? Seems so. He’s used to adjustment. “I was born in a council flat in Renfrew, my dad moved to Ayr to work [he was a commission salesman] and then to Dumfries.” The family was “comfortable”, he says. It certainly wasn’t an Angela’s Ashes set in Scotland storyline. They even managed a holiday to Spain once.

Yet, the man who would go on to explain the Picts and Vikings and anacyclosis to us (the cycles of ruling elites, from monarchs to democracy, from elites to demagogues and back again) wasn’t top of the class at school. “I was in the upper half but I wasn’t so great at maths and science so I focused on English and history, which I was quite good at.”

Oliver was blessed with encouraging parents who most likely were baffled why their son wanted to study archaeology, (“After a trip to Glasgow University I fell in love with the prospectus”) given it rarely leads to a career. “I did work as an excavator for a few years going on digs,” he recalls. “It was fun, but there was no money in it. And during the winters it became a bit grim.”

One Friday afternoon he was excavating the Roman Road in Greenock, and on the Monday he was covering a peace protest in Lockerbie for the local newspaper. Why the switch to journalism?

“I liked the idea of journalism because it was essentially noseyness about people,” he explains, grinning. “It’s a bit like archaeology in that it’s the chance to poke through the rubbish, to find out what people were doing and why. Instinctively, I want to know who, what, where, why and when.”

Journalism has been as important to his current career, he says, as his time spent scraping dirt with a big spoon. “When I’ve been cast in the likes of Coast as a presenter it helped me get something out of people. And this Magpie-like work taught me how to become engrossed in a subject for a day then drop it, and move onto something else.”

The curious mind continued to search for the next adventure and in 1995 he joined a BT internet company. “I thought that may be my future. I was also fascinated to learn how it had evolved, largely financed by the US military, who wanted to know if computers could survive after a nuclear attack. And so they hired these hippies to find out. And then I wondered what do we do with it? What are the consequences of it?”

He answers his own question: “It’s created titans such as Mark Zuckerberg, and Amazon, Google and Pay Pal.” He adds in soft, serious voice, “Now, Zuckerberg is almost at the point he has more power than Putin, without the missiles.”

While working for the internet company, Oliver decided to set off for Zululand. (As you do.) “I had met up with my close pal from university Tony Pollard one day in the Granary Bar in Glasgow’s Shawlands and we came up with the idea of going to Zululand to make a film [which became the BBC’s 2002 documentary, Two Men In A Trench].”

Boldness has to be part of the reason for Oliver’s success. He had a good job, with a good salary, a car and an Amex account. “But I didn’t have a mortgage. I wasn’t married. I could take a chance. And I knew I had had experience. When the TV job ran out I’d do something else.”

Does the job flipping suggest a malcontent? “No, when I was at BT I figured I’d give it a couple of years,” he says with a wee hint of umbrage in his voice for me having suggested such a thing. “And we made the film really because we wanted to go to South Africa.” The voice warms again: “Archaeology was my first love and we met again. It was like Friends Reunited. And we’ve been together ever since.”

He’s a television natural. But did he always feel confident speaking to the camera? “Yes. I’ve always had a good memory and I’m lucky in that I can remember 50 words in the right order,” he says, grinning. “Talking to the camera is not a natural thing to do. It’s like a golf swing. But some people can do it. And I enjoyed being with these like-minded people. It was quite collegiate. I loved it from the get-go.”

Oliver landed on the box at the right time. “I was 31/32 when television began to happen for me. I had few delusions about my own reality. I’d been in a few different jobs, had the rougher edges knocked off by life experience. I’d filled shelves at Presto supermarket while eating the Mars Bars. I’d worked on an M&S till.” He adds, with a wry smile, “I’d been dumped often enough by women.”

Women. Yes, now he’s married to one. And history taught him he should incorporate this woman into his future. Oliver met his future wife Trudi when he was at university. “I was in third year at the time, the president of the archaeology society and she was in first year, and she came in to join. I made a bee-line for her when she walked in the door.”

He grins. “I don’t think she was as impressed by me as I was by her.”

She must have liked him a little because the pair were together for seven years. “And it just sort of fizzled out. Then, years later, I met her wee brother Johnny and we swapped numbers and a few months after that I was back in touch with Trudi. It was as if I’d seen her the day before.”

He reflects: “That’s another great thing about my life. Whatever happens, I know I’m with someone who remembers me when I was 19 and a silly arse. She remembers me when I had all sorts of archaeology student affectations, all patchouli oil and cheese cloth shirts. We can remember the teenagers we were.”

Oliver reveals he had the long hair back in the day. He didn’t create the soft Tarzan look for telly. He has just never bothered to have it cut. And it works for him, gives him a USP, although watching him on TV with the wind blasting into his face as he stands on a cliff edge he does have to brush it away from his mouth a little too often but, I suppose, a kirby grip or a hair scrunchy would wreck the image.

He laughs. “I’ve been holding out for the Head and Shoulders contract for 20 years but it’s never happened.”

There’s a calm about Oliver, even though he does become animated when he talks about the politics he says he wants nothing to do with. And he clearly loves his life, beaming at the delights of a career which allows him to take his family adventuring in the likes of Australia and New Zealand while filming Coast. Yet with three children he’s not immune to worry, about the impact of social media, for example. “People can have 10,000 friends, but ironically they have never been more isolated and lonelier. People go to Facebook – I don’t – hoping to see other people in this clearing in the forest who are equally lonely.”

He’s happy however, very happy. “The thing I most love these days is writing. I wrote as a student, as a journalist and then in TV with scripts. I’ve written ten books or so and it’s something I’ll be able to do.”

And now he’s making live appearances. “I’ve sort of blundered into them. I’m out there talking about our world, like Simon Reeve and Dan Snow. Maybe I can do this every year. Why not?”

So the world will be all right, Neil? We need you to tell us it will be. “We tend to think this is a modern concern, but perhaps Stonehenge and Avebury are partly expressions of feeling the same concerns, people feeling they are little specks in the great scheme of things and wanting to be heard, to make a mark.”

He grins, reassuringly. “We’ll be fine, but I won’t be if I don’t do this school pick-up in time.”

Neil Oliver – The Story of the British Isles in 100 Places, the Theatre Royal, Glasgow, November 20.