She specialised in the archaeology of Romano-British Northern England but was also involved in excavations outside the United Kingdom and the Roman period.

[2] Her paternal grandfather was Edwin Charles Clark, Regius Professor of Civil Law at Cambridge University, and her maternal great-grandfather was George Parker Bidder, an eminent engineer.

[1] After graduating with a Bachelor of Arts (BA) degree, she remained at the University of Cambridge to study for the one-year diploma in archaeology.

[2] Kitson Clark belonged to the generation of amateur archaeologists who remained as independent scholars; over her lifetime she "witnessed the decline in influence of the amateur, independent scholar, and the rise of a professional class of archaeologist and historian".

It was described in 1990 as a "well-loved, well-thumbed classic",[3] and according to her obituary in The Independent "remains one of the starting points for any study of the Romans in the north of England".

[2] In 1935, she was part of a team that excavated Petuaria, a Roman fort in Brough, East Riding of Yorkshire.

[4] During her involvement in the 1929 excavations in Palestine, Kitson Clark met her future husband Derwas James Chitty (1901–1971); he was also an archaeologist and an Anglican priest.