The over-dense environments of protoclusters of galaxies in the early Universe (z > 2) are expected to accelerate the evolution of galaxies, with an increased rate of stellar mass assembly and black hole accretion compared to co-eval galaxies in the average density ‘field’. These galaxies are destined to form the passive population of massive galaxies that dominate the cores of rich clusters today. In previous work we found an enhancement in the fraction of Lyman break galaxy mergers in the z=3.1 SSA22 protocluster compared to the co-eval field. We now compare the physical properties of these two galaxy samples. We use multiwavelength data to determine whether evidence for accelerated evolution can be found by comparing the mean stellar mass, star formation rate, age and star formation histories of these populations.