Wayne's blog post from yesterday covers some of this quite eloquently:
Thanks, Alfred, for posting the Sayles blog extract, though I have to say I found it very strange. The idea that there is some vast conspiracy involving the academic archaeological community and ‘nationalist governments’ (whatever they are) is, frankly, bizarre.
I think that the argument that archaeological research is dominated and severely restricted by local authorities who won’t issue permits is basically wrong. Sure, there are always hoops to jump through and specific local regulations – in
Greece, for example, a university department has to buy the land on which it wants to dig and then donate it to the Greek Ministry of
Antiquities, and in
Israel all digging stops if you hit a burial that might be
Jewish. And there are a few countries (e.g. Saudi
Arabia) where it is hard for any foreigners to get a permit to dig, but the major constraints are human and financial. Human, because there are not that many trained archaeologists – and the
average field archaeologist will only
work on maybe ten or so sites during the whole of
his or her professional career. Financial, because it costs a lot of
money to assemble, equip, transport and sustain a team for a season of
field work. It’s the potential sponsors (usually private individuals or corporations) in their
home countries that the archaeologists have to attract and please, not foreign governments.
There are moments when Sayles just seems to be playing with words. He says, “Archaeology is not dealing with a finite resource, it is dealing with the rolling window of human existence and that resource just keeps getting bigger every day.” Yeah, right – except that isn’t what most people mean when they think of archaeology. As soon as you add an adjective – ‘
Roman archaeology’, or ‘Classical Greek archaeology’ or ‘
Bronze Age archaeology’, or whatever – then it’s obvious that you are dealing with an extremely finite resource.
Sayles also writes, “
Nor is the concern about site looting.” I’m sorry, but that’s exactly what the concern is and I’m sad that Mr. Sayles doesn’t see that.
The picture at the end of this post was taken in the Lycus Valley in
Turkey. The mound in the background is a typical tel – an unexcavated archaeological site. There are thousands of mounds like this scattered across the former eastern
Roman Empire, the remains of ancient
provincial towns and villages. But (atypically) we can give a name to this site: underneath is Colossae, somewhat famous because in the first century St Paul wrote a letter addressed to the
Christian congregation there. In spite of the New Testament connection, Colossae hasn’t been excavated yet because it is smaller and less obviously attractive than other nearby sites (
Laodicea and Hieropolis), and doesn’t have clear surface traces of monumental
architecture. But it’s not because the Turkish authorities have refused permission: it’s a funding thing, and a personnel thing, not a bureaucracy problem or a government thing.
Someday some university will develop a research programme to dig at Colossae and explore and carefully document what’s there. Meanwhile it sits out in the middle of nowhere, rarely visited, and really impossible to monitor or protect. So equally possibly, someday some bugger with a metal detector is going to come out and dig a bloody great hole in that mound, all maybe for the sake of stealing a few handfuls of coins and some
oil lamps and pots, and not caring a whit about the potentially priceless information they destroy while doing so. That makes me angry. Doesn’t it make you angry too?
Now, the argument for import restrictions is precisely that they might
help prevent looting by making illegally dug coins and similar portable
antiquities much harder to sell. It’s meant to discourage the bad guys. It’s not some vindictive attack on coin collectors
nor is it a devious government plot to take away our liberties.
But would restrictions really have that effect? I don’t know, but I’d like to think about the idea and discuss it rather than just knee-jerk dismiss it out of hand. And if import restrictions are a really terrible idea – I’m open to persuasion – then I’d like someone to suggest alternatives that might be more effective. Because looting really does bother me. And speaking personally, I would be very content to pay more for the coins I collect if I knew they were available through legal excavation and not the product of looting.
Bill R