NationStates Jolt Archive

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26526464/

JERUSALEM - Israeli archaeologists unveiled a 2,100-year-old Jerusalem perimeter wall along with beer bottles left behind by 19th century researchers who first discovered the stone defenses.

The wall, on Mount Zion at the southern edge of Jerusalem's Old City, dates back to the Second Jewish Temple, which was destroyed by the Romans in AD 70.

Yehiel Zelinger, who headed the excavation for the Israel Antiquities Authority, said the location of the wall indicated that Jerusalem had expanded to the south at the time, reaching its largest size in biblical times.

The 10.5-foot-high wall was not supported by any mortar or other bonding material and formed part of a 3.5-mile-long fortification around the city, he said.

The present wall around Jerusalem's Old City is 2.5 miles in circumference.

The ancient wall on Mount Zion had disappeared from view by the time a similar stone barrier, also uncovered in the dig, was built at the site during the Byzantine period more than 250 years later. Nonetheless, the second wall followed almost exactly the same path.

"During these two periods, Jerusalem was the centre ... to the Jews during the Second Temple Period and to pilgrims from the Christian world (during the Byzantine Period)," Zelinger said.

British archaeologists surveyed the site in the 19th century, leaving behind a shoe and beer and wine bottles, which Zelinger's team found and put on display on Wednesday.


So, my question is this:

Should archaeologists clean up after themselves, or deliberately leave artifacts behind so future archaeologists can find them?

Personally, I think that once an excavation is complete, they should leave behind a few tools, some beer bottles, and a copy of their notes printed on long-lasting paper. The last one is to help the future archaeologists excavate quicker.

It is useful to leave some indication that a site has been dug, by whom and when.

I agree that a copy of the notes should be left somewhere safe on site, and I would add a copy of the complete site publication. This is important as some sites that we excavate now, may be degraded in future, and so our reports may form a large part of what a future project has to rely on. This is the case today in many sites such as Hermopolis.

However I think it should be done systematically, disturbing the site and leaving leftover modern artifacts lying around will only do more to confuse the picture. There are sites that have been turned over like this where you find a New or Middle Kingdom Egyptian pottery sherd along with Roman or Ptolemaic coins all in (supposedly!) the same occupation layer and you might as well just throw up your hands and quit there and then.

My preferred idea would be to find suitable place on site with no actual importance in itself (such as as the already sifted backfill of the existing excavations) and bury in there, in a secure container a complete record of everything that's been done to the site in your excavation, with notes of where any removed artifacts have been taken, and a copy of the final published report. Otherwise, there should be nothing left on the site at all that could confuse any future work. It should be left as uncontaminated as possible.

Hey that's cheating! These archaeologists are just trying to artificially create more work for their selves. It's like politicians voting on whether they should get a pay increase or not.

you could say the shoe is now on the other foot

Hey that's cheating! These archaeologists are just trying to artificially create more work for their selves. It's like politicians voting on whether they should get a pay increase or not.

Now that you are on to the secret, I'm afraid you'll have to be sealed inside a coffin and buried ready for next years "finds" :(

I would think (hope?) future generations would be smart enough to determine the age of different items found in the same sites, especially if it seems as if they don't belong there.

I would think (hope?) future generations would be smart enough to determine the age of different items found in the same sites, especially if it seems as if they don't belong there.

It's not identifying the age of individual items that's the problem. We can identify modern pottery from medieval pottery from ancient pottery. The problem comes when it comes to building up an occupation history for a site. If habitation layers (literally, the different layers in the ground which contain fragments of artifacts from the time in which they were laid down) are disturbed and other material is mixed in, it becomes much harder to tell what occurred at what point.

They should leave behind some Twinkies and cans of Spam. Future archaeologists might be hungry. :)

Now that you are on to the secret, I'm afraid you'll have to be sealed inside a coffin and buried ready for next years "finds" :(

They should leave behind some Twinkies and cans of Spam. Future archaeologists might be hungry. :)

Sine it'll be for ones own benefit next season, I recommend After Eights, Ferrero Roche, Champagne and caviar nibbles ;)

NB: Preferably at AHRC expense, it is never good to pay for your own indulgences....

Sine it'll be for ones own benefit next season, I recommend After Eights, Ferrero Roche, Champagne and caviar nibbles ;)

NB: Preferably at AHRC expense, it is never good to pay for your own indulgences....

Even with proper preservation techniques, those items will be lucky to last a year. Twinkies and Spam will probably remain edible for several geologic ages. *nod*

Sine it'll be for ones own benefit next season, I recommend After Eights, Ferrero Roche, Champagne and caviar nibbles ;)

NB: Preferably at AHRC expense, it is never good to pay for your own indulgences....
Champagne would just go bad, but a bottle of hard liquor (provided it is placed somewhere out of the sun and not too hot) would last for several decades and be just as good as when it was buried it.
Even with proper preservation techniques, those items will be lucky to last a year. Twinkies and Spam will probably remain edible for several geologic ages. *nod*
Don't forget Pop-Tarts.

They should leave behind some Twinkies and cans of Spam. Future archaeologists might be hungry. :)

Future archaeologists would not recognize them as food. Much like contemporary archaeologists! They would probably assume the can of Spam was some sort of sarcophagus.

Future archaeologists would not recognize them as food. Much like contemporary archaeologists! They would probably assume the can of Spam was some sort of sarcophagus.

Then King Tut was some sort of jerkied meat snack?!? :eek:

Even with proper preservation techniques, those items will be lucky to last a year. Twinkies and Spam will probably remain edible for several geologic ages. *nod*
still... care would still be needed. after all, this (http://www.twinkiesproject.com/) proves that Twinkies are not invulernable...

Future archaeologists would not recognize them as food. Much like contemporary archaeologists! They would probably assume the can of Spam was some sort of sarcophagus.
I doubt they would assume that.

now the idea that the ancients thought spam and twinkies worthy foods to take to the afterlife...

still... care would still be needed. after all, this (http://www.twinkiesproject.com/) proves that Twinkies are not invulernable...

This scientific study meets my approval. :)

This scientific study meets my approval. :)

I thought you would.

Love the Turing test...

Observations:
Before Test:
Before the test, the Twinkie was relatively quiet, and the Lovett sophomore was confused by the whole thing. One typical statement was, "Wait, you're testing to see if a Twinkie is intelligent?"

We feel obligated to mention that the test was conducted twice. The first time, our subject was a Lovett freshman, but after two questions we discovered that he had eaten his subject counterpart, so the test was aborted and new subjects (human and Twinkie) were chosen.

The human and Twinkie subjects were placed together behind a sheet (see Fig. 1). The sentient nature of the human subject was at this point brought into question. When asked to assign himself and the Twinkie the designations A & B without telling us which was which, the human promptly replied "I'll be A." However, we decided to continue the test.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26526464/
Personally, I think that once an excavation is complete, they should leave behind a few tools, some beer bottles, and a copy of their notes printed on long-lasting paper. The last one is to help the future archaeologists excavate quicker.

I like this suggestion enough to admit that I wish that I was the one to think of it first. :hail:

It's not identifying the age of individual items that's the problem. We can identify modern pottery from medieval pottery from ancient pottery. The problem comes when it comes to building up an occupation history for a site. If habitation layers (literally, the different layers in the ground which contain fragments of artifacts from the time in which they were laid down) are disturbed and other material is mixed in, it becomes much harder to tell what occurred at what point.
So people's fascination with antiques is really going to mess with the heads of future archeologists?

I can just imagine...

Finding beer bottles will only spark controversy... can you imagine...

"Professor Heiniken's work is totally wrong. by the amounts of beer bottles found at his site that we recently uncovered, we can conclude that he was totally blotto with intoxicants and made up most of his facts."

So people's fascination with antiques is really going to mess with the heads of future archeologists?

Personally, I doubt that any contemporary towns/buildings that become archaeological sites in future would be as difficult to interpret as those from the Middle Ages and earlier (Rome is an exception, due to the survival of many Latin scripts through the church), due to the development of mass media. Modern culture records personal life and habits in incredible detail, so finding out about our habits, beliefs and ideals in the future would be totally different to the way past societies are studied now, unless the records we leave behind were to be significantly destroyed with the demise of our civilization, which, of course, is possible.