Issue: Energy Companies Destroying Archaeology

“It’s a beautiful example of totally screwed up priorities,” says Katherine Faull, a professor at Bucknell University, “there’s nobody, it seems, who can say anything or stop the energy companies.”

In the eighteenth-century a village utopia was founded by a Moravian missionary on the North Branch of Pennsylvania’s Susquehanna River. The village is called Friedenshuetten, which means “tents of peace.” Excavations of the site began in 1972 and revealed that the village was where expats of what is now the eastern Czech Republic and Native Americans of the Eastern Delaware Nation coexisted in log cabins and wigwams from 1763 to 1772.

The archaeological site is now being threatened by the growing natural gas industry surrounding it. New developments allow companies to extract greater quantities of methane trapped within the rock. This has caused a boom in Pennsylvania’s natural gas industry. The resulting gas rush could encroach on Pennsylvania’s archaeological sites thanks to minimal regulatory oversight from the state capital, Harrisburg.

This particular site brings up issues with archaeological ethics. Should the preservation of archaeological sites be jeopardized just for the sake of expanded energy companies’ resources? The article that deals with this particular issue is titled “Does the Natural Gas Boom Endanger Archaeology?” and discusses some of the legal aspects of the situation.

Two energy industry-friendly provisions are currently very dangerous to the lives of archaeological sites. The first provision being the “10-acre rule,” which states that if a company applies to the state’s Department of Environmental Protection for a permit on a project that will take up 10 or fewer acres of land, the Pennsylvania Historical & Museum Commission (PHMC) is not required to review the proposal to ensure the protection of archaeological sites, nor does it have to be notified.

I find this to be extremely unethical in regards to preserving archaeological sites. Not only is the energy company automatically granted passage to use the land however they choose, but they are not required to notify historical or archaeological authorities whatsoever. This means that several archaeological sites may be damaged without anyone knowing, meaning that that history and information is lost forever. Several sites can also be threatened during the process of excavation. The energy company’s site may encroach on an excavation and make the archaeologists work faster, perhaps resulting in a poorly recorded site and the loss of some artifacts that were unable to be uncovered.

Issue: Jehoash Inscription

When an ancient artifact is found, whether within its original context or not, its interpretation is very easily be influenced by bias. Of course, in archaeology bias is always present when it comes to an objects interpretation but it is important to understand that interpreting an artifact on the basis of one’s own theory instead of interpreting the artifact in its raw form is ethically irresponsible.

The Jehoash Inscription is an excellent example of an artifact not being interpreted in its raw form. This artifact appeared in Israel in January of 2003. This artifact was extremely controversial when it was first found. The inscription describes repairs made to a temple by Jehoash, which corresponds to a story in the Bible.

The inscription was thus exposed to bias of cultural ideas and interpretations which represent the influences of the contemporary society. There was a religious bias and desire to connect the inscription with the Bible in order to confirm it as true. There was also a political bias as Israeli extremist groups wanted to use the tablet to support their movement to build a new temple on the Temple Mount.

 
Neither of these biases took into consideration the actual context or meaning of the raw artifact. They were too eager to connect it to their own interpretation and exploit it for their own purposes. I think that the biases could have contributed to the delay in finding out whether or not the inscription was authentic or not. I think that there is a general ethical responsibility for everyone to accept and respect the truest interpretation of the artifact.

Issue: Selling of Ancient Jewellery and Artifacts

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This was an actual website that came up on Google when I typed in ‘authentic ancient jewellery.’ I was curious to see what types of advertisements would come up with regards to the sale of ancient jewellery and antiquities. I find it kind of funny that this website expresses that if you are a collector you will love what they have to offer. I would think that if one is a serious collector of ancient artifacts, one would not support such a website. I think that not only do true antiquities collectors have the ethical responsibility to not support a website like this, but all people also do. It is very doubtful that the products available on this website are genuine even though they are “guaranteed to be authentic.”

This website brings to mind Article 4 of the UNIDROIT 1995 Convention on Stolen or Illegally Exported Cultural Objects. The article states:

In determining whether the possessor exercised due diligence, regard shall be had to

all the circumstances of the acquisition, including the character of the parties, the price paid,

whether the possessor consulted any reasonably accessible register of stolen cultural objects, and any other relevant information and documentation which it could reasonably have obtained, and whether the possessor consulted accessible agencies or took any other step that a reasonable person would have taken in the circumstances.

If any of these artifacts happen to be genuine, they were most likely stolen and therefore illegally exported. The UNIDROIT 1995 Convention can thus be applied to whomever is in possession of the artifact, but I wonder if the website would provide (or is even able to provide) the buyers with all of the information that is required to prove due diligence

Issue: Reconstructive Archaeology

This week while looking for ideas to write my essay on for my “Pirates, Traders, and Sailors in the Ancient Mediterranean” class, I became interested in researching what it would take to reconstruct not only an ancient ship, but also an ancient naval battle. An article that came of particular interest was one by N. Whatley titled “On the Possibility of Reconstructing Marathon and Other Ancient Battles” in The Journal of Hellenic Studies.

This article brings to light some of the concerns with reconstructing ancient ships and battles. In this article Whatley brings up two questions that I thought were particularly valuable to determining the ethic responsibility of those who do the reconstructing:

1.                     1.  How far is it really possible to reconstruct ancient battles with any finality?

2.                     2.  How far are the methods of attempting to reconstruct usually followed by modern writers, the soundest methods to employ?

Should the reconstruction of ancient ships be done ‘properly’ or just as something ‘cool?’

I think that if archaeologists and historians are working together with those who reconstruct the ship and the battle, there is an ethic responsibility among all of them to properly reconstruct the ship and the battle to the best of their knowledge. Of course something like re-enacting an ancient naval battle can easily be turned into more of a theatrical display and can therefore simply become something cool. The theatrical display of a naval battle would be considered more like a historical re-enactment, which is generally a hobby. The point of reconstructive (or experimental) archaeology is to generate and test hypotheses based on archaeological material, not necessarily to entertain.

 
Therefore, I believe that although it is possible to educate the wider public by exploiting a reconstruction’s entertainment value, it is not the true ethical purpose of reconstructive archaeology.

Quote of Interest

I thought that this quote could be considered when determining whether or not something is ancient.

"Old enough to belong to an historical and social epoch that is felt sufficiently different and far from the present one by most people."

-Franco Rollo, University of Camerino, Italy

Issue: Treatment of the Ancient Deceased

“The human body, alive or dead, has a moral value” – Frank Rühli

This blog refers to an article written in the magazine New Scientist, and more specifically the article titled “Ancient mummies have rights, too” by Jo Merchant. In the article, Merchant discusses how mummies weren’t always seen to have been ‘real’ people with families, morals, and a say in how their bodies would be treated after death. Ancient mummies were commonly assumed to be fair game for science. This perception is now beginning to change.

Anatomist Frank Rühli and ethicist Ina Kaufmann argue that “it is disturbing because research on mummies is invasive and reveals intimate information such as family history and medical conditions.” Rühli and Kaufmann are suggesting that mummies be treated as if they were a recently deceased person of today. I think that this particular concept about ancient mummies could also be applied to Native American burials.

I have found that many of those who want to dig up Native American burials use the excuse that goes along the lines of ‘these people have been dead for hundreds of years and have no direct lineage to any living person.’ Native Americans believe that all of their dead are still as much part of their family dead as they were alive. The concept of ancient mummies being real people should also therefore be applied to Native American burials.

Every burial, no matter how old or new it is, can provide extremely valuable information about the deceased’s life, family, and medical history. It may further provide information regarding the culture and society that the deceased lived in.

Merchant mentions that although it would be difficult to create a universal policy regarding the ethical treatment of mummies, a checklist of questions to consider would be useful.

It is unfair to treat any ancient body without the respect that one would treat a more recently deceased body with. One must at the very least consider his responsibility towards the body before invading it.

Link to the article: http://www.scribd.com/doc/37256004/New-Scientist-11th-September-2010