Facebook group criticises government stand over underwater loot seeking

While US collectors of portable antiquities of all kinds (ancient coin collectors, supporters of pot-digging robbers of ancient Native American graves etc. ) are trying to oppose their government's plans to protect the archaeological heritage, the British have another fight on their hands with theirs. The British government seems relatively unconcerned about the archaeological heritage as a whole. Quite apart from declaring the archaeological establishment to be a "partner" of metal detector usung artefact hunters and collectors, we have the Sussex fiasco. There is now a new Facebook group set up in order

to encourage the British Government to pledge that it will never again sign profit sharing deals with US-based Odyssey Marine Exploration and that it will always oppose mercenary profit-led salvage of historic marine archaeology sites'.

This seems a bit of a lost cause, as I bet they'll never pledge any such thing as they demonstrably like the "Treasures" so much more than preserving real archaeology, but please join to show your disapproval.

To become a member of the Group, you'll need to have a Facebook account,and then navigate to the group's page.

There is some interesting coverage of marine issues in the online version of the magazine "British Archaeology", mmostly based on the story of Odyssey Marine Exploitation's discovery of HMS "Victory" here (note the share prices graph), and a feature on undwerwater landscapes here.