An article in the Federation of Independent Detectorists Newsletter by Justin Deeks gives a brief account of the fourth (and he says final) commercial artefact hunting rally to be held at Water Newton in September. This site became (in)famous by the involvement of a Scottish archaeological contractor in setting up the first one, just off the scheduled area, but nevertheless an archaeologically sensitive location. This year's was on "the land from the successful 2009 rally that produced an unexpectedly large amount of Celtic, Roman and Saxon" [finds]. The rally was organized by the Northern England Weekend Searchers which is a commercial firm facilitating artefact hunters access to land. This attracted "a few people (about 100)".
What could be left to find? The cosy event went well. people did find it hard to find much on the fields that had obviously had plenty of attention in the past but finds trickled in. Small coins (I saw a brilliant quarter stater) and other bits over the full range of history. Over 700 items recorded by PAS pleased them and reflected the immense effort put in by expert searchers over 3 days. At the very end, an enormous vessica [sic] shaped medieval seal matrix (high ranking churchman perhaps?) came up from great depth on an area already well covered by everyone. Full marks to the XP Goldmaxx and a lesson to us all.
Well, I wonder if the PAS really is pleased with all those "expert searchers" who put in such an effort (some with XP Goldmaxx machines) to empty the archaeological record into their scattered ephemeral private collections for entertainment and profit. Are they really "pleased" about erosion of the archaeological record on such a scale? Really? That is not exactly what we are paying them for.
Chesterton is not by any means in "Northern England", but the "weekend searchers" keep coming south - why? Have they no more archaeological sites in the North to loot any more?
Let us note that 100 blokes with metal detectors hoovering away for a weekend found on average seven recordable items each. (And that's just the ones that recorded finds with the PAS we do not know how many finds were not recorded - where is that "quarter stater' on the PAS database? I could not find it). That is on an area where hundreds of people had already three years in a row hoovered the site. Some of the people coming along had the so-called 'depth advantage" and were able to pull stuff out "from great depth" to "please" the PAS. Hmmm.Let us also note that seven recordable finds each was not felt justifiable return for the 'effort" put in by these expert searchers who are now going to try for pastures new.
These are facts and figures that need to be taken into account by anyone who says that the Heritage Action Erosion Counter is a "misrepresentation" of finds rates. If all these detectorists went out just four weekends a year with such finds rates, the HA model would be entirely justified. I suspect that many of them get out more than four weekends a year, and that the PAS did not see all the recordable finds at Chesterton Rally IV.
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