Wednesday 30 April 2014

UK Artefact Hunting, Artefact Ownership "a Minute Detail"


Some people just don't get it. Janner now comes out with this gem ('We Are All Thieves....(Apparently)', 30th April 2014):
" The law regarding all finds are the landowners might exist, but its unworkable. Whats all the fuss about anyway. [...] Okay, by law its the farmers property, but its stuff he never even knew he had, never even knew existed, even stuff he most likely never lost in the first place.[...] I can't see what all the fuss is about other than some bodies trying to get detecting banned and stressing out about minute details".
Take a look at the finds valuation pages of the two main British metal detecting magazines, a common buckle starts at twenty quid, many coins much more. Janner reckons he's being very generous giving a farmer a tenner a visit to take away stuff:
"the odd coins, buckles, buttons, musket balls, pieces of rusted iron, pull tabs, silver foil, anything at all that's found. [...] Tally up if we sold what we find and its us that comes out the losers [cue: plaintive violin music] . Just look at the amount of treasure finds that are made, the farmer gets half of the total amount and some farmers have done really well out of it. Why shouldn't we as detectorists get the other half, we invested in the equipment and put the time in".
As do Somalian pirates. Arrr.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Aaaah, he PAYS to detect now does he, what a convenient and unusual revelation!

So he is saying he BUYS the farmer's stuff, unseen by the farmer! Maybe he also has a business clearing peoples' lofts of what they didn't know they had (another well-respected profession) and by some magical, piratical process he never finds anything up there worth more than a tenner.... What a twerp.

Mr Janner isn't the problem. Anyone can see he just doesn't understand decent behaviour. (How would HE like it if it was his elderly granny's land or loft?) What really matters is how many Mr Janners there are out there knocking on doors with their marvellous loft-clearing offer. Judging by the fact detectorists aren't saying on forums (or even on "responsible" blogs) that his behaviour is idiotic and unethical and a disgrace to detecting, I'd assume many are of his persuasion.

Paul Barford said...

"Judging by the fact detectorists aren't saying on forums (or even on "responsible" blogs) that his behaviour is idiotic and unethical and a disgrace to detecting, I'd assume many are of his persuasion".
Indeed, as I pointed out in a later post, some metal detectorists are defending him, criticising instead those who "badmouth our pastime".

http://paul-barford.blogspot.com/2014/04/no-one-is-squeaky-clean-so-i-can-take.html

But you are right to highlight the fact that this "discussion" was not met with a flood of disapproval from the 9999 other metal detectorists in the UK. Where are those "responsible detectorists" when oikism of this magnitude is being flouted by ambassadors of the hobby?



 
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