Tuesday 23 September 2014

Hoard Hoiking: A Word from the Archaeologists


Heritage Action made a comment about professional reticence in addressing artefact hunters' bad practice under one of yesterday's posts which I think worth highlighting:
Well, all those professionals may have stayed silent but notional octogenarian Farmer Silas Brown said it for them back in March after the Kent scandal, pleading with PAS over their inadequate advice..."can you please make the changes without any further delay – before another spade-happy hero digs up what he shouldn’t and comes asking the poor taxpayer for even more money and saying the state financed advice bureau hadn’t told him what he should have done? As a taxpayer I’m not sure who annoys me most, him or you, but I think probably you as you know I’m right." We have professionals who know what's right and we have amateurs who are too thick to work it out for themselves and the former won't explain it properly to the latter. That IS a scandal, there's no other word for it.
Meanwhile I am told by somebody who looks like one of the participants:
If fellow British archeologists are happy with how this was conducted then it shouldn't concern you. Our heritage. Our museums.
My reply:
Are they? Your FLO refuses to answer my letter about it. You get the FLO to send me a statement that they are "happy" with the level of recording here and I'll gladly publish it.
Very gladly. Trouble is, the FLO maintains a silence about the ‘Dunelme hoard’ incident, could it be they do not want to engage in any discussion for a reason? I thought though that this is the job of the FLOs, liaison.

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