The Festival Of Archaeology fortnight Has Come to an End, Leaving Questions Unanswered

In Britain they have this cutesy "#FestivalOfArchaeology" publicity stunt where all sorts of events are staged (some in the past involving "metal detecting" - ugh) anyway this year it lasted a fortnight. At the beginning there was an "ask an Archaeologists a question" session, the idea of this bit of public outreach being that members of the publlic could ask a real archaeologist a real question about real archaeology and they'd get an answer. Hmmm. Cute eh? Possibly they were catering just for the type of "what-do-you-do-when-it-rains?" or "do-you-find-much-gold?" type questions. Anyway since at the moment public archaeology is somewhat in competition with the Graham-Hancock-youTube "ancient lost civilization" take on the past (the popular Netflix series "Ancient Apocalypse" got a lot more viewers than anything actual archaeology has to show). I thought I'd see how British archaeology would cope with a Hancockian question or two. So here's one:

Paul Barford @PortantIssues ·Jul 19
#AskAnArchaeologist, What is being done in Britain to make available to the public the results of any current projects with relevance to the question of the existence of the possible Lost Ancient Proto-Civilization discussed in the popular Netflix docuseries #AncientApocalypse?

and the answer was revealing on just where public archaeology is going in Britain today....

I asked another one, a bit more specific, about the British evidence for that famed Younger Dryas Impact that you can read about in the Internet. I put a picture on this one, and the question is quite specific - and the answer would give the opportunity to explain a number of methodological issues (and the title's got "diamonds" in it):

Paul Barford @PortantIssues ·Jul 19
#AskAnArchaeologist, there is material claimed as representing a Younger Dryas Comet Impact (c. 12.9kya) at Watcombe Bottom, IoW, what is its archaeological context & is there more research in material of this nature in Britain? https://researchgate.net/publication/268390328_Nanodiamond-Rich_Layer_Across_Three_Continents_Consistent_with_Major_Cosmic_Impact_at_12800_Cal_BP 

So, whether or not Britain feels part of Europe any more, the whole of Britain and "Doggerland") are right in the centre of the shadow to the east of the effects of this claimed cosmic catastrophe - obviously something very significant to the prehistory and "story of our land", no?   So the answer to this question is pretty symptomatic too on the ability of British archaeologists to present to the public their side of a story that for at least part of the public that is fascinated by the mysteries of the past is part of popular culture... 

Just in case I was just a little too subtle above... despite the fact that thousands of people believe what they are told by the "experts" like Graham Hancock and his YouTube imitators that archaeologists "have got it wrong", "have not got a clue", or (worse) "are hiding from us all the truth", neither question was answered by a British archaeologist. As far as I know, there has not been any widely-accessible official response (such as a website or page on their own website) by any British archaeological body or organization to "Ancient Apocalypse". They've just capitulated to this widespread public misinformation about the past. the same with the Younger Dryas nonsense. It does not matter that there ARE technical articles in the internet in journals like Nature saying the reasons why there was no "impact", it's all there, but is it accessible to the average Joe Public. Will my Brexit-supporting Mum get anything out of it if she reads it? (Answer, no). 

Quite apart from the duty we have to inform public opinion (or am I dreadfully out of touch here?) there is a more important practical reason why archaeology should not be letting this slide. If tens of thousands of members of the public (that potentially includes developers, various shades of "influencers", local government officials as well as Westminster lawmakers) are firm in their belief that archaeology is a (deceitful) scam that cannot provide real answers, them why will they be persuaded to support our work in any way at all? 

After all, a bloke with a metal detector can find as many "treasures" as a fully funded dig done with little brushes and sieves that mostly finds only charred grains and potsherds the size of a thumbnail. A bus driver with a YouTube channel can show (and solve) more "mysteries of the past" (big stones "nobody knows how they were moved, pictures of ancient Egyptian lightbulbs, Sassanian pots that look like batteries, carvings on standing stones that look like aliens, etc.) that archaeologists who just talk about abstractions.... 

British archaeologists have surrendered long ago to the artefact hunters and collectors with their metal detectors and spades. Here too they also show their innate passivity. 

Please, show that you can answer the question. 

Jabhat al-Nusra’s attitudes towards tangible heritage in Syria

Almohamad, A., and Alabdullah, S. (2024). Jabhat al-Nusra’s attitudes towards tangible heritage in Syria: the disengagement from Al-qaeda. Journal of Conflict Archaeology, 1–26. https://doi.org/10.1080/15740773.2024.2383888

ABSTRACT
On 28 July 2016, Jabhat al-Nusra announced its disengagement from militant international Islamist organization al-Qaeda and became Jabhat Fatah al-Sham. In January 2017, Jabhat Fatah al-Sham rebranded yet again when it merged with several other Syrian groups to establish Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS). HTS formed a civilian ‘Syrian Salvation Government’ to manage its regions. Among the transformations was in its attitudes towards the looting and destructions of antiquities, which had become endemic in Syria. HTS had targeted archaeological sites for destruction and looting. After its disengagement from al-Qaeda, HTS reopened the Idlib Museum in 2018, and claimed to protection of antiquities. This article aims to study the reasons and motives for the transformation in strategy of HTS regarding Syrian tangible heritage during the ongoing war in Syria and argues that this strategy remains one in which Syrian heritage is exploited for political gain within the context of a larger conflict.

UK Archaeology Group Staff Member Under Investigation for Fraud

Fraud has been alleged in the UK in a "community archaeology" project, the Sedgeford Historical and Archaeological Research Project (SHARP). Its "former treasurer was charged with fraud and false accounting by Norfolk Police, amid suggestions in the media that over £100k may have gone missing from the project over a number of years". This group has been working with metal detectorists between 1998 and 2018. This comes after a recent case when the treasurer of another UK archaeology group was charged with a similar offence in May 2019 (" Detectorist Reportedly Defrauds Archaeological Organization of £11k"and the scandal involving the group "Detecting for Veterans" in 2021. How many more are we not hearing about? And whatever has happened to amateur archaeology in Britain these days that from being an honest and genteel pastime, it has become associated with such criminal activity ?

An Ancient Land.

US "Historian making videos on ancient civilizations":

Luke Caverns @lukecaverns · Jul 15
Good to be back in an ancient land. The Zapotec world is incredible.

"an ancient land" - as if there was nothing in his  native Texas before the white landgrab. In his local museum, are the Native American cultures housed in the Natural History museum alongside the butterflies and stuffed birds like one I saw in Florida? To me, that's a telling attitude.

Istanbul Church Reopens as Mosque With Medieval Mosaics and Frescoes Intact

After a four-year wait, the Chora Church has reopened as the Kariye Mosque with its treasured works of Christian art open to public view (Jennifer Hattam Istanbul Church Reopens as Mosque With Medieval Mosaics and Frescoes Intact Hyperallergic 14.07.2024)

When the 11th-century Chora Church was ordered to be reconverted into a mosque in 2020, many feared for the fate of its richly decorated interior, which features some of the world’s finest Late Byzantine-era mosaics and frescoes. After a tense four-year wait while the building was closed for restoration, it reopened on May 6 as the Kariye Mosque with its treasured works of Christian art [ ] again open to public view.

Except for a handful of pieces in the small central nave that has been set aside for the men’s prayer hall, off-limits to non-Muslims and women.

From "Encyclopedic" Trophy Museum to Trophy "Encyclopedic Museum"

Reportedly, Hartwig Fischer, former British Museum director, after resigning amid a theft scandal, has been appointed as the founding director of a new museum of world cultures in Riyadh, set to open in 2026.

YouTuber Insists "The Precision Egyptian Vases are (probably) NOT fakes"

 YouTuber Cosplay-past-explorer and out-and-out clickbait-farmer Luke Caverns characterised as "Toxic Archaeology" my earlier discussion of the pitfalls of trying to use artefacts (in this case Egyptian lathe-turned hardstone vases) as "evidence" of a lost technically advanced ancient civilization (LTAAC). Instead of being a witness to tools and techniques in use in the distant past, the many fakes among them instead reflect the tools and techniques (sometimes impressive) of modern fakers.  Caverns is enamoured of the LTAAC idea and is in denial. Of my commentary, he says: "articles like this from a professional are just unacceptable and it's very juvenile". Huh! In this new video, Caverns basically applies the main antiquities collectors//dealers' argument that, since we know a lot of looting of real sites took place, there is a high chance that large numbers of vessels on the market today are looted authentic artefacts. He also wishes to redate these artefacts deep into the pre-dynastic period

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Posted on You Tube by Luke Caverns 1 July 2024..

It really is a little suggestive of hero-worship of collector Matt Beall:

"I think that Matt is exactly right here , I mean we do have tools from the pre-dynastic Naqada cultures in Egypt but I just don't think that they are sufficient enough (sic) to create something with the measurements that are as precise or exact as these vases are and I personally do not have any suspicion that these are fake. We we see artifacts from all around the Mediterranean world that have no provenance, I mean, the Mediterranean world has been getting looted since ancient times and there are tons of artifacts that show up either on the Antiquities Market or end up in private collections or museums that have no ptovenance but their legitimacy is not really in question.Now I do understand taking artifacts with no Providence and rewriting textbooks based on the findings of those artifacts, I get that, and I can get why that's a major no no in archaeology.... but to attack the people simply studying them or label them as grifters or liars or whatever uh I don't think that that's warranted or called for [...] I think that these are real artifacts and I think that they are evidence for the fact that... well, I mean certainly it's evidence that a lathe existed 2,000 years before we attribute (sic) it to have existed in Egypt. I think that the earliest depiction we have* of the lathe comes from 1300 BC and these pre-dynastic vases date well over 2,000 years before that before 3,300 BC so it's it's pretty amazing..."

 

What has been said about the people that are studying these items and drawing far-reaching (but unwarranted) conclusions is not that they are "liars", but they are misguided and need to apply more rigorious methodology and source criticisms to their research. That's all. That some of them are making YouTube income from making videos about this reserach, having had these things pointed out (or them being easily worked-out), however raises questions.

*Note he goes on teh pictorial evidence, rather than the presence of excavated artefacts showing the use of this tool. Such as for excample lathe-turned stone vases of the fourth dynasty.