There is a City...

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There is a city...
which stops for one minute every year.

I've been living here for over twenty years and though the calendar is filled with many commemorations, religious, secular political, for some odd reason none affects me so much as this one. This year it caught me on the way to a meeting in the Old Town. Where I live the event (the sixty eighth anniversary of the Warsaw Uprising) is signalled by the loud plaintive wail of factory sirens all over the town which begin precisely at 17:00 and finish precisely 17:01. In the Old Town I was surprised to hear mainly peals of church bells, which was not quite the same (especially as they are all post-War casts and rather 'tinny' in sound). A bit later, already in the meeting, through an open window wafted in the sound from the market place outside of apparently spontaneous patriotic singing (incongruously mainly First World War anthems and marching songs, followed by hits of the Warsaw street orchestras of the interwar years and a few catchy tunes from the early years of communism - about  rebuilding the capital destroyed by the Nazis). They were still at it when I left over an hour later - a several-dozen strong group of mostly young people (probably many from the rather nationalist and wrong-headed Party-I-do-not-Support [PiS]) surrounded by passers by who'd stopped and knew most of the words ( I confess I do not). Just as I walked past the gathering it was being addressed by a little shrivelled old lady who'd taken part in the fighting at the age of 16. My late father-in-law was also a combatant. Apart from the patched (and some raw) bullet scars on many buildings - undatable of course - there are few traces above-ground of the Uprising in today's town fabric (apart from the graves in the cemetery that is). Part of the reason for this is that it was the 'wrong' partisan army that was involved (the anti-Soviet 'Home Army' and not the pro-Soviet 'People's Army') and the Communist authorities had no intention of paying any more attention to it than they had to, this is why the monuments that were put up in the 1980s were the result of long fights with red tape and restrictions.

But today it was not monuments that mattered.

[the palm tree is an urban sculpture, a pretend palm tree in the centre of a pretend roundabout - the police often stand on it and give you a fine if you try to use it as a roundabout, because there is a sign earlier telling you not to use it to turn left, crazy. The building with writing on it talks of the whole nation [re]building the capital after the War, the big square in the film is nearby and has the Grave of the Unknown Soldier - where Mitt Romney was shouted at yesterday - and the other scenes were shot by the central station and underground]

I am an Archaeoblogger, What do I do?

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Well, everybody else is doing this, and these have been going the rounds, so I thought I'd share them...

or...

KV64 Announced

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It has been announced today what the rumours were suggesting a while back, a KV64 has been found in the valley of Kings near the tomb of Siptah. It is Third Intermediate Period which is nice, as that was the date of the ones I excavated in Deir El Bahari in 2009. Let's hope this one is more intact than they were. It is a shame though that the geophysical anomaly found by the Amarna Tombs Project could not have got the number KV64. It will be interesting to see what happens there...

UPDATE 16th January
Can't get Thebes out of my mind. I decided not to take part in this season's projects at Deir el Bahari, but as the snow and ice take hold and I re-read Mirek Barwik's "The Twilight of Ramesside Egypt" with all those fascinating graffiti, I cannot help but dream of the desert valleys and a crazy woman Pharaoh's Temple of a Million Years nestling under the cliffs. It's a place I'd been fascinated by since I was seven; on my first visit I was surprised to find out I already knew (almost) every corner of it, never having been there. The fascination, perhaps obsession, remains and I am thrilled and privileged to be able to work there. Oddly enough, it is not the great monuments that excite me as much as the rocks around and in particular the fascination of the ancient graffiti on them, walking in the steps of Butahamon and all the others that scribbled away out in the remote valleys. It's a total contrast to the type of archaeology I specialise in normally, illiterate, anonymous makers of grotty, baggy pots who lived modest lives in holes in the ground (the Early Slavs liked swamps).

Happy New Year to All Blog Readers

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At this time of the year I normally sit down and try and look through the past events and try to write a summary, mainly to get my own ideas into shape. I've not been able to find time to do that (nor do a couple of posts I was planning - UK's plague of scrap metal thefts, answering Raimund Karl, the fact that once again I was not invited to the PAS Christmas party and a couple of other things) this year, though they were on my 'to do' list for today.

New Year's Eve festivities beckon, so it remains for me to wish anyone looking in today a very Happy New Year, and I'll see what I can get on bloggy-virtual-paper tomorrow.

Vignette: (Urban) Poland goes firework-crazy on New Year's Eve, the explosions start about eleven in the morning (sporadic) and reach a crescendo at just before midnight and about an hour or so into the morning of Jan 1st. It drives one of my cats crazy.

PACHI BLOG BACK ONLINE, DESPITE UK METAL DETECTORISTS' THREATS

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I was gratified by the number of people and institutions who wrote asking for invitations to read this blog while it was "author only" (that's what it should have said) and offered its author messages of support. Thanks very much to all those people. Concerned heritage organization Heritage Action (on whose forums aggressive and disruptive behaviour of metal detectorists and their supporters is no novelty either) helped out by hosting a text by me explaining why this blog was offline and pointing out in no uncertain terms why this sort of thing matters. I am grateful to them for this gesture of goodwill and support. Thanks also to Meg Lambert over in the US for recognising that problem with antisocial metal detectorists is no different from any of the other conflicts of interest in the 'scary' world of portable antiquities ruffianship.

I have now decided to re-open access to this blog to all interested (on both sides of the collecting 'fence'). The whole point of a public debate is that it should be public. If artefact hunters (so-called "metal detectorists") in the UK object to that, that's just their tough luck. There is absolutely nothing to stop them producing their own open-access blogs and websites, commenting on and debating points made, articulating their counterarguments and addressing the issues raised in texts like the ones I write here. That is something that to this day is wholly lacking from this milieu. In my view crude thuggish attempts simply to silence an ongoing debate about what is after all the common archaeological heritage by making threats and by the sort of pathetic 'anti-blogging' we have seen until now, is nothing but an immense and very public signal of the intellectual bankruptcy of the artefact hunting and collecting "cause".

To judge from the reaction on some metal detecting forums (like the Detecting Wales discussion list which you can see without registering to get access to closed access areas) artefact hunters in the UK were delighted that "the Barford Slayer" (sic) among them had managed to - as he put it - "put an end to Paul Barford and his anti detecting blogs" by resorting to enlisting local low-life to threaten his family. There has been almost universal approval in the milieu of the actions of the person concerned and by extension the crude 'methods' applied. I think many "metal detectorists " in the UK are only too aware of the "Portable Antiquities Scam" currently being perpetrated on British public opinion. That is, the huge holes in the arguments put forward by the supporters of the hobby of so-called "metal detecting" and the degree to which the flimsy façade of "responsibility" and alleged "benefits" for archaeology is based on wholly questionable premises as the foundation. Tragically for the archaeological record of Britain, the number of people actually questioning these premises is still relatively small. This is partly as a result of the sort of aggression and unpleasantness (including threats) that tends to be directed at their authors (even on 'academic' discussion lists such as the JISC-run Britarch discussion list of the Council for British Archaeology, and before this forced its closure, the Portable Antiquities Scheme's own public-access forum).

This has to change and there has to be more transparency about what these people are doing to the archaeological heritage in which not only archaeologists and collectors are the only stakeholders, but - primarily - the whole of society (and internationally). The conservation policies of English Heritage on sustainable management of the historic environment (download here) state clearly that the issues concerning conservation of the cultural heritage should be a matter of open debate and consultation. This is quite patently not happening in the case of portable antiquities issues. This may be very comfortable for the artefact hunter and procurer, it may be comfortable for the dealers and buyers, but all the time this is going on, the evidence we have indicates that the long-term survival and integrity of the archaeological record which we aim to protect is being severely compromised.

Since the metal detectorists of the United Kingdom with few exceptions failed to speak out against the attempt to frighten the author into silence - giving the impression at least that they were solidly behind it - this seems a good time to summarise some of the problems the milieu does not want talked about. I intend to make the next fortnight on this blog - "Scrutiny of English Metal Detecting Fortnight" with a series of posts summarising the chief problems with current English policy on the hunting and collecting of freshly dugup artefacts from archaeological sites and lifted out of the archaeological record.

In response to the sense of entitlement expressed in the all-too-public jubilation of 1000+ Welsh "detectorists" over on their forum at the news that a critic had been crudely silenced, and in the light of current ongoing political events over in Wales, I have started a separate blog:

'Na i PAS ar gyfer Cymru: No to a Welsh PAS'

This looks more carefully at what the Welsh artefact hunters in particular have to hide. In it I put forward the argument that the existence of the Portable Antiquities Scheme, an organization which is a "partner" to these artefact hunters, is to a great degree sheltering some extremely disturbing features from deserved public scrutiny. The archaeological record belongs to us all and not a minority of individuals with metal detectors who claim absolute entitlement to take what they want from it and do what they want ("it's legal innit?"). I present a number of cogent arguments for wider debate concerning the total scrapping of the Welsh PAS in order to bring out into the open the issue of what should be done about the damage caused to the archaeological record by "metal detectorists". Maybe English lawmakers will eventually draw a more logical conclusion about the need to do something about the 'hidden hobby' than to simply pat a few of the collectors on the head and throw millions of pounds at a Scheme-facade in a pretence that the problem is in some way dealt with. It is not.

In case anyone is wondering, though I did from other archaeological bodies in the UK , it was notable - though not unexpected - that I did not get a single message of support from the fifty or so fellow archaeologists working in "Britain's largest archaeological (sic) outreach" organization whose job it actually is to be conducting public outreach on the portable antiquity issues which I cover in this blog. Perhaps, like their "partners" the so-called "metal detectorists", Bloomsbury was only too happy at the apparent closing down of another venue of open public debate about portable antiquities and heritage issues.

UPDATE 11th October 2011: It seems "Detecting Wales" have decided they do have something to hide after all: access to the page about the Welsh detectorists' reaction to "Steve the Barford Slayer's" discussion-stifling "achievements" now seems to have been deleted or blocked. It must be so awkward being part of a hobby where you can't allow outsiders to actually see what members write because it would show that the hobby is not at all what your propagandists would like people to believe about it. More transparency and honesty with the general public please.
Vignette: The 'Guennol' Lioness and I have some loose ends to tie up.

PACHI BLOG OFFLINE

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Yesterday, I informed the police about serious threats made against the author of this blog and his family by a British metal detectorist and an attempt to blackmail me into deleting it. I have decided that this blog will remain closed while the initial stages of their investigations are in progress to prevent further malicious activity by UK metal detectorists in support of this individual.

Some Useless facts and Numbers About this Blog

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I just came across this while looking for something else. At first I was not sure whether the numbers are good or bad, but when I started comparing results elsewhere, it seems its not that bad.
Statistics Summary for paul-barford.blogspot.com

Paul-barford.blogspot.com is ranked #2,340,509 in the world according to the three-month Alexa traffic rankings. Visitors to the site view 1.3 unique pages each day on average. Approximately 79% of visits to the site are bounces (one pageview only), and search engines refer roughly 21% of visits to the site. The time spent in a typical visit to Paul-barford.blogspot.com is about 70 seconds, with 38 seconds spent on each pageview.

I can't quite see how anyone can get through a page of my stuff in 38 seconds, must be good at skimming. This does not suggest that the message is getting through too effectively to the general public, I imagine those who persevere beyond 70 seconds are those who have an interest in the topic anyway.

In comparison, I can't say this surprises me (but I wish the website contained more than it does, this seems likely to be largely traffic to the database) Portable Antiquities Scheme 'http://finds.org.uk/' Rank: 935,475. What did surprise me greatly was the granddaddy of the archaeological heritage blogs, started July 17, 2007, with a post called Does looting matter? which according to this firm's estimation comes out 3,404,592th.

But then compared with the opposition, that's not by any means a bad result. look at this:
Site Information for ACCG ('accg.us') Alexa Traffic Rank: 9,684,267
Peter Tompa's 'Culturalpropertyobserver.blogspot.com' fares even worse, Rank: 25,560,129
Dave Welsh 'classicalcoins.blogspot.com': Rank: 26,525,235 and for Sayles' 'ancientcoincollecting.blogspot', a rather better - Rank: 6,837,041
Antiquities Dealers Association UK: 'http://www.theada.co.uk/' Rank: 7,077,510
BUT: Association of International Antiquities Dealers (AIAD) 'http://aiad.org.uk/' Rank:160,303 (Hmmmm, must pay them a lot more attention).

and "Candice Jarman's" Anti-blog? Site Information for 'paulbarford-heritage-the-ruth': Alexa Traffic Rank: No Data. It does not even figure on their radar.

The Portable Antiquities Collecting and Heritage Issues blog was begun on 7th January 2008 and currently has 2261 posts on it on a variety of topics. Initially it was started so I'd not clog British and other archaeological forums with posts about metal detecting which nobody wanted to read, especially when the detectorists began being obnoxious in "reply" and I'd not attract the US coineys to the SAFE blog which had more or less the same effect. The direct stimulus, I can reveal now, was that Peter Tompa started his blog [September 16, 2008] and I felt something was needed to counter the misinformation the coineys were spreading (and continue to spread). I thought I'd retire to my own little corner of the internet and rant on and those who want to can drop in, those who don't stay away. Well, it seems there is a niche need for something like this, Peter Tompa has just gained 90 000 hits (which is not to be sneezed at of course) and in a few days this blog's counter will be registering 390 000 hits, even if they are 38-second ones.

I suppose the next challenge is to write posts which can be read from beginning to end in 38 seconds and contain all the main points.

Vignette: Alexa logo from their website

My Sir Mortimer Artefact

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After my mentioning my fascination with Sir Mortimer Wheeler and pointing out there's a cunie on sale at Bonhams that used to be owned by him and his first wife, Kyri incites me:

take the plunge paul, buy your first piece. After all it has great provenance. you will see how rewarding collecting antiquities [ethically of course] can be.

yes, provenance (collecting history) is a good one, pre-1970, though no information on how Sir M. got it. Certainly I would have no problems with somebody (else) buying it, it even has a decent low estimate (I really cannot follow the logic of the estimates in that catalogue, some are remarkably low). OK, but how "rewarding" actually would be having it in my home? I cannot read the thing, I could fondle it, perhaps sit in a darkened corner with it grasped tightly in my hands and with my eyes shut try to imagine myself back in ancient Mesopotamia or something. But once you've fondled it and done the "imagine who touched this all those years ago" bit and looked at it admiringly from all sides, and showed the neighbours who feign interest, what else is there to do with such a thing? That's what I do not really understand. It's not even pretty.

OK, here's my Sir Mortimer "relic". A long while ago I set out to buy a copy of every book he'd published, I almost managed to do it too, tracking down some rare "Early India" volumes and some of the difficult early Welsh items for example. Most of them are in storage in the cellar, but one came up to the house with me. It was published in 1966 and is not one of Wheeler's best known works.

I found it in a bargain bin in a second hand bookshop by Bristol University. It's still got the price pencilled in: "Ł1.50 scored". I'd read this book earlier (thought it was boring at the time) but did not have a copy. So when I saw this one, I picked it out of the bin, opened it in the middle but found some jerk had been scribbling over it in biro. At first I thought it was a printer's copy, in some places the marks were proof-reading marks showing errors in the typesetting, but then as I studied it, I found that some of it was a discussion with the author, some of it downright rude. The writing was barely legible. Anyway, the book was ruined.

Then as I rejected the idea of buying it in disgust, automatically I opened the front cover to see if the scribbling vandal owner's name was on the flyleaf. It was not, but instead was an inscription which gave me a start. I recognised the handwriting immediately, having spent a while a few years earlier researching the 1930s Verulamium archive for a project I was once doing.

A little nonsense book for Max and Agatha with love Rik

Now obviously the person who'd put that copy in the bargain bin had no idea who this "Rik" was (Robert Eric Mortimer Wheeler) nor who the Max was who'd scribbled in a way which suggests the "love" was not particularly reciprocated, still less Mallowan's wife Agatha (Christie of course), with whom Jacquetta Hawkes' biography suggests "Rik" may have had some kind of a romantic attachment at one stage... I suspect if the shop assistant had known, it would have been on another shelf at the back of the shop. The one with the glass doors.

It was a long walk to the cash till as I recall, an irrational fear overtook me that perhaps somebody had seen the expression on my face as 'd opened it and before I got to the till and got my money out, they would snatch it from me and say, "sorry sir, there has been a mistake, this is not for sale". Should I be honest and tell the shop assistant that the book was probably worth a good deal more than one pound fifty? (I think I would have paid any price for it). Much to my discredit, I did not. It now sits on my shelf among a lot of other older books for which I paid considerably more, but this is the one that I keep anxiously pulling out and showing my family and saying when I die, it does not matter what they do with the rest, but remember, THIS book is special. I think they've got the message.

I suppose this is the same thrill as the coiney gets having spotted that something on ebay is a rare variety which neither the seller or other buyers seem to have noticed (I've discussed a US pastor with an uncanny knack for doing precisely that on this blog earlier). Watching the last seconds of the auction ticking away with their heart thumping, "has somebody else spotted it?" is the same as my long walk to the cash till. The feeling of self-congratulation, to have recognised something that was lying under everybody else's noses "for what it is" must be the same. So yes, that's a reward - a happy memory of a moment of serendipity.

But I can do more than fondle my artefact and bore people to death with my tale of how I found this "treasure".* I can read Wheeler's words in an actual copy I know he held in his hands, moreover (if I were interested in him) I would have a bit of an insight into the mind and character of Max Mallowan from his scribbled comments (though would not be surprised to hear he'd done this to a great many other books too). Sadly Agatha did not make any comments in the book I can see.

Whatever Peter Tompa and the rest of the finger-pointers say, in collecting old books and prints etc no resource is destroyed (unlike the digging of archaeological collectables out of archaeological sites). I have not enquired what happened to Mallowan's library when he died (Wallingford, Oxfordshire, August 1978), certainly if the bulk of it went to an institution, some less important books, less relevant to his own work would appear to have been split off and some four years later at least one of them turned up in a bargain bin in Bristol, and at the moment is in Poland. Habent sua fata libelli.

*[my "treasure" I suspect actually has more value as a bibliophilic collectable for most people because of the connection with Agatha Christie - even though physically it is less tenuous than the two archaeologists - "Mortimer who?"]

More Museum Confusion (part 2), "notorious" in some circles maybe, but not for that

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As I mentioned in the post above, Cairo based Egyptologist Nicole Hansen put a text up on a facebook group of 1000 members about the Cairo Egyptian Museum. It is apparently a message from Yasmin El-Shazly head of documentation at Cairo Museum. I cited the first part about an alleged mixup of photographs above. Here is what she writes in the second part:

By the way, Yasmin also asked me to relay the following message, because Paul censored and did not approve her message when she replied to his attack on her on his own blog: If any of you, especially Paul due to his background in medieval European coins that makes him more knowledgeable about the artifacts in the Egyptian Museum than the museum's own staff, find any inconsistencies or errors in the list that she compiled of the stolen artifacts, then kindly send them to Yasmin directly so she can correct them.

Well, first of all, I am not at all sure which of my posts here qualifies for the label "attack on her". She wrote critically of me on the Facebook page mentioned above - as is her right - I answered her here, as is my right. I also wrote to her perfectly civilly privately - which she either did not receive or is ignoring.

Certainly if she sent something through blogger here, I did not receive it. I would encourage her to send it again. I certainly would not have "censored" or rejected her reply, even if I disagreed with it. We are on the same side after all. So Yasmin, send it again, please - or to the email address I sent you and I'll post it for you.

But Yasmin, I really must take exception to the comment: "Paul due to his background in medieval European coins that makes him more knowledgeable about the artefacts in the Egyptian Museum than the museum's own staff". In your earlier text you labelled me "notorious", so that suggests you actually know something about me. What is this nonsense about Medieval coins? I am not a coiney !! How dare you !! (that's in ironic script) The coin collecting fraternity also will be mightily angered that you count me as one of their number as I gather I have a certain notoriety among a section of them, and its not for my "background in Medieval European coins"...

Certainly I do not claim to be "more knowledgeable about the artefacts in (or missing from) the Egyptian Museum than the museum's own staff". Like the Museum's staff and many other people (look at the news coverage you are getting) I am concerned about what happened on 28th January, I am concerned that there is so much confusion about what actually happened and who actually was involved.* Why is it wrong, in your opinion, to ask questions when something is left unclear - especially when it seems that the lack of clarity is deliberate?

And by the way, it was Vincent Brown, not me, who was the one to spot that the artefact in the photographs was not the one the press release says. I just assumed that if the Egyptian authorities say it is the one they say it is, it is.

Like it or not, interest in ancient Egypt, the Egyptian Museum and the global antiquities trade is international. On 29th January we all saw a shocking video of bits strewn across the floor of your museum. While I am sure most members of staff of your museum knew full well what most of the bits on the floor were, it was left to bloggers here (Margaret Maitland in particular), unaided as far as I am aware by anyone from the Museum, to try and work out what pieces were affected. From the beginning, we were told one thing and all saw something quite different. This was the beginning of the attempts of some people to try and piece together the conflicting pieces of evidence to reach some kind of understanding. Even today the museum staff seems to be doing very little to aid that process, and whatever information emerges still seems intended to sow the seeds of confusion. Like your "wrong photo" shabti-story (see above). You complained that you are getting too little support, how about first a little openness with those you expect to support you?

But certainly, I hope people send any "inconsistencies or errors in the list" of the missing artefacts, which Yasmin, it now turns out, compiled so she can correct them. It would be helpful if she could give out with such a request/ suggestion / offer an email address to which they can be sent...

*(for the reasons I indicated when I wrote to you privately, if you did not get it, send me another email address and I will try again).

Vignette: denar of Mieszko II king of Poland... (it's a fake, not a dugup, so OK to collect )

"The staff of the Egyptian Museum has seen very little support " (1)

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On Facebook, the following text apparently by Dr Yasmin El Shazly, Head of Documentation at The Egyptian Museum Cairo has been posted with the enjoinder "please circulate widely". It is dated 16th April 2011, but I only became aware of it today. In it we read:

I must admit that I am very disappointed at how some members of the international community have reacted to the looting of the Egyptian Museum, Cairo. The staff of the Egyptian Museum has seen very little support (there are a few wonderful people who did offer a lot of support, which we very much appreciate), and a great deal of attacks, nitpicking, sarcasm, etc... without any effort to actually understand what's going on, or how much hard work the museum staff is putting and how very very difficult this has all been for all of us. All the negative postings and articles have put a lot of pressure on us. If this material contained any constructive criticism, and was actually sent to us, so that we could try to use it to improve things it would've been very much appreciated, but most of it is in the style of the notorious Paul Barford, who posts material with nothing but criticism, and is clearly far less interested in the actual wellbeing of the Egyptian Museum than in promoting himself. OK, so it's world heritage, but why doesn't the international community react that way when thefts happen in museums in other parts of the world??? Why are we being treated like we had borrowed these objects from them and that we need to constantly justify everything we do? Why are we being treated with so much mistrust? Like we are always lying or trying to hide something???? Don't people understand that the museum has close to 200 000 objects? Don't people understand that the army only allowed us into the museum on February 6th, 2011, and even then, we had no access to the database? Don't people understand that the army only allowed a very small number of people into the museum, before it was reopened to the public, and that we had to walk in groups of 10-15, escorted by army commandos? Not to mention that we had a revolution and spent some time without a minister or a head of the SCA! If the looting had happened in Paris, London or the US (without a revolution) would people have reacted the same way? I wonder!

Well, I am very sorry that Yasmin feels that "the staff of the Egyptian Museum has seen very little support" from outside. I am not quite sure what kind of help the international community could have offered in the circumstances. There were calls for international action to look out for the stolen artefacts if they had been smuggled out of the country, but we only learnt what was missing from the museum weeks later (much later than Feb 6th). It was impossible for outside specialists to come to the museum to help while the unrest was going on, and when there was an international mission in Egypt, it was strongly criticised by the Egyptians that it had come. Its not clear what the writer thinks is needed, money, advice, moral support only, being left alone? What kind of constructive advice could we offer Egyptian museum professionals? Has anyone seen any actual request for help from the Museum?

Certainly Yasmin, a lot of people - myself included - were (and are) deeply concerned for the safety of the Museum, the objects in it and the people who work in it in the current situation. We are, I would have thought, on the same side in this concern for what happened and why.

You mention me by name, critical of my commentary here on these events. I am going to answer those points below.

Let me assure you however I have deepest sympathy for those of my colleagues who have to work under such conditions and that I am very concerned indeed about what happened on 28th January, and about what has happened since. And it is precisely because of that concern that I do not think we should pass over such things in silence, and strive to get to the truth about what happened and why.
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Vignette: Wsparcie.

"The staff of the Egyptian Museum has seen very little support" (2)

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I am called to the blackboard and accused by name of having a negative attitude towards the looting that happened in the Egyptian Museum on the night of 28th January. It is not quite as simple as Dr Yasmin El Shazly would like to make out. Perhaps it would help her understand what she clearly does not about what I have written if we look at the development of my blogging on the matter in the context of events.

Back in January the world was shocked to hear about the violence which had broken out on Cairo's streets as a wave of protests started to sweep the country. I was watching this pretty carefully as I was supposed to be going out there a few days later. Then came the equally dreadful news from the media on 28th Jan that the police had withdrawn from the streets and there were thugs, including 'escaped' prisoners and looters abroad. The internet and phone lines were down and there was no contact with our friends in Cairo, let alone friends and colleagues in Luxor. Then the world heard, at first very confused, accounts that the Egyptian Museum in Cairo had been looted. I remember feeling physically sick at the news and I am sure that I was not the only archaeologist who took that news very badly and - whether Yasmin El Shazly likes it or not - very personally. I started several posts here on that topic, and finished one that day; now actually in hindsight considering what we had to work with, that was not a bad account. I was one of several bloggers trying to make sense of the fragmentary information (see links to some of the others here). There are a series of posts on my blog for the next few days expressing deep concern about the fate of monuments and antiquities in the civil unrest that was developing. I posted a text on the 30th suggesting that it was likely that the looting of sites could follow and hoping that they were going to be better guarded. The next day it turned out those fears had already been fulfilled. The information emerging from the Egyptian Museum and the Ministry of Antiquities over the next days and weeks was wholly unclear and contradictory and there was much questioning and speculation about what was going on. It stands to reason that anyone who cares, whether they are Egyptian or not, is going to want to try and understand what was going on. Why does that disturb Yasmin?

Like many other people, I had difficulties following the various pieces of contradictory information that were coming out of the Ministry of Antiquities, and occasionally the Museum. I was however privileged that I had the opportunity almost as soon as the Museum re-opened to go there and see for myself, and within a few hours of getting off my plane I was in the museum doing just that. I suppose its a professional disease, trying to make sense of past events by their material traces, it does not matter if its the robbing of a tomb in the 20th dynasty or a museum in 2011, there are traces there and a story to try to unravel. I was the first foreign archaeologist to enter the Museum since it was closed in late January the lady at the door checking my papers said. Let it be on record that before I flew to Cairo, I wrote to Dr Yasmin El-Shazly through Facebook perfectly civilly asking if we could meet when I was in the Museum. I received no reply. I did, however, meet several very interesting people, including some journalists both international and Egyptian who were able to give me their take on what was happening, I met the wonderful Salima Ikram there by chance and we went round together for a while and I was privileged to be shown her favourite pieces (none of which were touched by the looters) and we talked about what had happened. I also bumped into Albert Ghaly of the Museum staff who first agreed to show me where the looters had been, but disappeared when I started, perfectly civilly and wholly innocently, asking certain questions - like how the mummy heads had got into the Museum where the journalists saw them on the 29th. I met him three times in the next few days and he gave extraordinarily conflicting stories about the mummy heads each time before darting away again on "urgent business". To be fair to him, he was (he says) abroad when this happened, but still clearly will have known more than he was apparently prepared to say.

Wandering around by myself, I found out where all the cases were that we'd glimpsed in the film reports of Al Jazeera and a few days later CNN, and found the places where the well-known publicity photos had been taken. I tried to trace a route (one guy) or routes (the nine-guy version) that led from one smashed case to the next and tried to imagine covering them in the dark by men knowing/suspecting there were somewhere in the building security guards who would be reacting to the sounds of the breaking glass. I reconstructed in my mind where the objects we had seen in the photos had been removed from cases and where they had ended up (we did not have all of this information, and still do not, of course) and where possible tried to surmise their route through the Museum. It then slowly started emerging that the stories we were being told simply did not make any sense when confronted with the evidence on the ground. Puzzled by this, I spent many hours re-examining and trying to make the stories fit. They did not. Which is what I wrote what I wrote. I even went back there again on my way out of Egypt because I wanted to make sure I'd not imagined it. So I do not make the statements about what I saw lightly.

Now apparently Dr Yasmin who so objects to me expressing an opinion based on what I read and saw has a different view, she's walked around those galleries more times than me. Since she objects so strongly to me offering a version opposed to it, it would seem she has no doubts in accepting the official story. It would be useful for historians of Egyptian archaeology and others (and settle this once and for all) if she would set down in writing what she thinks the traces left behind show. Where she says the looters were and what she thinks they were doing there. After all, she would have been one of the persons actively removing and - one hopes - fully documenting the traces of the events (the scattered objects and their fragments) which I was interested in examining. Perhaps I missed something that is in her documentation?

Yasmin El Shazly's critical text on Facebook was written on the 16th April 2011. Let's see what was happening about that time. On the 12th April I was absolutely overjoyed to learn that four more objects had been recovered. Literally because I was sure until then that the harpooning statue (which really is one of my personal favourites from Tutankhamun's tomb) was lost forever. That was fantastic (I even posted it on my facebook page saying so) - and I was quite happy that this meant that one of my earlier deductions about the theft had been disproven. I think that can be seen in the first part of my post about it. No "criticism" there. I was puzzled that nothing had been said about how they had been recovered. Odd, I thought.

That joy turned to disappointment and anger when we were told the first version about "how they had been recovered". Dr El Shazly's Museum Director appeared at a press conference (see the video in my blog post) announcing to all the world in an offhand manner that four objects had been found in an unattended bag just ever-so-coincidentally but also extremely conveniently on his way to work by Salah Abdel Salam, who just happens to work at the ministry. I do not think I am the only person in the world who feels insulted that we (and in that I am not excluding Egyptians) were expected to believe that. That is simply demeaning - not surprisingly the story later changed in its details.

I really cannot help it that I do actually have at home in my upstairs bookcase next to my desk a big red folder with a printout of the Egyptian Museum's missing objects list (because Yasmin, I do care about the missing objects - right?). When I was joyfully ticking off these four newly recovered items, I realised that the shabti which the Egyptian authorities said had returned was in a different state from the depiction in the picture in the list, and I posted about that, registering my concern (concern, Yasmin). It seemed from the photo which we were told was JE 68984 that the object was splitting because unstable (note the problem arose because I accepted what we'd been told). It turns out (after I went to bed) somebody over the other side of the world, equally concerned no doubt, found out that the people announcing the miraculous find of just four items had got it mixed up with another. Well, jeez Yasmin, what can one say - but "shambles"? [Your "Missing objects" lists still lack a title page, date of publication, page numbering and still contain a number of apparent errors and inconsistencies].

Then there was that needlessly stupid anti-Hawass bru-ha-ha about the Museum shop lease and a fashion collection. I posted on the one, not the other as I recall, pretty disgusted by people's reactions to both (I really see nothing to get worked up about with the clothes line and photography and I really liked the Museum's new gift shop - best thing in the Museum and they wanted to put the guy in jail for creating it).

Then on the 16th April, I posted a text on the changed story about "how the bag was found" and the mysterious offhand mention that somebody-or-other had already been sentenced for some theft-or-other in the museum, leaving it wholly unclear (to me at least) how that related to any of the other stories. This was the day Dr Yasmin El Shazly wrote about the "notorious" Paul Barford and his criticisms. Now I really do not see that any of my criticisms were unjustified. Maybe Yasmin would like to explain what a blogger should have praised?

Perhaps it is worth noting that between these posts on my blog there are a whole load of others about other portable antiquity issues. Including quite a lot expressing concern about what was happening in Egypt outside Cairo. This is not a blog about one museum and its problems, however interested I am in (and puzzled by) them. It is a blog about portable antiquities and issues, and the Cairo museum looting story involves a lot of rather knotty issues connected with portable antiquities.

As for being "clearly far less interested in the actual wellbeing of the Egyptian Museum" that is simply not true, Yasmin. Of course any archaeologist is extremely concerned about the wellbeing of the Museum. Anyone interested in ancient Egypt (and I am) is going to be particularly interested in the wellbeing of that particular Museum, aren't they? (I even bet some collectors and maybe even antiquity dealers are too, though you'd not see it in the blogs of the usual culprits.)

Yasmin also accuses the foreign devil Barford of "promoting himself" by writing about the Museum. Yasmin, a blog is a blog. A blog is what a bloke writes about what interests or concerns him. Some people write about what they had for breakfast, others about what Lady Gaga had for breakfast, some what they saw in a demonstration outside a courthouse. I write about "portable antiquities" because it is what I like writing about and feel very strongly about. Nobody makes Yasmin or anyone else read this. (Anyway, I would not bother too much, if you look over at the "popular posts" sidebar, I am currently mostly visited by UK metal detectorists who don't care about anything much and the global tarantula-breeding community.)

I don't know whether this is really "promoting" myself. It serves primarily to get me to set out my random ideas in a coherent form, and also get those ideas out where they might eventually be seen, thought about and - please note Yasmin - challenged. I rather think that as a means of "promotion", this blog does me no favours at all. It certainly makes me rather a lot of seriously vindictive enemies among collectors, dealers and antiquity smugglers, museum staff who've got dodgy objects in their collections, and archaeologists who don't like me criticising metal detectorists. Even the UK's Portable Antiquities Scheme have threatened to have their lawyers on me. Twice, so I hear. So does that mean I should not speak out about what concerns me as an archaeologist (or as anyone else)? Somebody ought to. I think we have far too many jobsworth archaeologists who do not speak out about various things because they are afraid of the reaction. Is that not the case, Yasmin?
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Book Chapter: Halte au Pillage

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Some time ago I was invited to contribute to Halte au Pillage! - a collaborative book by authors based throughout Europe, which addresses the issues connected with the preservation of the archaeological heritage from the depravations caused by mining archaeological sites as a source of commercially attractive collectables. It is a call for policies to oppose this resource-damaging practice. The book (edited by Gregory Compagnon) was recently launched in Paris and apparently has been well received.

I was tempted to write about my usual hobby horse topic, the UK's approach to so-called "metal detecting" but I knew Heritage Action's Nigel Swift was also planning on covering that topic and I knew he would write a competent account - which he did, It is titled “Fantaisies, fictions et faussetés : quelques tristes réalités derrière la coopération entre « metal detectorists » et archéologues en Grande Bretagne” (it is in a section called “Le scandale des détecteurs de métaux”). I hope he publishes the English version of this text somewhere, not more than a few UK "metal detectorists" can barely read and write their own language, so any hopes they can cope with getting to grips with his arguments in a French one are a bit unlikely. Not of course that these people are at all interested in why there are criticisms of current British policies on artefact hunting anyway.

Looking at the conspectus it struck me that I should attempt to fill in a gap in its coverage and attempt to summarise what's happening in Eastern Europe. It struck me that as far as I was aware, there was not such a summary in print anywhere, so I set out to write one. The effects are the text "commerce de vestiges archeologiques dans l'est de l'Europe" pp 137-146 which was useful in getting my thoughts in order. I might try to get a longer version out later on in Polish.

Egypt here I come...

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Last night I heard that the decision has been taken that the 2011 season of the Polish-Egyptian mission in Deir El-Bahari will be continuing (it had been functioning with a skeleton staff throughout the recent events but it was unclear whether it would continue or cut sort the season). Our (Polish) Foreign Office has not yet downgraded its travel warning, but diplomatic sources suggest its a matter of days. The British one has however downgraded theirs. So after talking with Cairo last night, I will close the half-packed suitcase gaping all this time in the hall attracting dust and cats and fly out Sunday at dawn for a shortened stay. So blogging really will be light from the end of this week.

The shorter stay means I will not be able to get done all of what I had planned. Last night however I saw the preliminary results of ground penetrating radar survey of where I am supposed to be digging in the Lower Court (a small version here), and they are amazing but at the same time worrying. It seems that against all expectations (as turned out to be the case last year) the earlier work there had not removed all of the stratigraphy. So what should have been a 'take-off-the-old-backfill-down-to-rock' exercise to prepare foundations for the display of reconstructed statuary looks like it could be far more interesting - and complex. It seems though with tourist figures down, there may be no better time to excavate the bit we were planning. Let's see what conditions are like on the ground however and how far the paperwork got through the SCA before all the troubles.

Meanwhile I have been enjoying Peter Kircham's blog, he's down there as a tourist, having a whale of a time just observing life as it goes on in the Luxor region. Worth a read.

Photo: The Lower Court of the Hatshepsut temple (middle foreground on the left) from not-even-half way up the cliffs behind, the degree to which that valley was modified to fit this thing in is not often appreciated, modern excavators' spoil heaps don't help either. [the thing in the foreground right is the Mentuhotep temple] (Photo PMB 2009).