From Bangor: 'Archäologische Denkmalpflege Neu Denken'

Raimund Karl (Professor of Archaeology and Historic Preservation at Bangor University),  has started a new blog Archäologische Denkmalpflege (http://archdenk.blogspot.co.uk/) where he posts his thoughts on heritage protection. Most of the posts so far are in German, though some of his controversial ideas are there in insular-speak to gladden the hearts of English-speaking artefact collectors too. He says:

 ich sehe dies hier als experimentelle Blogschrift, ein Mittelding zwischen Blog und Zeitschrift.

and seems to welcome guest posts. There is your opportunity, messers Thugwit, Howland, Taylor, Winter, Stout and all the rest of you 'members of the public so interested in the past that you want to collect it all away' that Dr Karl so assiduously supports - your own pro-collecting archaeological magazine.  Mind you, the guest:

  ist herzlich eingeladen, seine Texte an mich zu schicken und um ihre Aufnahme auf diesen Wissenschaftsblog zu ersuchen. Sofern sie den gewöhnlichen Regeln des zivilisierten Umgangs miteinander genügen und auch so verfasst sind, dass sie als - und sei es nur mehr oder minder - wissenschaftliche Auseinandersetzung mit Fragen von Denkmalschutz und Denkmalpflege zu betrachten sind....

I suppose that depends on what one considers to be protection and preservation of the historical resource and archaeological record. Whether or not some of the information (for it can never be more) gets into the hands of the denkmalpflege-folk, it seems pretty obvious that Collection-Driven Exploitation of the archaeological record can never be any form of protection or preservation. That is the basic issue on which Raimund Karl and myself will never agree. But nevertheless, it certainly will be worth looking at the ideas he will be presenting in this new blog and debating them, both within the discipline and outside it (with lawmakers and in the public domain through social media).

What the Heritage Schemers Will Not Tell You

FLO gives Collection Driven Exploitation of the Archaeological Record the thumbs up   (original drawing after CIMuseums material)

FLO gives Collection Driven Exploitation

of the Archaeological Record the thumbs up

  (original drawing after CIMuseums material)

Heritage Action have another go at explaining what the PAS (you know, the public-funded 'scheme' to inform the stakeholder public of England and Wales about portable antiquities matters) would never so much as whisper. The Schemers are a quiet lot (Portable Antiquities Scheme Staff Manual – smile, whatever you think! 04/03/2018). Personally, I cannot see anything to smile about in the current situation:

Some British detectorist super brains have been debating how many rallies or club digs you can have on a field before it becomes not worth detecting. What they mean is how long before the archaeological record has been destroyed. The answer seems to vary between a few times and many but they all understand it will happen sooner or later and not one of them ever, ever expresses remorse. That’s why we think they and their hobby are a disgrace.

I call it Collection-Driven Exploitation of the archaeological record, the PAS might one day start using the  term, it might help clarify matters more than merely using the vague pc euphemism 'metal detecting'. It's not the detecting that is the issue, its the taking of what is detected and pocketing it that is the issue.

The Ilves Collection and the Finnish Academy

The eBay seller going under the names MixAntik in 2012 and then in 2016, ebuyerrrrr has supplied apparently unpapered artefacts to a number of collections. We know that the Green collection has bought from him, and according to Roberta Mazza, so did another collector:

According to my research, an anonymous Finland-based collector bought papyrus fragments through ebuyerrrrr and other Turkey-based accounts, and has found academics and conservators to research them. [...] International academic journals have recently published editions from the Finnish collection, now known as P. Ilves (the inventory numbers count over 100 of them). 

Rick Bonnie in Helsinki announces that he has been accumulating info on this Finnish anonymous collector (P. Ilves) for a while now and asks anyone (dealers?) who know anything about him or her to contact him. He says that he's informed the Finnish National Board of Antiquities already about the collection and adds that it is 'pretty large.. somewhat around a thousand fragments is my lowest estimate'. It is not clear whether that is 1000 papyri, or 1000 artefacts.

Bonnie indicates that 'This case also has helped in creating @WCOM_Helsinki, which is now in the process of developing a policy within the university regarding work with cultural objects. Rick Bonnie and Suzie Thomas will be teaching a course in the autumn of 2018 'on the ethics of working with cultural objects including manuscripts specifically targeted to graduate students within the university'.It seems to me that a few more institutions need such policies. WCOM Helsinki is a Helsinik University project "Working with Cultural Objects and Manuscripts: Provenance, Legality, and Responsible Stewardship". Good for them.

See also: The Publication of the Coptic Manuscripts of the Ilves Collection Research project

and: Coptic Manuscripts from the Ilves CollectionA Research Project of the Academy of Finland
Note, neither of these give any information about the artefacts themselves, how they arrived in, of all places, Finland, and how the collector acquired them.

Archaeologists Getting Comfy with Site Eroders

Michael Shott, Department of Anthropology and Classical Studies, University of Akron (2017). Estimating the Magnitude of Private Collection of Points and Its Effects on Professional Survey Results. Advances in Archaeological Practice. 1-13. 10.1017/aap.2017.8.

Abstract
Chipped-stone projectile points are used to mark the passage of time and cultures in the [archaeological] record. Archaeologists often recover points in surface survey, yet we do not know how many were found by private collectors before or after professional work. In a 1975–1977 Michigan probabilistic survey, professional archaeologists documented 30 private collections from 20 sample units. In those units, points found by private collectors outnumber professionally recovered ones by a factor of about 32. The survey region's point population estimated separately from the professional and private-collection samples differs by nearly an order of magnitude in favor of private collections, despite highly conservative assumptions about the latter. The number of points found in professional survey is inversely correlated with the number found in private collections, and the professional sample is more sparsely and randomly distributed. However, proportions of several common types are similar between professional and private collections. To the extent that large, reasonably complete samples of points are important for research and preservation, archaeologists must document private collections compiled in and near their survey areas.

This I read as yet another archaeologist promoting 'working with' collectors. But this is just nuts. What he's saying is that whole sites have been completely destroyed by collecting activity. The collectors take away the diagnostic stuff, leaving the 'common types' for the archaeologist to find, but even then, the distribution of material across the site and area cannot be interpreted because the collectors have left behind them a distorted pattern, the sample observed by professional archaeologists was left more sparsely and randomly distributed by the collectors picking over the sites. I really do not follow the logic of saying that one has to document private collections compiled in and near their survey areas for preservation of sites. The collection has destroyed the site and no matter how many photos Prof Shott takes of the loose bits, the site has been trashed, not preserved. Surely this is a question of professional ethics, are we to use the results of Dr Mengele's medical 'experiments'?

I my view  patting on the back collectors who have destroyed a site in one's study area is not any kind of 'advance' in archaeological practice, though I suppose it might save a lazy archaeologist the effort of getting off his backside and actually fieldwalking a site backwards and forwards in order to get his nice 'chipped' stone projectile points to win his academic brownie points by writing about them.

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Responsible-Otherwise UK Detectorist: "I wuld Record Th' 'Istry but..."

Some Facebook tekkie-talk from December 2017:

David Shelley

We've been detecting for 20+ years on our Stater hoard field. Farmer has now gone to HLS agreement & has a clause written in specifically that NO detecting allowed again on the hoard field!

Henri Eighth

What about the field next door[?]

David Shelley

Allowable detecting providing everything is recorded with PAS. Already done them and nothing but cartridges lol

John Maloney

Its very unusual for a field to be added in to HLS purely on detecting finds without anything else such as features or buildings. Does the same HLS agreement stop him ploughing etc? As for the recording aspect...... I have never seen a time frame mentioned.....if you know what I mean.

Vignette: What 'being responsible' means...

US MOU Map

The Antiquities Coalition have produced an interesting resource: 'Mapping MOUs: An Interactive View Of  [US] Heritage Protections In Action'.

 The looting and trafficking of cultural property is a threat in countries the world over, and particularly in nations facing crisis and conflict. With the U.S. serving as the world’s largest market for art and antiquities, many illicit artifacts are destined for this burgeoning market. But the United States can help mitigate this threat by enacting bilateral cultural agreements to stop illicit artifacts from making their way onto American shores. Bilateral agreements, or memoranda of understanding (MOUs), between demand (“market”) countries and supply (“source”) countries are an effective tool in discouraging the illicit trade in antiquities. This is especially important for countries whose cultural heritage is at risk (or may soon be at risk) from armed conflict or violent extremist organizations.

The cultural property crisis with 'rampant industrialized looting, conflict, and trafficking by extremist groups' in the MENA region is blamed on  'the Arab Spring in 2011' )in Iraq it was actually due to something else and began well before 2011). Also it cannot be stressed enough that the 1970 UNESCO Convention, the selective 'implementation' of which the 17 MOUs are part is in no way a measure against looting. Also the Convention is supposed to protect the heritage of all states party to the document, not those that each of them may select (or deselect) from the list. So the 'Coalition'  points out proudly that

'in November 2016, Egypt became the first Arab nation to sign a bilateral cultural agreement with the United States.Just over a year later, in February 2018, Libya became the second.'

Global heritage is protected by the Convention, not just that of Whites, Reds and Yellows, Arabs Jews and/or Hindus.  That's the Convention, the Americans however treat it differently. The cultural heritage of my countries, the UK and Poland are not protected by these MOUs. There is conflict on going in Donbass and Rohinga land (to name two), but objects looted within it are in no way 'protected' from being smuggled to the greedy US market by any piece of paper. The US select and deselect whose cultural property laws they are going to respect, in most cases, over 170 countries are totally excluded from CCPIA 'protection' by the US... it seems to me that a 10% coverage is next to no protection at all.

 This interactive map provides an overview of the 17 cultural MOUs currently in effect, along with two existing emergency actions in Syria and Iraq. Each highlighted country reveals information on when MOUs began and what archaeological and ethnological material is covered. Play around, interact, and scroll across the map to learn more about what is protected. To learn more visit our page on bilateral cultural agreements.

Yeah, Trump's USA is only 'playing around'. Most of the land surface and territorial waters are blank, not covered by US measures. There are some significant ones, not even neighbouring countries Canada or Mexico are protected by these means from having their archaeological and ethnographic cultural property trafficked across the borders (and there are a lot of unpaperd artefacts of Mexican origin at least on the US market). Neither are areas such as Japan and Korea covered, yet both countries suffered a US occupation during which cultural property (from Occupied Japan in particular) ended up in the hands of US collectors and dealers. Most of Southeast Asia and most of Africa are unprotected.

Oddest of all the US itself is a blank area, where the provisions of the 1970 UNESCO Convention are not 'implemented', and that is the reason why when Native American artefacts coming from the northern part of the American continent are on sale in auction houses in France, Germany or Switzerland (all three countries with which there is no MOU) the US has no legal means of combatting those sales (which they would, if they rendered them liable to export licensing). Even the moral argument falls flat when the US itself does bnot have  legal measure in place (MOU) to render reciprocal aid to those three countries which as far as the US system is concerned, can be pillaged at will.

Personally, I think that the Antiquities Coalition instead of boasting about how good it is that another two countries are added to the US heritage protection shortlist should be heading a forceful campaign to have that protection extended to the world's heritage, and not just to a few select countries from among those that currently happen to enjoy US friendship and public concern.   There should be more public concern about the number of countries that are NOT protected under the atavistic programme instituted by the CCPIA.

Threatened but not Cowed, Expert Gives Other Academics Good Advice

Roberta Mazza has written an interesting article on some recently 'surfaced' ('from underground?') unpapered papyri that pulls no punches ('The Illegal Papyrus Trade and What Scholars Can Do to Stop It' Hyperallergic ) that focuses on a fragment containing a bit of the text of Galatians that appeared out of nowhere on eBay in 2012. Her research into its origins raised troubling questions - and offered some light on the sort of people that openly sell unpapered antiquities:

I did a Google search for Robert’s cell-phone number, which led me straight to his real name and address. eBay shut down the account, and I filed a report with the London Metropolitan Police’s Art and Antiquities Unit. In light of what has happened since then, I do not recommend entertaining conversations with people of this kind. I have received threats of acid attacks and other abuses. Do not be as silly as I have been: I am not in a nice place at the moment.

Readers of this blog will know that people involved in portable antiquities do not appreciate any kind of criticism and have in the past reacted not only with frequent threats and abuse but in at least one case seem to be implicated in actual physical attacks not only against the critic, but also his family. Dealers who hide behind assumed names and aim to profit from the sale of unpapered artefacts that have arrived in their country via unknown processes probably will stop at nothing to protect their interests, in which they may well be mixed up with some very unsavoury suppliers. Should we therefore simply turn a blind eye and shy from confronting the issue? Certainly that is what the entire contingent of dealers-that-call-themselves-responsible do, judging from the number who are apparently not suffering acid attack threats and attacks on their children. But what kind of 'responsibility' is that, which runs away from confronting the evil in their own industry? Should it not be 'responsible-dealers-worthy-of-the-name' who should be at the forefront of attempts to stamp out, corrupt and abusive practices in the trade, threatening behaviours of their colleagues and fellows in the trade, and those who sell potentially smuggled artefacts? Roberta however is not cowed by the loutish behaviour of those intent on preserving the 'rights' of the no-questions-asked antiquities trade:

We academics must help protect the objects we study. Some of my colleagues believe that scholarship comes first, or say that texts have no guilt, so we should be faithful to them. They publish what emerges from the market. I disagree. To publish papyri with suspicious — if not illegal — provenance is unethical. It lends a new identity to those artefacts and feeds the illicit market. Looting and illicit excavations in Egypt not only destroy the archaeological landscape forever, but also have also caused deaths and injuries to Egyptians, including children, employed to dig in narrow shafts. In 2016, two archaeological guards, Ashrawy and Mustafa Ali, were shot dead by looters in action. And there is good reason to believe that many crimes go unreported in the current political and economic climate. (That said, in the UK, academics who facilitate exchanges of improperly-obtained antiquities can be charged for money laundering.) So what should we do with all of these suspiciously-sourced fragments? They should be immediately returned to the legitimate owner: Egypt. (Egyptian authorities may eventually reach a deal with the collectors for study and publication before repatriation.) Those who study papyri must exercise due diligence before publishing anything, and academics should exercise an active role in educating collectors and keeping an eye on the market. Would you knowingly buy a stolen bike? Why would you buy — or publish — a stolen manuscripts?

And just what is it that the 'Christian' Green Collection and the Bible Museum are mixed up in? Acid attackers and cold-blooded site guard shooters don't really seem to me to be the sort of people Jesus would have his followers siding with.

Vignette: Mentally disturbed acid attacker