"How do archaeologists justify grave robbing?" Topic

There's a thread running here about Nefertiti's tomb probably being right behind a wall in Tut's tomb. Let's knock it down and see if she's there.
What is so virtuous about digging up people's tombs and "studying" their remains?
Put the mummy on display, stripped of all dignity. Stuff the grave goods in a closet in some museum, never to see the light of day.
I can at least understand the motivation of legitimate grave robbers who just want to melt the gold down.

So. How is digging up King Tut and his Mum justified?

1. We need to figure out who killed who so we can fill in the blanks in an organization chart.
2. Knowledge needs no moral justification.
3. It's a false religion anyway, so what's the beef?
4. Better to stuff the stuff in a closet in a museum than to let a bunch if peasants feed their families.
5. It'll look fabulous in National Geographic.

We're human. It's what our species does, along with killing our own kind.

Hi

Tough question but ill go with #2. They have already found the queen's mummy and her tomb is most likely looted.

Grave Robbing is when a private individual does it.
Research is when an institution does it.

6. When we learn from the past, we learn about ourselves for now and the future.

I agree with Dynaman8789…

TMP link

I agree with extra its our curiosity and general desire to know everything, but I disagree with GamesPoet, we haven't learnt from our past otherwise the world wouldn't allow IS the next Nazis, we still bury our head to genocide

How is it not justified? The dead don't care, they're dead.

#2 seems to be the best of crap choices…..

Study of the remains and artifacts helps us understand what life was like back at the earliest record of human history. The Egyptians did a pretty good job of leaving records, but this can fill in the gaps. I think there's definitely a new ethical standard in play now than there was in Howard Carter's day.

I know there was some effort a few years ago to try and place mummies back after data was recovered. Others had minor restoration conducted on them, which makes sense to me because the Egyptians wanted mummification to last forever and those efforts will ensure the remains last a bit longer. Some mummies where uprooted in Antiquity and hid by priests to prevent them from being looted, but they didn't mark which mummy was who. So some of the invasive tests done on them is to identify who they are and where they belong. Of course, the last time I really looked at this field was two classes I had in college in the late 1990s so I could be waaaaaay off.

My 2 cents.

… I disagree with GamesPoet, we haven't learnt from our past otherwise the world wouldn't allow IS the next Nazis, we still bury our head to genocide

Not everyone learns from the past, yet some do. And if a poll is posted, feel free to choose whatever your heart desires for an answer. : )

In 5000 years they'll be digging us up.

In Tony Hillerman's novel 'Talking God' a Native American activist digs up and steals the remains of a WASP museum curator's parents. Just to make a point.

I love #3 lol, all religions are false… Morality of a grave robber is, "i am digging this grave because I want to take the loot I find for my own personal financial gains." Those are nefarious intentions. The archaeologist is digging to discover the past for knowledge that may help in the future. The premise has no personal financial gain at the expense of others. This is like apples and oranges, morally…

Need a number 7 – Lets not forget the "Collector" who needs it for private collections – some hidden away and some displayed – or better phrased "Looting"

For any that are really interested in diving into the topic more – some of the archaeology magazines run regular internal debates on the topic

One of many such articles link

Note – in addition to looting discussions there are also some decent articles talking about privacy, the past, what should and should not be done

All your answers are flawed.

@Mexican Jack Squint,
What point would that be? Did he have untouched grave goods? Was there art with the colors intact?

Because it was a long time ago. For a given, acceptable value of 'long' of course. We also dig up and analyse people in our own country (eg plague pits, battle pits as well as more 'normal' cemetries').

Will 'how do wargamers justify making of death a game' be the next question?….

Interesting article on this in the Huffington Post.

link

This bit seems eminently sensible

"The line between scientific interest and considering graves sacred has never been a hard and fast one. What is considered proper to display or hold in museums has also changed, over time. And where that line should be drawn depends on who you ask."

For a start, without all 'that' grave robbing my Egyptian 28 mm army may as well be depicted by the Minions from the movies. Actually an Egyptian minions army would be quite cool :)
Every thing we do is grave robbing Winston otherwise we would have no history to worry about.
Cheers, Here's to her Royal Majesty, the Queen Nefertiti consort and ruler of Upper and Lowe Egypt, may her radiance shine like Aten for infinity.
Laying it on thickly :)

"The archaeologist is digging to discover the past for knowledge that may help in the future."

Well, and to justify the funding he got for his grant proposal, so he can get another.

Cynicism aside, I'm interested in the past, and fascinated by what we can learn from studying human remains. I wouldn't mind them studying me that way, or my close relatives, once we're gone and past caring. Not that I'll be able to control what others do to my grave.

But there is this,

Part of being human is to show respect for our loved ones' remains. To curate them some how, to bury them and mark the spot with a stone, or keep them in a jar. To say a prayer over them from time to time and remember Grandma.

And part of being human is to show disrespect for our enemies, to harm them even beyond death by leaving their corpses unburied for the crows to eat, by eating parts of their bodies ourselves, by keeping body parts as trophies and drinking from their skulls.

When I was a boy, the local natural history museum had display cases full of Indian graves, complete with the skeletons, laid out for school-boys to gawk at. Later they repatriated the bones. I'm pleased that they did.

Wait! I thought aliens built the pyramids?

no, we supervised. why do it yourself when they are all these handy indigenous folks to exploit. we taught you that one too

8) To keep the Nazis from getting the magical goodies first.

Mr. Smith,

Most human activities have positive and negative aspects, so we can compare the two and decide which is more important on a case-by-case basis:

Positive: Half of what we know about ancient peoples comes from ancient graves. If you value history, this is useful. If you don't, why are you posting on this board?

Negative: It might annoy their descendants. All other things being equal, I suppose I would prefer that my grandfather's grave remain undisturbed. Still, the farther back you go, the less impact this has. To take an extreme case, most people aren't bothered by recovery of billion-year-old fossils of their single-celled ancestors.

MH

How else would we know how to paint our Egyptian figures?!?

"Grave robbing" is such a… plebeian… term!

Winston/John the OFM – How does this relate to playing with little toy soldiers on a table top?

Are you trolling? That is a question, not a charge/statement.
The linkage seems awfully thin to me. YMMV.

Mruuurrrr! The ring! The ring you took from my crypt! "Mruuurrr!"

Otherwise, what Mark Hinds said.

Follow the money……..

the question is so subjective that it shouldn't be allowed on TMP

Begging the question, "Winston." Therefore, I reject the premise.

Archeology is NOT grave robbing.

Therefore, the question is not valid and the discussion is not valid, pro or con.

Next.

I'm an archaeologist with close to thirty years of experience at various sites in and around the Aegean, and I can assure you that this is a topic of much discussion in academic circles. How do we study the past without dishonoring the intentions of those that lived in the past?

In most cases, such as settlement sites and so on, the line is much less controversial. However, we do come across non-grave sites that were intentionally sealed off and covered over (the entirety of the recently discovered and very influential site of Gobekli Tepe is one example), and of course we also come across rare instances of bodies of individuals that died untimely deaths and were never buried – my first experience of this was a partial skeleton of a man who had several tons of Mycenaean citadel wall fall on him! In the latter instances, it's much easier to convince yourself that you are giving some sort of meaning to a sorrowful end, but the core of the matter remains the same – by the very nature of the work you are destroying an ancient context in order to study it.

With specific regard to digging occupied graves, I have to admit that I've always been able to delegate that responsibility when it arose (which has not been that often), and my feeling of unease is not all that unusual. However, the simple fact of the matter is that burials are both sources of immense knowledge about past cultures, and also the easiest of targets for looters. Thus, we are often faced with no real professional choice when graves are discovered, and it is sometimes a race against time to see who gets to the graves first.

The hard reality of the practice, however, is that most ancient peoples have no living advocates to contest the disturbance and study of their graves, and often those with some tenuous ties to the past peoples of an area (for example moderns Greeks or Italians or Egyptians and so on) are no longer connected on a spiritual level to the deceased, and often encourage their study in order to further their knowledge of their past. However, the excavation of modern American Indian grave sites is one example of how living advocates can have an extremely influential (and limiting) role to play in the practice of field archaeology. You have to remember that field archaeology does not take place in the isolated confines of academia – it is very much part of the public and political system, and is heavily influenced by evolving perspectives on how sites and artifacts should be treated.

Thus – leaving aside the needles pejorative of "grave robbing" – the answer to your question is that we justify it with concern and regard for both the ancient culture and evolving modern feelings about how such sites should be treated. We welcome the source of knowledge, but should always respect the human context of the material remains we unearth.

Some interesting posts here. CATenWolde's in particular.

Several digs & various finds in Australia have been challenged by Aboriginal people. Here, the indigenous people have quite different views to death & the dead from people with a Western culture. Their connection with the land & their ancestors is very strong.

I am very much in favour of the pursuit of knowledge but you can't ride rough shod over people's sensibilities. If archaeologists can't negotiate to study an example of 30 000 year old human remains with the traditional landowners, well, that's that then. They don't get studied. Any other view is arrogant.

Grave robbing it seems me alludes to a private and solitary enterprise – archeology, as so nicely demonstrated by CATenWolde, is a very public thing

Wonder if we should cut open the Arizona or start digging around in Arlington?!?

In the U.S. southwest there are a range of reasons. None have to do with treasure, unless you are talking about pottery and stone tools.

Academic archaeology out here is usually driven by the desire to develop the history and prehistory of the region. Features like structural remains, as well as artifacts, and human remains are all pieces of a puzzle that when brought together can provide a fairly good understanding of how past generations lived and died.

Contract archaeologists are the hired guns. They are usually called in when an archaeological site is stumbled upon by workers at a construction site. The contract firm sends in a field crew to excavate the site, to clear the way for construction. The discovery of human remains or burials is NOT celebrated. Excavation of human remains is time-consuming and often requires oversight by the local tribe.

Tribal archaeology is characterized by both academic, and contract type archaeology. They certainly don't want to build a home on a prehistoric cemetery, and they are eager to define their own history. Tribes, such as the Hopi for example also use archaeology to establish land affinity.

Personally, I am most interested in how prehistoric peoples interacted, migrated, and subsisted. I don't get out in the field much anymore, but I can tell you, that it is rewarding work, something as simple as uncovering a projectile point, shell bracelet, or a complete pot is a thrill.

This really just scratches the surface. There's a lot more to it.

"Wonder if we should cut open the Arizona or start digging around in Arlington?!?"

The question is as flawed as the OFM's original. Those two sites are memorials that have massive significance to the emotions of American citizens currently living. Remember though that an inhabitant of another country cares little for the Arizona, I accept that Arlington is different as it is still in use.

Relative distance makes a lot of difference. If in 2,500 years there is no USA and little accessible data on the events of this era, if all the major religions of today are just poorly understood legends do you think anyone will object?

To put the question in a context perhaps more tied to TMP, we could consider the cases of three different, famous military shipwrecks: the CSS Hunley, the USS Monitor, and the HMS Hood.

link

link

In the case of the Hood, only the bell was recovered, to serve as a focal point for a well-deserved memorial. While the recovery of the bell probably involved some disturbance of what is regarded as sacred ground, I think the vast majority of people would regard this as a salutary action. The appalling loss of its crew in its famous engagement with the Bismark, as well as the ship's long and public pre-war history, make it a focal point for remembering not only the loss of those lives, but also the loss of other lives during the war at sea. As the ship is so well known, little knowledge could be gained from excavating the wreck, and to my mind there is no driving purpose for further investigation.

In the case of the Monitor, portions of the vessel were recovered, including the iconic turret, also to serve as center-pieces of a memorial. While the hull was left intact and the site designated the first National Maritime Sanctuary, some human remains were recovered, presumably in the turret. Although the Monitor was lost during a storm, and her crew small, the purpose of the memorial is similar that of the Hood – to mark the unique nature of her service and honor her dead, but also to help people remember other sacrifices through that lens. Was a line crossed with the decision to bring up the turret, when it must have been known that this could easily house human remains? The ship is well documented, so the recovery was probably not done for the purposes of extending knowledge, but rather of enhancing the memorial – which it doubtlessly does. This is an excellent example of the grey areas we have to explore as archaeologists, and the difficulty we face when drawing that line, especially when our work crosses over into the public domain.

As for the Hunley, its story is less well known, but it was nevertheless an iconic ship also lost with all hands. In this case, the entire ship – evidently with the remains of its crew – was recovered. Here we have to ask ourselves, what makes this ship and this crew different? Firstly, it was a small ship sunk in comparatively shallow water, and undamaged by battle, so the recovery was easier. Secondly, it would probably have been difficult to remove recognizable parts of the vessel for a memorial, if one was even planned. Thirdly – and here I think we get to the crux of the matter – unlike the Hood or the Monitor, the Hunley was a mystery. How did these early submarines actually operate? What caused her to sink? Was her crew really all lost? Lastly, and perhaps controversially, we should probably mention that her crew was part of the losing side in the war – could this have lessened sentiment for the crew? On the other hand, raising the ship also gave us the chance to honor them, which is a more positive way of looking at the situation. All of these factors – practical, academic, and cultural – came together to inform the decision to raise her in toto; a decision probably also influenced by the fact that once the location was known, the more easily accessible site was a prime target for looters. The raising of the Hunley has certainly taught us a great deal about early submarines and the fate of her crew, and brought her part of the war back into common memory. Did we venture further into a grey area, or were we forced by necessity?

This decision-making process, of not just how to dig but whether and what to dig, is what makes field archaeology – as it should be – such an openly public and cultural venture.

Tough call. Without an understanding of the past – primarily at the hands of historians and their on the ground allies, archaeologists – we'd all still be sure that the earth was created in 4000BC…

Think of the vast wealth of knowledge we have gleaned from (just for example) the Vindolanda Tablets? I know that they are, in effect, digging in a bonfire/rubbish tip, but they dig graves there too.

I guess as long as they do with a degree of decency, I haven't got a problem: I'm not really bothered, I suppose, if we don't show much reverence to whatever wacky religious beliefs the folks of a couple of thousand years ago had as long as we treat their bones with due respect.

I guess if someone told me before I pegged it that in a couple of millennia school kids would be learning about their history by examining my remains and reading what I'd jotted down, there's a part of me that'd be quite flattered.

And, of course, highly surprised

John T

"What is so virtuous about digging up people's tombs and studying their remains?"

Why not turn that around and ask the proper question:

What was so virtuous about robbing all future generations of the resources and – in many cases – great farm land?

In case you didn't know: most cemetaries in Europe dig up and destroy graves that are older then a certain age, just to make room for the new generation of dead.

Just try to imagine enough plots to bury the current 6 Bn …

Cheers.

"Wonder if we should cut open the Arizona or start digging around in Arlington?!?"

The question is as flawed as the OFM's original. Those two sites are memorials that have massive significance to the emotions of American citizens currently living.

Interesting spin but brings up two problems:

#1 – It means that the "memorials" are therefore meant to honor the living and not the deceased service members that made the supreme sacrifice or passed after serving.

#2 – By censoring and limiting their investigations, the "archaeologists/grave robbers are dictating what we are allowed to know and what we are not.

Parzival,