I need an Archaeologist

[Canrider]

Ah, now, do you have a beard these days? Perhaps he has a point.

'fraid not, I've gone native! (SAA meeting -- you could tell the UK from NAmericans by their lack of Biblical beardage)

What Berties is omitting to mention is
- Winterslow lies on the Roman road from Winchester to Sarum
- The entire village is in a Special Landscape Area
- The entire region north of the village is an Area of Special Archaeological Significance

What he's also ignoring is that his planning application will be on file with Wilts council, and the grey lit report will almost certainly be searchable.

 

[Arch]

I make money,and have employed a young lad who did his archaeology degree and never used it to any use,so have listened to his tales going through uni,also phil harding who drinks in a pub we have frequented does not have a beard just wild hair
the remark is a stereo type, if i get a bill for holding up a job,for wages and accommodation and all the red tape,it takes a percentage off our bottom line,so like everyone i don't always appreciate this,
not a job of mine but a friend had to have a dig last year it cost over 10k he would not tell me the final figure,
I am glad you enjoy the roast lamb

A builder then. A class of people well known for efficient effective work, that everybody loves to employ, and who never cause a moment's stress.

Do you wear those trousers where your bum hangs out,and dodge tax working cash in hand? Just a stereotype, you understand.

 

[Canrider]

"If I get a bill for holding up a job..."

Surely he means 'If I cost-cut by not budgeting for environmental impact assessment, then get caught out...'

 

[Hardrock93]

... if you don't hoover it up eventually it looks like Bleak House.

*Engage pedant mode*. I'm currently slogging my way through Dickens' seemingly endless Bleak House and there is no suggestion that it was particulary dusty. On the other hand, Miss Havisham's gaff, Satis House, definitely suffered from Dyson neglect.

 

[Berties]

A builder then. A class of people well known for efficient effective work, that everybody loves to employ, and who never cause a moment's stress.

Do you wear those trousers where your bum hangs out,and dodge tax working cash in hand? Just a stereotype, you understand.

I pay my tax thanks,and have interests in a few things , but never show my back side to any one who does not want to see it, but thanks for asking

 

[growingvegetables]

I pay my tax thanks,and have interests in a few things , but never show my back side to any one who does not want to see it, but thanks for asking

Noted - you missed the bits about "efficient effective work, that everybody loves to employ, and who never cause a moment's stress."

 

[biggs682]

never found any bike bits buried whilst gardening has anybody else

 

[rikki]

never found any bike bits buried whilst gardening has anybody else

Did Romans have bikes?

 

[wobbler]

I never thought about leaves building up, rotting and turning in to soil. The landscape would have looked very different in Roman times. A lot more woodland.
Are the builders of today not leaving valuable evidence for future archaeologists of how we lived?
In a few thousand years when someone digs your patio up what will they be amazed by?

The equivalent to a shard of Roman pottery, could be a fragment of plastic cup from a Thermos flask.
Or an ancient Amphora, could be a 25 litre water carrier.
There has to be a Coke can and a Rizzla paper. Perhaps stuffed inside a Tupperware sarnny box.

Any other suggestions?

 

[Headgardener]

I make money,and have employed a young lad who did his archaeology degree and never used it to any use,so have listened to his tales going through uni,also phil harding who drinks in a pub we have frequented does not have a beard just wild hair
the remark is a stereo type, if i get a bill for holding up a job,for wages and accommodation and all the red tape,it takes a percentage off our bottom line,so like everyone i don't always appreciate this,
not a job of mine but a friend had to have a dig last year it cost over 10k he would not tell me the final figure,
I am glad you enjoy the roast lamb

That's Dr Phil Harding by the way.

 

[Arch]

I never thought about leaves building up, rotting and turning in to soil. The landscape would have looked very different in Roman times. A lot more woodland.
Are the builders of today not leaving valuable evidence for future archaeologists of how we lived?
In a few thousand years when someone digs your patio up what will they be amazed by?

The equivalent to a shard of Roman pottery, could be a fragment of plastic cup from a Thermos flask.
Or an ancient Amphora, could be a 25 litre water carrier.
There has to be a Coke can and a Rizzla paper. Perhaps stuffed inside a Tupperware sarnny box.

Any other suggestions?

The urban nature reserve I work at is an ex-landfill site, which was capped with clay when they stopped filling it. But we think animals or people disturb the clay because everyso often the litter pickers pull up a 1970's beer can or something.

There are interesting questions though, about the 'readability' of our rubbish in the future. A CD or an MP3 player might withstand being buried, but will the technology to play it exist in 1000 years? The laser discs they put the grand Domesday Book update project on are already virtually obsolete. Without the internet, say, think how much of our 'culture' is lost. But it's not just media that could be incomprehensible. How much sense will a pair of hair straigheners make? Will they be able to make any value judgements for one brand over another? Will the remains of a BMW necessarily seem any more 'quality' than a Kia? Or a high end road bike over a BSO?

One thing I guarantee - the archaeologists of the future will put a lot of our atefacts down as 'ritual', because that tends to be the explanation for anything we don't understand!

 

[Night Train]

It would be very tempting to bury some odd unrelated modern objects deep in the ground and then bury some very old stuff above it. That would confuse the archeologists when they find an MP3 player much deeper, and hence further in the past, then a 78rpm shellac record.

 

[Arch]

It would be very tempting to bury some odd unrelated modern objects deep in the ground and then bury some very old stuff above it. That would confuse the archeologists when they find an MP3 player much deeper, and hence further in the past, then a 78rpm shellac record.

It would be...

although we're pretty good at spotting the sort of disturbance that would cause, unless you were very very careful about relayering the soil...

I remember there was a Time Team, where they found an anglo-saxon sword, but they had doubts about its authenticity, and thought it might have been planted by the landowner for some reason. They were vindicated when a little lower down under it, they found a strand of barbed wire....

Many archaeology undergrads toy with the idea of being buried with something confusing. One in our year played the tuba, and said he wanted to be cremated and the ashes put inside it and buried....

 

[fimm]

Shielings (abandoned villages/summer grazing areas) in Scotland give you an idea of a point in the process. This page http://www.incallander.co.uk/shielings.htm has some quite nice photos. (Its just the first one I found while googling...)

 

[Rickshaw Phil]

It would be very tempting to bury some odd unrelated modern objects deep in the ground and then bury some very old stuff above it. That would confuse the archeologists when they find an MP3 player much deeper, and hence further in the past, then a 78rpm shellac record.

We have a family tale along these lines.

Great, great uncle was a dairy farmer who had an ancient cheese-stone (large circular stone with grooves cut in it for the whey to drain off). This thing eventually got so worn and damaged he decided to get rid, so he took it and chucked it into a nearby disused quarry.

A couple of years later, some archaeologists surveyed the quarry and made an amazing discovery - a druidic sacrificial altar stone! It was quite clearly an altar stone as the position where it was found made it approximately 3000 years old and it had grooves cut in it for the blood to drain off.

Apparently this object is still in store somewhere in the British Museum.