Tag Archives: Antiquities

Flash Drive vs. Sumerian Clay Tablet

April 20, 2010

I was just at Costco this weekend, wheeling one of those immense, T-Rex shopping carts past the ever-so shiny electronics section, when my eye fell on a row of flash drives. I currently back up all my research and stories on a battered 8 Gigabyte Kingston flash drive that I bought in Cuzco last summer and that I strongly suspect is a knockoff. But Costco’s new line of drives, the LaCies , are 32 GB and look like house keys. I immediately wanted one.

Now you might reasonably think that a brand-new flash drive would win hand’s down every time as a back-up system when pitted against, let’s say, a 5000-year-old Sumerian clay tablet. But you’d be very, very wrong. According to a fascinating study I recently came across by Paul Conway, who teaches in the School of Information at University of Michigan, there is one critical way in which the Sumerian clay tablet, the world’s earliest data storage system, beats the hell out of the flash drive jingling on your key chain. Longevity.

Here’s Conway’s main point. Someone who knows how to read Sumeria’s cuneiform script (which gets its name from the Latin word cuneus, meaning “wedge”–an apt description of the little wedge-shaped marks that Sumerian scribes made with their styluses in moist clay) can still read the message on a clay tablet 5000 years later. Now what about a LaCie flash drive? All the computers we use to read it today will be obsolete in 20 years, and we will have no way of accessing what’s on it. It might as well be a big lump of metal. You scoff? Just think about the stacks of floppy disks that littered our desks back in the 1980s.

Conway calls this “our central dilemma”: the capacity for storing information is soaring exponentially just as the longevity of storage media is plummeting. In other words, the more ancient the storage system, the longer it tends to live. A 4500-year-old Egyptian papyrus can still be read, so can the Dead Sea Scrolls. But a book published in 1851 on acidic paper only has an average life expectancy of 100 years. And the pace of obsolence has greatly accelerated over the past 40 years: if I handed you a computer punch card or a magnetic tape could you read it?

I am not Luddite. I love new technology (bring on the iPad!), but it’s clear to me that Apple, Microsoft and Google don’t have all the answers. Maybe the guys in Silicon Valley and Redmond, Washington ought to give a little more thought to cuneiform tablets and a little less to flash-in-the-pan data.

Repatriating the Lewis Chessmen from the British Museum

March 17, 2010

I sometimes think that one of the worst jobs in archaeology today would be to work as a curator at the British Museum. Yes, there is the prestige of researching and mounting massive exhibitions that attract international attention. But who would want to be on the receiving end of all the ire of foreign governments who want their treasures back, from Iran demanding the loan of the Cyrus cylinder to Greece pressuring for the return of the Parthenon marbles? And I sure wouldn’t want Zawi Hawass lecturing me on the return of the Rosetta Stone.

Now a new front has opened up in the diplomatic war to pry loose national treasures from the British Museum showcases–and it’s not at all where you might think it would be. Last week, Scottish National Party MP Angus MacNeil called for a debate in the British House of Commons over the repatriation of the very famous Lewis Chessmen discovered in a sandbank on the Isle of Lewis, in Scotland’s Outer Hebrides Islands sometime before 1831.

First a very short primer on the Lewis Chessmen, which are my all time favorite artifacts from Medieval Europe. A 12th century artist carved the exquisitely beautiful chess pieces–93 in all–mostly from walrus ivory, which could well have come from the Greenland colonies, or possibly even from the Canadian Arctic. (That’s another story I’ll save for another day.) No one knows for certain, however, where the chessmen were carved, although some scholars lean towards Trondheim in Norway, since similar chess pieces were found there. How these wonderful chessmen–one of the best preserved sets from the medieval world- came to lie in a sand dune near Uig on the Isle of Lewis is unknown.

Shortly after they came to light in 1831, however, the Hebridean finder decided to sell them. A private buyer purchased 11 of the pieces and the rest went to the British Museum, which displays several of these miniature artworks in one of its galleries.

But now people in the Outer Hebrides want their famous chessmen back. Indeed, their MP Angus MacNeil is working hard to repatriate them to the Museum nan Eilean in Stornoway, the major town of the Outer Hebrides. And what has provoked this protest? It appears that the British Museum has stepped very clumsily on toes and local sensitivities in the Outer Hebrides. Its curators have been working on a major travelling exhibit of the chesspieces to Scotland and according to a recent online article in The Press and Journal, advertising for the forthcoming exhibit attributes the chesspieces to Norwegian craftsmen, completely ignoring the possibility that they were carved in the Outer Hebrides.

Is this just a tempest in a teapot? I don’t think so. The Lewis chesspieces are objects of of immense pride in the Outer Hebrides, and someone at the British Museum should have known this. I am becoming more and more sympathetic all the time to foreign governments and even local museums who want to repatriate their greatest treasures from the vaults and exhibition cases of the British Museum. It think it’s patronizing in the extreme today to think that only the big national museums in developed countries know how to take care of the world’s most important cultural heritage.

Pirouetting in the Street over Bronze-Age Wreck

February 16, 2010

Every once in a while, an archaeological discovery comes along that makes me feel as if I should leap out of my chair, cartwheel across the room, and turn pirouettes in the street. I had one of those days yesterday, when I read the British newspaper accounts of an absolutely stunning underwater discovery off the coast of South Devon. The South West Maritime Archaeological Group has discovered the debris field of a Bronze-Age trading vessel, dating back to 1300 B.C.

This is one of the oldest known shipwrecks in the world. And what makes me so very, very happy about it is that this immensely important find is in the hands of serious archaeologists whose sole objective is to advance scientific knowledge –not corporate treasure hunters driven by the bottom line. Hallelujah!

I have long worried about ancient underwater sites such as this in British waters. The British government, I am sorry to report, has failed miserably to step up to the plate when it comes to protecting shipwreckl sites. Although the Britannia long ruled the waves as a great maritime power, the British government has so far refused to sign the UNESCO Convention on the Protection of the Underwater Cultural Heritage, a vital piece of international law protecting prehistoric and historic wrecks from the clutches of treasure hunters. Thirty-one other nations, however, have taken the much-needed plunge.

So the discovery of the South Devon site and its astonishing cargo of gold bracelets, rapiers, sling shots, tin ingots and the like by devoted avocational underwater archaeologists is cause for real rejoicing. Ben Roberts, an archaeometallurgist and curator at the British Museum, couldn’t be happier. “The Salcombe site,” he notes, “is now one of the most important Bronze Age sites currently being investigated in Britain.”

Those interested in learning more about this amazing discovery can read about the work up until 2006 here, and can then follow the story to the present here.

Fueling the New Chinese Mania For Antiques

February 5, 2010

I can’t believe how badly the New York Times missed the point this morning in its article on the newly red-hot antiquities trade in China. Journalist Dan Levin reports on the growing mania among middle class buyers in Beijing for Chinese antiquities, extolling their newfound passion for ” Ming Dynasty porcelain vases, 19th century hardwood furniture and even early 20th century calligraphy ink pots.” Such antiquities, Levin explains, “have become popular status symbols for an emerging middle class eager to display its new wealth and cultural knowledge.”

Too bad Levin didn’t ask a few hard questions about exactly where all these Chinese antiquities are coming from. If he had, he might have come away with a very different impression. While researching a new story for Archaeology magazine, I recently discussed with Victor Mair, a Sinologist at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, and one of the world’s leading experts on the archaeology of Xinjiang province, this very issue.

I had noticed in Mair’s articles that many of the most important Bronze Age and Iron Age sites in Xinjiang–sites that have yielded European-looking mummies and western grave goods and that are now revolutionizing our understanding of Central Asian history–had been badly looted. In fact, looting in Xinjiang has become so serious that Chinese archaeologists are constantly forced to excavate entire cemeteries just to salvage and protect some of the finds.

I asked Mair what on earth was going on. The Xinjiang sites, after all, are in the midst of a huge and very barren desert–one of the bleakest and most remote places on earth. Mair explained to me that Chinese looters have become very sophisticated. They journey into the desert equipped with GPS and specifically target the ancient cemeteries there. The devastation is enormous, Mair explained, with mummified human body parts strewn everywhere. “They just take the bodies, the heads, the coffins and throw them out on the ground,” he said. “They are looking for gold or they are looking for something that is obviously a nice artwork.”

Most looters then sell their finds to middle men in Hong Kong, individuals who don’t ask any questions. “You can go down to the antiquities market street there,” said Mair, “and you can find unbelievable things, precious materials or precious objects from all over China being sold there. So Hong Kong is like a door for selling.”

To me, this is the real story behind the newfound enthusiasm for antiquities in China. And there is a terrible irony here. During the Cultural Revolution, Mao Zedong ordered the destruction of “old culture,” officially condoning the looting of old cemeteries and destroying antiquities. Now the pendulum has swung wildly in the other direction, as the Chinese middle class celebrates its ancient culture. But the change in attitude has only led to further destruction of the archaeological record.

Museum Curios or Objects of Spiritual Healing?

February 4, 2010

Two days ago, I suggested that the Vancouver Museum seriously consider repatriating a petroglyph-covered boulder in its collections to the tribal group in whose territory it was found. The art on the boulder appears to be deteriorating badly in the museum courtyard as moss and water erode the stone, obliterating figures that were clear as a bell in the 1930s. I argued that repatriation would be a good solution to this problem, for I believe that tribal group in question would have a much greater interest in taking care of the art.

But there’s also a moral argument to be made here. I don’t think that national, provincial or city museums are the right places for objects of great spiritual importance to aboriginal peoples, objects that still have a tremendous meaning today. These items, in my opinion, really need to go back to the tribal group from which they came. Imagine the outcry, for example, if an Egyptian museum held part of the manger of Christ in its collections and would not return it to the Vatican on request?

My views on this matter were strongly shaped by an experience I had while I was working for what is now the Royal Museum of Alberta back in the 1970s. At the time, the museum held a collection of sacred medicine bundles once owned by healers and spiritual leaders in the Blackfoot Confederacy, the Niitsitapi.

The museum bought the bundles back in a time when residential schools and other modern ills had badly eroded the traditional culture of the Niitsitapi. But in the 1970s, a few people in these tribes were actively reviving traditional spiritual practices. They wanted their bundles back, because these sacred objects were absolutely essential to age-old spiritual practices. The museum, however, stubbornly refused to part with them.

Finally, however, four members of the Kainai Nation (part of the Niitsitapi) arrived at the museum one spring day and asked if they could take the Longtime Medicine Pipe Bundle outdoors for prayer, as was tradition. As a young research assistant, I watched them carry the bundle out past the security cameras and guards. Outside, they walked in a procession around the museum, with the museum director and a few other staff members following.

As they passed the parking lot, the Kainai delegation broke into a run toward a waiting pickup truck. They swiftly clambered in with the bundle and drove away. As I later learned, one member of the delegation had dreamt a few weeks earlier that he could spirit away the bundle from the museum: today the Kainai talk about how this man cast a charm over the curators.

Many of the Kainai have now returned to their traditional spiritual practices, and I have heard that the bundle is a very cherished part of those practices. Clearly, the museum should have restored the bundle to the Kainai when they asked for it.

I have often heard aboriginal people talk about the sacredness of the rock art. Isn’t it time that museums think about giving it back to the people who rightfully own it?

P.S. In You interested in healing and ayahuasca retreats at www.spiritplantjourneys.com.

What Will Happen to the Staffordshire Hoard?

January 22, 2010

Ben East wrote a short but incisive article yesterday in a United Arab Emirates newspaper on the irony of British efforts to keep the Staffordshire Hoard in Britain. The British have long been oblivious to those same sentiments on the part of others, such as the Greeks who want the Elgin marbles back.

How Early Wooden Armor Defeated Russian Firearms

January 15, 2010

As regular readers will know, I’ve been thinking a lot this week about ancient forms of body armor. I got started on this subject last weekend, when I read about new research on the cloth armor that Alexander the Great and his army favored. But a question from reader Dan Hilborn and a very cool post over at Northwest Coast Archaeology (one of my favorite blogs) have led me to the subject of wooden armor, specifically the armor Tlingit men wore into battle against Russian traders in the late 18th century.

The Russians coveted furs — primarily the sea-otter fur, which is the thickest and warmest of any mammal on Earth. By the 18th century, these traders had pretty much exhausted the sea-otter populations that once flourished in Siberia’s kelp forests, so they sailed further east along the coast of the Bering Sea, searching for new kelp forests and more sea-otters. Along the Aleutian Islands, Alaska and eventually northern British Columbia, they spied abundant sea-otter habitat

Initially, the Russians traders sailed into Aleut villages, taking women and children hostages in order to force the men to bring them pelts. They did not hesitate to murder their captives if things didn’t go their way. In 1745, a Russian group slaughtered 15 Aleuts on the island of Attu, just to strike terror into the hearts of the villagers. The Aleut people, in turn, tried to expel these ruthless invaders from their lands, but Russian firearms and Russian diseases took a terrible toll.

Eventually, the Russians worked their way southward into Tlingit territory. Like many Northwest Coast peoples, the Tlingit fished the bountiful rivers and coasts of their territory and hunted sea lions and other sea mammals. They had a rich, complex culture, with chiefs, nobles and even slaves. To settle grievances with their neighbors, they embarked on raiding parties from time to time, outfitting themselves in armor made from the one of the most bountiful materials in their territory: wood. Tlingit men carved alder into slats and rods, then lashed these pieces together to form sturdy, lightweight armor.

The Smithsonian Institution holds several really spectacular examples of the traditional Tlingit armor. I particularly love the Tlingit battle helmet beautifully carved from a very hard spruce burl. The helmet itself is shaped like a very fierce-looking (and tattooed) man’s head and would have been worn atop the fighter’s head. According to the Smithsonian notes, “it would have been “impossible to split open with a club.” (The two images accompanying this blog show other Tlingit armor from the collection of a Spanish museum.)

But back to my story. After seeing images of Tlingit war gear, I began to wonder how effective it was in battle against the Russians and their firearms. I knew that the Tlingit had put up a very strong fight against the Russians, even capturing their settlement, New Archangel, on Sitka Island in 1802. But an account of one battle in Carl Waldman’s book, Atlas of the North American Indian, really caught my attention.

In their attack on Russian-led forces in Prince William Sound, writes Waldman, the Tlingit “wore animal masks to protect their faces as well as chest armor of wooden slats lashed together with rawhide strips, which actually repelled Russian bullets.” (The italics are mine.)

I would never have guessed that well-made wooden armor could deflect a bullet. It looks to me as if we don’t give early armorers nearly enough credit.

Confiscating the Dead Sea Scrolls?

January 1, 2010

As I was recovering from last night’s revelry with a large mug of very black coffee, I noticed in this morning’s Globe & Mail that Jordan is officially asking Canada to seize the Dead Sea Scrolls. Eight of the 2000-year-old scrolls, including fragments containing “The Song of Moses” from Deuteronomy, are on exhibit at the Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto until Sunday, January 3rd.

The exhibit in question, “Dead Sea Scrolls: Words that Changed the World,” was a major coup for the Royal Ontario Museum. The Dead Sea scrolls are extremely fragile, so the Israel Antiquities Authority has been reluctant to allow them to travel. As a result, the government of Jordan has had to wait patiently for this opportunity to press its claims to the scrolls in a big way on the international stage.

The history of these scrolls is complicated. The first were discovered in 1947 by a Bedouin herder, Mohammed Ed Dhib, while searching for a stray goat in a cave overlooking the Dead Sea. Seven of these scrolls came to the Israeli government. But over the following seven years, Jordanian scholars supervised additional recovery operations on land that Jordan occupied west of the Jordan River. These excavations produced thousands of other fragments of the scrolls, which were sent to the Palestinian museum in east Jerusalem.

Now here’s the nub of Jordan’s request to Canadian authorities. During the Six Day War in 1967, the Israeli government took the scrolls from the Palestinian Museum, and occupied East Jerusalem. Jordan is now asking Canada to abide by the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the Event of Armed Conflict. As a signatory to this important international convention, Canada is obliged to “take into its custody cultural property imported into its territory either directly or indirectly from any occupied territory.” In other words, Jordan is asking Canada to honor its international obligation, and confiscate the scrolls until the ownership issue can be resolved.

Canada, however, is very reluctant to get embroiled in this difficult situation. Yesterday a government spokesperson stated that “it would not be appropriate for Canada to intervene as a third party.”

I am personally sympathetic to Jordan’s claim. I recognize that the scrolls constitute an important part of Jewish heritage, but it looks to me as if Jordan was the victim of cultural looting. The Israeli government should not have taken the scrolls from the Palestinian museum in east Jerusalem after the Six Day War. This kind of “spoils of war” thinking is inherently wrongheaded and unethical. No curator or scholar should indulge in it.

Moreover, I find Canada’s position in this very disappointing. What’s the point of signing an international convention if you don’t honor it when the chips are down?

The Streets of Pompeii, Google Style

December 4, 2009

Image courtesy Wikimedia Commons

Over the past few months, I have developed very mixed feelings about the internet giant Google. I hate to see how Google is draining the life out of the newspaper industry, slurping up all the advertising dollars that once paid for investigative journalism, foreign bureaus, and very fat papers. All that has largely fallen by the way for many newspapers, who are now firmly focussed on survival.

But having said that, I can see that someone very high up the food chain at Google is passionate about archaeology. On November 25th, I wrote about the 3-D laser scanning project that Google is funding at the Iraq National Museum. The intent is to bring the treasures of Mesopotamia and other ancient civilizations from the region to scholars around the world. It’s a wonderful plan.

Now Google has done something else that I really like. It has just posted a Street View of Pompeii, and it’s very, very cool. You are free to navigate the narrow stony streets of the ancient city at your desk, stopping to take a gawk at the market stalls and a spin around the forum. And all on a beautiful, blue-skied day in southern Italy.