Roman helmet update

[ossamenta]

The fancy Roman helmet I posted about a few weeks ago was sold at the auction for 2.3 million pounds! Unsurprisingly, the amount raised by the Tullie House Museum wasn't near enough. A shame, as I guess that the buyer won't let the helmet be displayed at a public exhibition.

Comments

[berangere]

This is why I'm really glad we have laws in France against detectorists !

[ossamenta]

I know what you mean! It's the same in Sweden. Ideally, however, I'd wish that metal detectoring was slightly less heavily regulated in Sweden, perhaps allowing permits for registred metal detectorists, archaeologists and amateurs alike. You can get permits for metal detectoring today, but it's rather rare and seldom (never?) outside an archaeological excavation/survey. This leads to a lack of experience among Swedish archaeologists, and often - in excavations in southern Sweden at least - Danish metal detectorists have come over to do the work.

(for general info on metal detectoring in Sweden, go to Aardvarchaeology.)

[berangere]

That's an interesting point of view.
Even if there is a law protecting buried properties, illegal detectorist exist, and that's why the hatred (this word is not too strong) of French archaeologist against detectorists is really developed. When you wake up on a morning to discover your site ravaged by tenth of holes made during the night by detectorists, that's really hard to stay calm at the mention of metal detectors... In fact I think French archaeologists hate detetorists so much that metal detectors are really rarely used on archaeological campains. You can have a permit if you ask the Cultural Direction of your region, but they generally ask for a strong background in archaeological studies, and for a detailed plan of prospection that will be included in a more advanced research (not only metal detectorism is forbidden : all kind of archaeological prospection is forbidden if you do not have a permit delivered by the cultural direction).

I have heard of archaeological excavations that used detectors, but I never participated in one. First, it is only relevant if you're looking for... metal, and the major part of archaeological goods here is ceramics... (I'm not fond of ceramics).
And then, it is only relevant in 1- rescue archaeology (OK, this is 95% of archaeology...) 2- when you have really little time and a big surface, so you have to decide quickly where will be your priority, 3- for periods when there IS metal (I'm a neolithist ;) ).
But I'm still thinking that the places where there is the biggest concentration of metal are not necessarily the most interesting to excavate in a site.

I read the article you pointed at, and it seems swedish law is quite similar to our !

[ossamenta]

I have heard of archaeological excavations that used detectors, but I never participated in one. First, it is only relevant if you're looking for... metal, and the major part of archaeological goods here is ceramics... (I'm not fond of ceramics).
And then, it is only relevant in 1- rescue archaeology (OK, this is 95% of archaeology...) 2- when you have really little time and a big surface, so you have to decide quickly where will be your priority, 3- for periods when there IS metal (I'm a neolithist ;) ).

I will have to disagree with you here (but, then, I'm a medievalist at heart): metal detecting of plough soil, which would normally just be scraped off prior to excavation, has helped to illustrate the large amounts of metal objects at high-status sites in Scandinavia, such as Uppåkra. That site is situated in a heavily agricultured land, and the actual features below the plough soil contain comparatively very little evidence of fine metal working. And since Uppåkra is a research excavation, they have had time to go over the fields for many seasons.