Interesting Article

Yes certainly an interesting article and while the percentages might have changed due to Chinese metal works the damage to historical valuable information is going on.

Sap: Well said.

It is a pity that Nathan Elkins never mentioned anything about the British Laws relating to treasure trove, and their effectiveness.

Perhaps they could be a standard and an inspiration to the writing of similar laws in most other countries.

How active is UNESCO on this subject?

The profession of archaeology as a whole enjoys the reputation of adding to our knowledge of history, site by site. Are you aware of the very large number of sites that have been excavated for years with nothing or almost nothing published? Have you ever read an archaeological report? Most add very little to history, and most (not all) don't teach us about coins or use coins to teach us much about the site. I used to give lectures at my U with the standard "you can use coins to date strata" and the other purported uses of coins. Then I got deeply involved in hoard reports and coin studies. It turns out those purported used don't happen often and when they do it is usually very minor. (One exception, Morgantina helped date the first denarius). However, for most sites the use of coins and the value to numismatics is so close to nil that it would rarely take more than a couple of sentences to tell the story.

On the other hand, hoards are used a lot to determine numismatic chronologies. It is usually not where they were found, but that they exist and get recorded that matters. When location would matter, as in one study of coin mobility, Duncan Jones lamented that in all of Italy only two relevant hoards had been recorded (when it was obvious many had not been recorded and many were recorded elsewhere, especially in the west.) All the draconian laws of Italy have not caused that history to be recorded.

We all, collectors and archaeologists, want the information from antiquity to be recorded and disseminated. Coin dealers do far more of that useful service than archaeologists. Most Ph.D.s in ancient numismatics rely on information recorded in coin catalogs for collectors (not for, or by, historians, and not for, or by, archaeologists). Rational English laws do far more to contribute to knowledge of antiquity that than calls, or laws, to shut down collecting ever will. Most English scholars (I have known many personally) don't shun collectors the way the US archaeology profession does.

Of course, the history of archaeology is almost completely the stories of archaeologists who were collectors or funded by collectors who expected to, and did, bring artifacts home. The museums we visit have antiquities because of collectors. It might be fair to say the profession of archaeologist exists because of collectors.

Hoards from England are often well-published and I think professionals would agree that the majority of them actually get recorded and published. Look at the locations of the finds in England (in books such as "Coin Hoards from Roman Britain, volume X") and you will see very few are from established sites and many are from the middle of some field which seemed to have little prospect of producing a hoard.

So, rather then misrepresenting the value of archaeology to history (which they do), archaeologists (who we appreciate anyway) should support rational laws like those of England. If by some turn of events they did manage to shut down collecting, it would be a Pyrrhic victory because their support would plummet. Relatively few people care about antiquity and many, like us, who care are coin collectors or artifact collectors. Collectors and archaeologists are natural allies as history proves and the change in that relationship in the recent past is unfortunate. Now, in universities, it is politically correct to denounce collecting and shun collectors. Although 20 years ago my numismatic talks were frequent and very well-received by the history department (which had no faculty who could talk about anything remotely similar), it has been a long time since I have been invited to give a talk.

Anti-collecting articles have unstated assumptions upon which the arguments rest. Most of those assumptions are false, but if you do't know any better the argument looks good. For example, we deplore looting. "Looters loot for profit. Collectors buy looted material, providing the profit. Therefore, the best thing to do is shut down collecting."

But, even people making that argument know full well that looters will loot anyway. Read Burton Berry's stories of collecting in Istanbul in the early 1900s. It was common to seek and then melt down silver coin hoards to make convenient silver bars, regardless of collectors. Collectors preserved information, they didn't cause it to be lost. They were major players in precisely the opposite way they are now depicted in academia. Plus, there will be many people out there collecting even if legal trade ceases. We are convinced coins have value and that will not go away even if collecting is given a bad name.

The point is to find some way to get the information about antiquity out. Archaeologists have a terrible record in that regard. (Read a history book about your favorite time period and ask yourself how much of that information was obtained obtained archaeologically without collecting being the motive). Coin portraits illustrate the rulers, regardless of where the coins were found. Collectors contribute to producing far more information about antiquity than would be the case without collectors.

Those don't want artifacts "ripped from their original contexts and associations," act as if that is the big picture. No. The big picture is getting, and not losing, information about antiquity. Suppressing collecting would not help, rather hinder, that goal.

i enjoyed reading that augustus.