In a message dated 9/27/2006 2:34:00 P.M. Pacific Daylight Time,
[log in to unmask] writes:
paradoxical for historical archaeologists to have such a poor
understanding of the history of archaeology...
I am quite sure we do not even have a clue as to in our own families were
interested in archaeology before us. My wife was digging into her Ballou family
history and learned a distant relative worked for the Smithsonian doing
archaeology. My grandpa "surveyed" Anasazi or Fremont archaeology pottery while
out driving cattle in southern Utah in the teens and 1920s. In truth,
"historical" is where we find it and where we define it. Although U.S. American
historic archaeology is far later than that in England, the prehistory that Anita
says we cannot discuss goes back a fair ways and I am just waiting for
someone to find marks on camel or mammoth bones indicating Kenewick Man had a form
of writing (thus, extending the concept of "historical" much further than
previously expected.
Ron May
Legacy 106, Inc.