The trouble is we are all fallible. Lets not pretend we get it all right
especially if we have any pretence at pushing the subject forward.
However, we are all reliant on other people's work. We don't go and
check every archaeology monograph with the site archive and if you do
complex historical research using scores of different sources, possibly
scattered across different countries and in multiple languages, the
chances are you don't go and look at every original document just the
key ones. But a deceased and very eminent professor of Historical
geography once told me that its only idiots who think they get it 100%
right. thus plenty of reinterpretation to be done by us and those who
come after us. And one of the commonest mistakes made in analysing
documents especially by archaeologists (But also historians) is not to
read the whole document (Lyle's context) - so tempting I know as life is
indeed short and time is money for most of us.
paul