Firstly let me thank everyone who posted (both on and off list) suggested
reading for those uninitiated in historical archaeology. I've checked with
Reading University's library and met with blank faces when I tried to
track the titles down so it's off to Oxford next!
As for the Time Team issue, Mary raised the issue of the three day time
limit. I think primarily its an attempt to add an element of excitement to
the preceedings but to be honest I think you'll find that three day limit
is something of a front, applying mainly to those whose names appear in
the credits! A couple of series back the programme was based on one of
the Western Isles in Scotland where, again, the 3 day limit was reportedly
used; but a Reading University team working on the Island some months
later were told by the locals that a three week estimate would be closer
to the truth...
The issue that interested me the most was that of 'screening'. It is a
proceedure which is now firmly entrenched in the tactics of British
medieval archaeology, but the sieving of topsoil is something which (as
far as I am aware) we have never witnessed and probably never will.Any
material culture which could be retrieved from the topsoil is virtually
decontextualised and I would therefore question the contribution it could
make to our historical understanding of a site. Are the unstratified
artefacts retrieved from topsoil being used to answer specific historical
questions of, say, an economic or social nature, or are they rather simply
convienient illustrations of a history which has already been constructed
from the documentary sources? (sorry, that sounds a bit like the old
archaeology vs. documentary history debate rearing its head again).
As for screening of stratified layers beneath the topsoil, well I'm all
for it. However, I don't see how it is possible to be anything but
selective in such screening. Sure, in an ideal world we would like to be
able to collect ALL the data from a site in the hope that we can have ALL
our questions answered. But, over here at least, there are the constant
restrictions of time and money hanging over any excavator's
head(particularly as most excavations in this counrty are conducted under
'rescue' conditions dictated by the rate of development). Furthermore, on
our medieval sites at least the quantity of materail culture which can be
produced is enormous. Bearing in mind the number of sites which have
already been excavated one is thus left to ask whether fresh adances in
our understanding will be gained by adding to this corpus
of material (i.e. by sieving) or whether or not we should be asking new
questions from different perspectives of the artefacts we have already
amassed.
There is, of course, also the issue of sieving for environmental data. But
even here selective sampling of appropriate contexts likely to furnish
important data is surely more appropriate than blanket screening.
'Appropriate contexts' should be defined- certainly the excavations with
which I have been involved have been advised by soil morphologists,
specialists in plant remains, and so forth as to which contexts will
supply relevant data. Are the returns of blanket screening that much
greater than this approach?
None of this is meant to sound like a critisism of the US approach- I am
sure the tactics you adopt are greatly influenced by factors such as
funding and environment which aren't relevant to the archaeology in
Britain-I'm just interested in what sorts of divides exist and why.
By the way, Anita mentioned the lack of any sort of sieving at Wharram
Percy, a deserted medieval village in the North of England. Despite this
site being at the forefront of changes to the way medieval
archaeology was practised in this counrty, you must realise that the
discipline has been in something of a time warp - we were about a decade
behind everyone else in finding out about the New Archaeology, for
example. If you look at medieval archaeology in this country generally
now, screening plays a much more important role (any one who is interested
should look at some of the environmental reports stemming from excavations
in the Roman and medieval towns of York, Lincoln and London, for example).
Thanks for your time,
Tim (University of Reading)
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