"Life can only be understood backwards, but it
must be lived forwards"
Those words by renowned existentialist
philosopher Soren Kierkegaard (Kier-ka-gaerd)
frame our County Seat Episode today as we talk
about the value of artifacts in the context of the
field where they are found, not the museum or
gallery where they end up. For years the
bigger picture of history and cultures were lost
as archeological gems were plucked from sites
by people more interested in the art of the
object as opposed to the history it held. About
120 years ago that all started to change when a
movement began to solve the mysteries of the
ancient Puebloan culture who suddenly
vanished from the southwest united states.
That led to the creation of the Antiquities Act of
1906 which is where OUR dig begins today with
Maggie K.
In the last year or two we have heard
a lot about the Antiquities Act and
how it authorizes the president of the
United States to reserve tracts of
federal land under special protection
called national monuments.
Speaking of national monuments, I
think you will find these facts rather
interesting. First of all, there are 117
of them, the smallest being a third of
an acre, the largest being more than
3/4ths the size of Alaska. It is called
{papa-hay-na-oo- mow-ku-a-kaya. It
stretches from Hawaii to Midway
Island in the Pacific. However, the
vast majority of monuments are
under 5000 acres.
In fact, it wasn't until December 1st
1978 that any monument was larger
than one million acres with the
creation of Admiralty Island National
Monument. (That was the same day
that President Carter set the record
for creating the most monuments in
one day. 11 of them. He must have
been exhausted!).
President Obama holds the record for
creating the most monuments (34 to
be exact) Here is another interesting
fact. Since the year 2000, 768 million
acres of new monuments have been
created. That is twice the size of
Alaska! Before the year 2000 all
monuments combined came up to
about half the size of Delaware.
There seems to be a lot of
commotion about whether the
antiquities act allows a president to
change or modify a monument, or
whether it gives him the authority to
declare whatever size monument he
feels like declaring. So let's dive into
the intricate inner workings of the
Antiquities Act of 1906 to see where
all this controversy comes from.
What I found surprised me.
The entire Antiquities Act consists of
5 paragraphs, 6 sentences and is only
419 words long. In fact, only one
sentence deals with the creation of a
monument it says:
The President of the United States is
authorized, in his discretion, to
declare by public proclamation
historic landmarks, historic and
prehistoric structures, and other
objects of historic or scientific
interest that are situated upon the
lands owned or controlled by the
Government of the United States to
be national monuments, and may
reserve as a part thereof parcels of
land, the limits of which IN ALL cases
shall be confined to the smallest area
compatible with proper care and
management of the objects to be
protected.
The bigger part of the Antiquities Act
says that people who excavate, injure
or destroy any historic or prehistoric
ruin or any object of antiquity on
public land without permission of the
U.S. government shall be fined and
imprisoned. It further states in
paragraph 3
that a permit is required to excavate
and gather artifacts from
archaeological sites and gather
objects and those will only be given
to reputable museums, universities
colleges or other recognized scientific
or educational institution and that all
the objects must then be kept in
public museums. That pretty much
sums up the whole antiquities act of
1906 and leaves us in a good place to
pick up the conversation about how
we protect these objects and artifacts
between the site and the museum.
But we will dig into that when we
come back. For The County seat, I'm
Maggie K.
Welcome back to The County
Seat we are talking about
archeology and the problems we
have with curating and
protecting archeological
resources across the state
joining us for our conversation
today is Shawn Lambert who is
the public archeologist for the
state of Utah and Nathan
Thomas lead archeologists for
the Bureau of Land Management
thank you both for taking the
time to join us today.
Fantastic to be here.
that got us all together here and
that's vandalism and looting the
problem with protecting our
archeological history and it's
apparently been wide spread.
To start the conversation I would
like to focus on vandalism. Is all
the vandalism that takes place
mostly intentional?
No, I would say that over 90% of
the vandalism is probably not
intentional but doing something
that they are not aware of
stepping on a site or scraping on
a rock face and rock are that
they cannot see.
But is hat still vandalism?
It is but they are unaware that
they are defacing an
archeological resource.
So if somebody walks into some
of these Chinese campsites that
are on the Golden Spike Railroad
and I picked that we were just
out there doing a show recently
and you see a shard of porcelain
and you pick it up and you look
at it and you put it back have
you just messed up history?
the law says anyone who
excavates illegally collects
damages or destroys
archeological resources that is
against the law but just looking
at the artifact and picking it up
and placing right back down
where you found it that is not
illegal. But archeologists are
really sensitive and they want to
know exactly where that artifact
came from so for me as an
archeologist it is really important
for me that the archeology and
artifacts stay in the same place if
the artifact is on this side of the
table vs. that side of the table
that's a big difference for us.
Say for instance if you picked up
an artifact in one room of a
pueblo house and you moved it
20 feet it's in another section of
that pueblo house or site it
totally loses its context so for
archeologists it would totally
disrupt how we see what was
going on as to what people were
doing in specific areas.
So basically you are saying how
So people who enjoy exploring
the outdoors it puts a large
onerous on them to be careful
when they come across
something and you made a point
of picking it up and putting it
right back to the place it was
should people be afraid to look
at something that they
discovered?
I do not think they should be
afraid I use that example
because that is the most
important rule of archeology it's
the same in real estate, location,
location, location that is pretty
important to us for telling that
story. But no I think as people
learn a bit more archeology and
they learn how to respect it and
they can come into areas and
learn how not to touch rock art
and not take artifacts home just
be careful where you walk and I
think they can come in and enjoy
and Utah is a great state and
there is amazing history here
archeology and I love it.
free to take photos be curious
about what you picked up and
placed back down and take a
few photos to state history office
or to the BLM archeologists and
we can help you in interpreting
what you found.
of input from people?
Definitely there are specific apps
that have been created in Utah
like friends of the cedar mesa
they can download an app and
them publicly take pictures and
become stewards of of where
they live around them and take
pictures help us document new
sites or document old sites that
we surveyed 50 or 60 years ago
so we can engage in the public
so they can help us preserve
other sites.
of archeology too I just
mentioned an old miners camp
is Swayze cabin any less
archeology say defiance house?
No I would say one interior
culture is not more important or
has less research value than
another culture. If you found an
historical can in one cabin and
you walk around and you find a
12,000 year old Clovis point
those two archeologist do not
have any less value to them we
look at them the same if they are
older than 50 years we deem
them as an artifact and they
both have research value. But to
the public they may seem
different. Because of the age of
the artifacts that is something
when archeologist come in and
talk to public and say these
artifacts not matter when they
were found or made or
produced they have a story
behind them specific people
made manufactured them used
them and reused them and then
passing them down as
archeologists we can reconstruct
that rich narrative and give those
narratives to the public think
that at which the point we can
connect with the public and get
them interested in the
wonderful history that Utah has
about 12 to 13 thousand years in
Utah.
My first experience in
archeology history was when I
was a boy scout. Our scout
master took us up to the Park
City mines and we saw the mine
shafts and the mines themselves
as an 11 year old boy I thought it
was awesome to hear the
historic stories and the folklore
its really cool and as I have
progressed in education and the
understanding of archeology in
Utah I am in love with all of it.
From the pueblo sites in the
southeastern corner of other
state to the railroad sites one is
not more valuable than the
other it depends on who is
looking at it and the lens they
are looking at it with it's a good
point as we need to be
respectful historic and
prehistoric sites.
One of the things that have been
expressed to me from people
who are responsible for curating
some of the information is that
some of the permit to go out a
college or university to do a dig
and they will go on a site and
collect data and gather it in
boxes and they go back and the
professor teaching the class gets
old and he dies and all his stuff is
in boxes in his garage and his
widow ends up with it and she
does not know what to do with it
and it tries to go back to the
University and then hey have the
problem of trying to put this
legally acquired archeology back
into context and apparently
Utah Museum of Natural history
is backlogged thousands of
hours of work to get caught up
and how do you solve that
problem? How destructive is
that to our full understanding of
history?
bit by bit we as an agency BLM
when we hear of agencies with
those collections from BLM lands
us are working with those
universities to find funding
which they are properly created.
When you compare to the
archeological work that has been
done maybe furring the DPA era
during the late 1930's and 40's
as compared to the residual data
bases that we have control of we
are seeing a lot less of the
misuse and the cultural
resources it's harder and harder
for to replace these items as
time goes on so we are inventing
new ways to make sure that we
never lose that context of
proving those artifacts.
And we are doing more digital
and more scanning.
A lot more nondestructive
archeology with drones and
satellites and 3D technology with
3D printing so we are doing a lot
of things now we are doing
GPR's Ground Protruding Radar
that we can that we can see
what is going on underground
without even having to dig
anymore the impact on the
ground a lot less right now these
days.
Here's a question and I know
that is particular in the Native
American Cultures. They want
their stuff back. The Antiquities
Act and some of the subsequent
Acts they say okay we are going
to collect this material and it's
going to be done by permit only
done by people who are
authorized to do it we are going
to curate it and its only going to
stay in a museum and that
making in trying to keep those
valuable pieces of history closer
to local communities where they
come from?
Right now when we have an
archeological firm or University
come into the state of Utah they
get a creation agreement. We
are requiring that creation
agreement is within University
here in the state. There may be a
few exceptions few outside of
Utah but on a whole those
institutions are curating within
the state. One thing that we do
is do permitting of any
excavation we require tribal
consultation so we require the
field office to go out and speak
with the tribes and let them
know this excavation is occurring
and get their input.
So I worked in Oklahoma for 7
years in the public archeology
sector when I was finishing up
my PHD and with 26 of the 39
federally recommended tribes in
Oklahoma and what I have
learned that when you do tribal
consultation you just need to ask
questions and they will tell you if
they are interested or not in
wanting these materials back
and the repatriate process can
start after that. As archeologists
it gets harder to understand
cultural affiliation the older it
gets maybe if we have an archaic
or paleo site it's really hard for
us to know which tribe has
ownership of that and we do our
due diligence and we try to
contact as many Native
American tribes as possible.
I would imagine if you had a
Freemont dig than there could
be 3 or 4 different tribes listed
today saying those are and then
no those belong to us.
Exactly.
They have really strong ties to
those artifacts for sure but I
want to point out though if there
are artifacts that are found BLM
administered public lands those
are artifacts that belong to the
American public and it's the
BLM's responsibility to manage
those artifacts so it's only when
we have situations that are
associated with human remains
so if human remains are found
with the grave with objects that
is when we bring in the tribes
and we try to do that cultural
affiliation. So artifacts found
outside of a grave context are
public resources.
Thank you gentlemen when we
come back we will go out on a
dig and see how much care goes
into dissecting history. We will
be right back with The County
Seat in just a minute.
Welcome back to The County Seat. In its most
simple form, archeology is the connection of
one generation to another. Unknowingly, the
Fremont Indians passed down their history and
traditions to a later generation by simply
moving on and not cleaning up after
themselves, took several hundred year to do it
but we have been able to learn a thing or two
from them. Today younger generations are still
learning from older generations through
archeology, but not quite in the way you would
think as we visit a dig in 9 mile canyon with a
youthful twist. On The Ground.
9 mile canyon in Central Utah south east of
Duchane is known for its majestic views, world
class ATV riding, and petroglyphs such as the
great hunt, it is also the site of some current
archeological digs dating back to the first
century
What we are doing is excavating one of the
larger sites in the canyon there is a series of
vertical set stone boulders that form a large
square that's about 4 meters by 5 meters in size
there's a small room inside of it and what we
are trying to do is get local youth exposed to
archeological methods and learning the
importance of preserving conserving cultural
resources for future generations
Students from around the state of Utah are
invited out to come and dig on location, and
learn the art and techniques of excavation, in
hopes of finding artifacts that piece together
the puzzle of the history in nine mile canyon.
Today our school was invited to have some
students come out and do and archeological
survey so what we are doing as you can see we
have them separated in to units which are two
meters by two meters when we take a bucket
out we sift it in our sifters over here and then
we look for the artifacts
We excavated this last year we are just above
the floor of this room it has an intact clay foor
we don't know if it has anything buried within
that floor but we will be finding that out this
year as well once we get the rest of this down
Today in this unit right here behind me we
found a drill bit that was used in their bead
making process. I think it's cool that they're
having us kids do it letting us give it a chance
like this the possibility to check out career ideas
to help the history behind these sites.
But it's important to get people involved in
these types of projects again because these are
nonrenewable resources and once they are
gone we won't be able to visit them learn
anything from them or even enjoy them from a
recreational standpoint.
This projects going on for a few more years in
various stages anyone that is interested can go
to our Facebook and web pages for nine mile
canyon volunteering and you can go to the nine
mile steward ship days and just get involved
more people the merrier
We can learn a lot from these dig sites, as to
how the people lived, how they managed their
land, and with proper care we can preserve
those stories for future generations to enjoy
You know, watching those kids get excited
about finding an ancient drill bit got me to
thinking what are we going to leave behind
that tells the story of our daily lives? This
notion creates some interesting conundrums
that we will take up when we come back on The
County Seat.
Welcome back to The County Seat. We have
taken a historical look at the roots of the
awakening American archeology movement and
the need to protect artifacts and more
important their geographical context. We can
infer a great deal from that information if it is
analyzed carefully. Today's modern digs even
include extensive soil samples from a site to
determine the weather, agricultural habits,
even traces of disease that might have
adversely affected their culture. When you
think about it in this context it becomes clear
why the modern day issues surrounding
archeological site protection and research have
become so important. The secret to our future
survival might actually be hidden in the relics of
the past literally. That is why careful scientific
deconstruction of sites is so important today.
But the question keeps coming up. In three
thousand years when they come to excavate
your neighborhood, what are they going to find.
What will tell them about your daily life. Think
about it. You don't leave your trash in the
corner of your yard. Homes aren't abandoned
anymore, they are demolished and either
rebuilt, or the land is reclaimed. There most
likely won't ever be a group of kids and
archeologists digging around your family room
getting excited over discovering a game
controller. How are the archeologists going to
explain our culture through our artifacts? What
are your thoughts about it? Would love to hear
them. Anyway, thanks for tuning in for The
County Seat. We put together this show each
week to help make sense out of the community
you live in and the things that directly affect
your life, if you think there is a topic that should
be discussed that is not being discussed, let us
know. And we will see you next week on The
County Seat.
For more infomation >> Tiny Kitchen: Halibut | Hell's Kitchen | TASTE OF FOX - Duration: 3:20. 
For more infomation >> Q&A #2 - Am I RELIGIOUS? - Duration: 9:30. 
For more infomation >> BITCOIN CURE - COMO SINCRONIZAR A SUA CARTEIRA MAIS RÁPIDO - Duration: 8:00. 
For more infomation >> Can't Sleep Love | Meme (Ft. Friends & Chrt 💛) - Duration: 1:11. 
For more infomation >> Minions 4 Toy ! Learn Colors With Minions ! Funny Finger Family Nursery Rhymes #Toys for kids videos - Duration: 2:26. 
Không có nhận xét nào:
Đăng nhận xét