Reblogged from the wonderful Day of Archaeology site. Things are very different one year on. This time last year, the History team at Caerleon was putting the finishing touches to a successful week long excavation, underneath the Iron Age Hillfort at Caerleon. It had been a wonderful excavation, with a perfect blend of highly experienced archaeologists, and complete first time novices – though by the end of proceedings we had established some new expert ditch diggers (though I don’t know how happy they were about it). Today, the planned excavation is a few weeks away, and the circumstances under which we are excavating are very different indeed, and for that to make sense, we need to go back in time a little. About ten years ago, Caerleon was a hot bed for archaeological activities. Those with good memories might recall the SCARAB group which used to operate out of Caerleon. Back then we did a lot of archaeology, a lot of great archaeology. But, for a series of quite boring reasons, most of which have long been forgotten, all that disappeared, almost overnight a great archaeology department vanished. A decade on, and I am very pleased to be able to announce, on this Day of Archaeology, that we are working very hard at Caerleon to bring archaeology back. As I write this, I know that I should really be working on the new degree proposals, but there will be time for that. Not just archaeology though, we are looking at delivering on Heritage, Archaeology and Historical Studies. It’s a long road to walk, but if this programme proves a success, we will be contributing to Days of Archaeology for many years to come, and that is something that really should be celebrated. For today though, it’s all about the comparatively more mundane process of pre-excavation prep. We’ll be spending most of the next two weeks finalising our team (and anyone reading this who might be interested, you’d be very welcome – see Excavate2013) and equipment. This year we are predominantly looking at a post medieval site, a series of farm buildings with some clear wall evidence surviving in places. In addition, there is one very tempting mound feature nearby. It’s never been touched before, and while it might end up being just a natural feature, or post med activity connected to the farm, it might, just might, be a Bronze Age feature – worth a look either way. We had a bit of a shock last week to hear that there were plans to demolish the tool shed and everything in it. A bit of a misunderstanding, which was quickly resolved, but those are the sorts of things that crop up from time to time, the least expected problems can be expected while preparing for an excavation. Rest assured, the tool shed and equipment are safe and sound, and ready to go into action in August. I’ve just had a symbolic unpacking of the trowel as well – a small but essential, and quite emotionally laden piece of kit. As we have officially been a History department in Caerleon for many years, the opportunities to excavate have not been as frequent as I might have liked, so my trowel of about fifteen years has a now annual recess, tucked away on the bookcase, where any who dare to touch it our quickly chastised and warned away from its proximity. That trowel has now made the symbolic move from bookcase to desk top – a daily reminder that we are getting closer to breaking ground. But that will be about as much as gets done on this particular Day of Archaeology. For all the excitement and rewards that field archaeology provides, there is that mundane trade-off, as planning, sorting and finding of tools that have been sitting dormant for eleven months, gradually come together. But come this time next year, I’m hoping that I’ll be complaining about the sheer volume of fieldwork facing us, after all, if all goes well, we will be, in part at least, an archaeology department once more.
0 Comments
The Holy Grail, or the Canton Cup?
It’s been an interesting week for heritage, not least due to the new Heritage Bill for Wales being released for public consultation. However one of the most interesting heritage related headlines to leap out from the pages this week was one to read ‘Christian icon Joseph of Arimathea could be buried in Cardiff’. The word ‘could’ is a fascinating one. Nero 'could' have confided in his beloved pet rat in times of crises, Silbury Hill 'could' have been constructed to act as a landmark to the finest Neolithic restaurant in all of whatever Avebury was referred to as back then, and forks 'could' be used to eat soup, of course none of them did, were or are, but if you were committed enough, then you could make a case for them. Therein lays the greatest danger of Joseph of Bute, as we should presumably now call him. The things we ‘could’ do with our heritage are fairly inexhaustible, especially if you want to put ethics and reason to one side. The article above goes on to tell readers that this is ‘our’ (Welsh) heritage. Is it though? Is it really? Okay, lets for one minute take off our rationale hats and swap them for our money making hats: Crook #1 ‘If we want to attract visitors to Cardiff, why don’t we just tell everyone that Joseph of Arimathea is buried here?’ Crook #2 ‘Good point, we can’t prove it, but that doesn’t matter.’ Crook #1 ‘Another good point, because we can’t prove a lot of things, but we can still say they happened right?’ Shortly after we can expect the Cardiff City sightseeing bus tour to suddenly call in at the burial place of Owain Glyn Dwr (conveniently buried directly under the pub of the same name, so ‘they’ say), metal shavings reputed to have splintered from Excalibur itself (new to the Origins gallery in the National Museum) and the final resting place of Madoc’s hat, washed up in Cardiff Bay. If you don’t take an ethical position on anything, we really could say and sell anything we wanted to about Welsh history. Does this sound a little extreme? Perhaps, but the other story to catch my attention this week might make us think about this issue for a little longer. China and the £58m Jibaozhai Museum, which was recently forced to close its doors to the public following a scandalous revelation that the majority of the artefacts displayed, were cheap fakes. Some wonderful quotes from the senior museum staff suggest that ‘some’ of the 40,000 objects were real, but not many. It would appear that this ‘institution’ has come to embody the very worst of museum corruption and deceit – morals and museum ethics have no place here, as the development of an attractive product seems to have consumed everyone involved. International condemnation and general mockery followed shortly after the story broke. So, with China in mind, let the cautionary tale of the museum that got caught out for misleading all of its visitors be a reminder. We certainly could say all sorts of enticing things about Welsh history and its connections to the world, indeed we can do that perfectly well with our legitimate and proven historical narratives, but let’s leave Joseph of Arimathea where he belongs, wherever that might be: it is certainly not in Cardiff City centre. We do not need to pretend, or need try to dupe anyone else into thinking anything other than that, and were we to do so, we would deserve the exact same scale of international mockery and derision faced by the Jibaozhai Museum does now. Some things feel like they never change. I first worked at Chepstow Castle around fifteen year ago, it might be longer, if it is, I care not to dwell on the passage of time. Back then the castle was a venue for all sorts of cultural activities – the Son et lumière being a particular favourite of mine, not least because it afforded me the chance to flail a sword around on stage for several nights. A very pleasant evening on the 13th of July this year suggested that the castle, as venue for cultural engagement, is alive and well. This particular evening’s entertainment though, served only to reinforce the castles potential as a long term venue for the arts, as Chepstow celebrated the centenary of the filming of Ivanhoe. Now, having worked in Chepstow Castle, and spent most of my early years in the town, I was familiar with the fact that a silent film had been shot in the Castle, featuring an American actor of the name King Baggot, but that was about all I knew. One hundred years on from filming, Chepstow Castle staged a unique event, screening the film in its place of creation for two nights - and so finally, after one hundred years of existing, and having known about it for some fifteen years, I finally had the opportunity to watch Ivanhoe. The evening was split into two parts, the first hour or so being led by various local singing groups, who regaled the audience in faux medieval garb, before the film was screened, accompanied by multi talented opera star [‘star’ might be strong, but I know Karl, so I’ll indulge him the title] Karl Daymond, performing a newly assembled score. Entertainment was very much the theme of the evening, aided by the film itself. I think there was a collective effort from the audience in attempting to maintain straight sober faces for the first thirty minutes of the film, but ultimately dramatic over, and at times plane awful, acting saw the audience break into fits of amusement – but yet all there enjoyed the film, and however ludicrous the film might have been, and regardless of the dramatically baffling plot (which seemed to revolve around hoards of men running in and out of Chepstow Castle, again and again and again), I would love to see it again. However the point of all this, and you’d be excused for thinking that there wasn’t one, is that a century separated the filming and screening of Ivanhoe. Yet from that point in 1913, to 2013, the castle was consistently an important landmark, attractive to audiences and a key attraction in the local community. Many of the faces in the audience were ones I recognised from the local community, just as many of the extras to perform in the film were at the time of production. Whether it be for the filming, or for the enjoyment of the final product, the community was central to the success of each event, and to the sustained importance of the heritage site in the locality. It’s an important thing for us to keep in mind, and thankfully as a sector we are increasingly wise and respondent to this need. It’s all very well and good maintaining a heritage site, but without connecting with the surrounding and local community, the relevance and justification for its conservation is much harder to justify. A decade or so on from working there, Chepstow Castle seems to be doing a good job of just that. Not directly to do with museums today, but certainly related, it is the Festival of Archaeology for the next couple of weeks, and it seemed appropriate to find something from the graphic novel vaults that linked to this celebration. Mentioned a few weeks ago, Carter Hall, aka Hawkman, is probably the most prominent of archaeologists in DC publications, active in fieldwork, and living in his own museum - few characters are better placed than this one to give archaeology a platform in graphic novel circles. The panel selected below is a nod to last weeks rant on the relocation of the Mold Cape, and develops a pretty direct repatriation narrative. A pitched physical battle ensues in this volume over the rights and wrongs of excavating a particular site, and while such extreme conflicts are rare in our more mundane real world, it does serve as a reminder as to some of the ethical questions that we are faced in archaeology, especially regarding collections acquired over a century ago.
'Heritage' Minister John Griffiths views the Mold Cape.
Be forewarned - there is a touch of the angry rant about this one, though I prefer to think of it more as a passionate perspective. I find the Mold Cape troubling, a beautiful, inspiring, technically brilliant, but ultimately troubling object. For the next few months, you can see the Mold Cape in Wales. Take the chance while you can, such occasions are few and far between, and duration of such visits are frequently ‘blink and you miss it’ moments. Before you know it, it will be packed up, shipped off, and back on display in London. Yet the ‘return’ of this object to Wales, initially to the south and then up to the north, does not really feel to me like something that should be celebrated. Instead it should be something that forces anyone in Wales with a love of culture, archaeology, or Welsh history in general, to ask some serious questions, of the object, and perhaps ourselves. I won’t disguise my delight at being able to peer at the cape at close quarters in Cardiff this week. It is a stunning example of Bronze Age gold working, and rightly placed in the company of the British Museum’s – ‘A History of the World in 100 Objects’ series. I had the comfort and space to explore the object for roughly half an hour during this last week [while managing to drop into the Origins Gallery at other points in the week as well], after all, there was next to no one else looking at the object while I was there, so no competition for viewing rights, no shoulder barging required. And while twitter trends are probably not the most reliable means of gauging public interest in an object or collection, a grand total of some twenty tweets on the objects return to Cardiff, at the very least indicates that the social networking communities are yet to be inspired by the cape coming to Wales. So why the lack of interest? Perhaps I should put my cards on the table, if you hadn’t already guessed it, I strongly believe that this object should be living permanently in Wales, if anything, Welsh museums should be loaning the object to the British Museum and not the other way around. I have never bought into the notion that this key Welsh object being displayed in central London somehow does anything beneficial for wider appreciation and understanding of Welsh archaeology/history/culture. Yet, what might be perceived as a lack of interest at the cape’s return, perhaps indicates why it should not be here, if audiences in Wales don’t care enough to come and look, what right do any of us have to argue for its return? Well, plenty of right. I have long feared that the disconnection between audience and object is symptomatic of the lack of engagement between audiences in Wales, and Welsh history. How are Welsh children, year on year, supposed to be encouraged to engage with our prehistoric narratives, inspired by the great artistic achievements to be produced on Welsh soil, when the greatest tangible products of those periods are behind glass case, some 150 miles away, in another country? This factor I fear is the key component in understanding why interest is so ephemeral. How might we be expected to launch a meaningful repatriation campaign when so few people in Wales seem to have any awareness that this object originated in Wales? The Mold Cape troubles me, because it should be in Wales, we should be fighting for it to be in Wales, but we don't, and we seem to have no inclination to ever do so - a situation which will only be reinforced through the continued absence of such works in Wales. Political representatives in Wales seem pretty happy to go along with the status quo as well. Culturally, we remain the junior partner, in spite of a decade of devolution. This is the ideal opportunity for political and cultural voices to make the claim – but none will. In turn, this should really challenge us to ask why bother loaning the object in the first place? If we don't care enough to fight for Welsh cultural heritage to be on Welsh soil all the time, why should we then care about such items dropping back in for several weeks – as suggested above, having spent some time with the collection in Cardiff, it seems that we don't care, and that should be the most troubling element of all. We should value the Mold Cape, we should appreciate its return, but then we should do one of two things. Fight for its return, or try to understand why we are content in Wales for such objects to reside outside of the daily reach of Welsh audiences? One or the other should be considered essential for the future of archaeological and cultural collections in Wales. It's that blissful time of year, when teaching goes into hibernation, and a research window suddenly opens up. I'm being ambitious this summer, with final editing on the PhD thesis still to do, I want to try and turn around three articles in three months - optimistic perhaps, but a worthy challenge. As time is at a premium, one of these research projects is making greedy use of the wonderful National Library Welsh Newspapers Online digital archive - far less time consuming than trekking back and forth to Aberystwyth. The only danger with such a resource is the near infinite scope for distraction. How is one supposed to ignore a headline like 'The Great Robbery at Llanfihangel'?! Published in 1882, Mr Evans had been relieved of a small fortune, no wonder then that he was 'agreeably surprised' at the overnight return of the bulk sum stolen. I'll be posting little snippets like this here over the coming weeks - otherwise my research will be heading in completely the wrong direction! |
Archives
January 2018
Categories
All
|