A handbook for new diggers?

[Dinosaur]

Of course there may have been timber pumping mechanisms to draw water to those troughs . . .

What, no illustrations? Can't think of any decent negeative evidence for such devices, and of course they wouldn't be needed on wet sites which is the only place they'd survive :face-approve:

[CARTOON REALITY]

I'm just being provocative, a bit like the camels Dino . . . And what sort of illustration would you like? Could offer you and an Archimedes screw but I'm sure the neighbours would talk . . .

[P Prentice]

dinosaur gets screwed every month - apparently

[Wax]

[quote=Wax]

why then is it a weakness
and why not touch on religeous belief?

Weakness as "easily distracted by". I try not to argue with people who have strong beliefs I don't have because banging your head on a brick wall is pretty point less. Also I don't enjoy winding other people up. Of course from an archaeological point of view religious beliefs are open season

[Jack]

[quote=Wax]

why then is it a weakness
and why not touch on religeous belief?

A weakness in terms of they are fantasy, passed down and embellished through the centuries. Written down hundreds of years after the time they are set in. Translated, re-written and re-written.

Very little to do with archaeology.

After all you wouldn't use the King Arthur film (c.2004) as a reference to say a site on sub-roman Hadrians wall..........even though 'The producers of the film claim to present a historically accurate version of the Arthurian legends, supposedly inspired by new archaeological findings' (wikipedia).

So why would older stories be any more accurate?

Religious beliefs are a whole different kettle of fish. Difficult to extract fact from propaganda; motives from lies; beliefs from agendas.

An organised religion is an institution bent on its own agenda...be it war on other ideologies, its own propagation through increasing membership, domination through wealth and/or politics or control of knowledge/ persecution and so on.

Evidence of these exist in history, so meaningful questions can be tackled. Before this, other than the physical remains of the end products (burials, deposits, artefacts) of whatever the people did/ thought/ believed, its a lot of conjecture.

Yes, there are some fragments of human bone, fragments of a pot common in graves, and an item of carved antler that may have some significance within the fill of that tree-throw hole.
But were they placed there? Were they thrown in as some kind of ceremony? Or is that tree-throw an accidental reservoir of soil and a conglomeration of stuff from an old topsoil the rest of which has been removed by later ploughing?

The items may have had ritual significance to those that made and/or deposited (or discarded/lost) them but how the hell (pun) can we understand this without knowing the details of that religion?

[Dinosaur]

and why not touch on religeous belief?

They might ask for a donation? or follow you home? or try and stab you?

[Wax]

Myths and Legends are indeed inaccurate and usually written down long after the supposed event. However they do tell you a bit about the world view of those who first constructed them and those who later wrote them down. It has long been aknowledged that each generation reinvents Arthur and the whole Camelot cycle to reflect their own concerns . So though a 20th century Arthurian film might not tell you much about post Roman Britain it will tell you a lot about the era that it was produced in.

At the core of most myths are some universal themes perhaps more appropriate to the study of the mind than archaeology. Though we dont know how people thought in the past there are some constants. They loved they hated and some got rich at the expense of others.

[CARTOON REALITY]

why not touch on religeous belief?

Using the words 'touch and 'religious' in the same sentence makes me uncomfortable, perhaps that's my Catholic background. . .

[P Prentice]

[quote=P Prentice]

A weakness in terms of they are fantasy, passed down and embellished through the centuries. Written down hundreds of years after the time they are set in. Translated, re-written and re-written.

Very little to do with archaeology.

After all you wouldn't use the King Arthur film (c.2004) as a reference to say a site on sub-roman Hadrians wall..........even though 'The producers of the film claim to present a historically accurate version of the Arthurian legends, supposedly inspired by new archaeological findings' (wikipedia).

So why would older stories be any more accurate?

Religious beliefs are a whole different kettle of fish. Difficult to extract fact from propaganda; motives from lies; beliefs from agendas.

An organised religion is an institution bent on its own agenda...be it war on other ideologies, its own propagation through increasing membership, domination through wealth and/or politics or control of knowledge/ persecution and so on.

Evidence of these exist in history, so meaningful questions can be tackled. Before this, other than the physical remains of the end products (burials, deposits, artefacts) of whatever the people did/ thought/ believed, its a lot of conjecture.

Yes, there are some fragments of human bone, fragments of a pot common in graves, and an item of carved antler that may have some significance within the fill of that tree-throw hole.
But were they placed there? Were they thrown in as some kind of ceremony? Or is that tree-throw an accidental reservoir of soil and a conglomeration of stuff from an old topsoil the rest of which has been removed by later ploughing?

The items may have had ritual significance to those that made and/or deposited (or discarded/lost) them but how the hell (pun) can we understand this without knowing the details of that religion?

oh jacky boy - hard science in archaeology will never win out

[Jack]

Hmmm.........something fishy happened in the quoting of quotes that were quoted.

I disagree (hard) science always win (if pointed in the right direction)..............take the Atom Bomb and Japan as fair warning.

Besides, many non-science archaeological theories/papers have been disproved (or at least discredited) by scientific evidence..........its just many archaeologist chose to ignore the evidence and to 'believe' otherwise.

Funny, a bit like a religion in that respect.

But I do agree that science can't answer all questions, as the evidence to answer some questions hasn't been uncovered yet. But then science's strength is not in answering questions, it's in how to ask questions and how best to propose present and destroy a theory.

So I suppose, if non-scientific archaeologists keep proposing theories based on belief and scientists keep knocking them down with evidence, maybe some answers may arise from the process.:face-stir: