19th July 2010, 06:54 PM
Thanks for the responses. I guess this means there is no set approach and each site is treated on an individual basis?
Unitof1: I wasn't really considering this from the perspective of profit and loss (or legal action, though that's an interesting point), just misleading archaeological interpretations that prove to be badly off the mark when the site is fully excavated. There is another side to the profit / loss debate which hinges on this as well: if one company costs for an eval on the basis of single context recording (time consuming, needs lots of staff etc. and therefore costly) and another for putting in a few slots (quicker and cheaper) isn't the latter generally going to win the contract? So, by extension, doesn't that mean that most commercial companies will opt for slot excavation for deeply stratified urban sites? (From the other replies I see some single context evals take place, so perhaps not...).
Is there any agreement out there on the best way to excavate urban evaluation trenches? Is one approach demonstrably better than the other?
vulpes
Thanks, I will take a look....
Unitof1: I wasn't really considering this from the perspective of profit and loss (or legal action, though that's an interesting point), just misleading archaeological interpretations that prove to be badly off the mark when the site is fully excavated. There is another side to the profit / loss debate which hinges on this as well: if one company costs for an eval on the basis of single context recording (time consuming, needs lots of staff etc. and therefore costly) and another for putting in a few slots (quicker and cheaper) isn't the latter generally going to win the contract? So, by extension, doesn't that mean that most commercial companies will opt for slot excavation for deeply stratified urban sites? (From the other replies I see some single context evals take place, so perhaps not...).
Is there any agreement out there on the best way to excavate urban evaluation trenches? Is one approach demonstrably better than the other?
vulpes
Thanks, I will take a look....