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Quote:quote:Originally posted by the invisible man
If there is to be a campaign for a change in the law (bearing in mind that PPG16 is not law, as such), what law will the campaign aim to change, and what is the change being proposed?
As I see it, to coin a phrase, we would need legislation to prohibit ploughing or other detrimental activities to or on areas with known archaeological remains.
Would there be an extension to PPG16 in effect, to include agricuture as development, thus requiring farmers to apply for permmission to plough? Would such an application be considered in the same way as a planning application, i.e. you might still get mitigation or "preservation by record?"
Or are you suggesting that class consents for scheduled monuments are abolished/amended? In which case only scheduled monuments are protected and we're back to square one, unless we schedule everything - then nothing ever gets built or ploughed.
Certainly the present arrangement could do with re-thinking but I see a number of questions to be resolved!
We owe the dead nothing but the truth.
Isn't it a shame that we [u]need</u> to think of having laws because of the 'I want' society we're in today. When I first read PPG16 I, naively, assumed it would be followed as 'what should be done'. It seems we now have to litigate against people's greed.
P
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Unfortunately laws are really rather necessary for us all to get along together. We are required to drive on a particular side of the road to prevent cars hitting each other, for example.
You want to prevent a farmer from carrying out a legitimate and lawful, and reasonable, activity on his own land. This activity is his livelihood. You have a reason for wishing to restrict his freedom of action, in that you believe that buried remains on that land are of value, as I understand it. Let us assume that the farmer disagrees, and wishes to pursue his activities.
The only way to resolve the conflict of views is through the law.
We owe the dead nothing but the truth.
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Quote:quote:Originally posted by Arthus
I think you perhaps are assuming something about me because it is apparent that I?m an archaeologist who has worked at the Henges.
Where in any of my postings did I argue or suggest,
?that So long as the developer can show the archaeology is being damaged, then a development should be allowed to go ahead regardless of its importance??
Once you have re-read my postings. I await your reply.
Arthus
I, for one, never make assumptions about people. If you are an archaeologist who worked on the quarry/possible quarry then I believe you were doing what you were paid to do, nothing more.
As for your previous posting, try reading point 5 again:
"any chance to excavate as much of the archaeology in the area surrounding the Henges should be taken now"
do I need to elaborate?
Point 6 in that post also makes me ask if you are keeping abreast of latest proposals for tourism around the henges. If so, what are you going to do about it?
P
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Quote:quote:Originally posted by the invisible man
You want to prevent a farmer from carrying out a legitimate and lawful, and reasonable, activity on his own land. This activity is his livelihood. You have a reason for wishing to restrict his freedom of action, in that you believe that buried remains on that land are of value, as I understand it. Let us assume that the farmer disagrees, and wishes to pursue his activities.
The only way to resolve the conflict of views is through the law.
We owe the dead nothing but the truth.
I know we have to have laws but farmers are often aware of having archaeology on their land, sometimes before archaeologists do. Surely a farmer is not being asked to give up his livelihood altogether, just to leave certain areas untouched. If some farmers can do it, why not all.
We all have some constraints on our activities.
E
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Exactly, we all have constraints, that's all I was pointing out. Some landowners may indeed be happy to comply with the wishes of those of us who have an interest in the remains of the human past, others may not. Inevitably there are conflicts of interest, so to speak.
I am certainly no apologist for farmers, who I regard as just another industry, no better no worse, but they are often small businesses (not always of course) working to very small margins. To them, land is income, and the loss of a relatively small productive area will mean a loss of income. I would suggest, with respect, that it is both naive and rather unfair to label the intention or desire to exceed outgoings with income as "greed". After all, we all do it (albeit some more successfully than others!  )
However, I think I've wandered off topic a bit.....[:I]
We owe the dead nothing but the truth.
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Quote:quote:If there is to be a campaign for a change in the law (bearing in mind that PPG16 is not law, as such), what law will the campaign aim to change, and what is the change being proposed?
Good question!
Having got us to this position, the various campaign groups who want to save the Thornborough environs from destruction must surely have some strategy for saving the archaeology at Ladybridge from the plough? What is it?
The destruction of the archaeology may be less imminent than when it was threatened by quarrying, but it seems just as certain - and, this way, none of us will ever know what has gone.
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Mike Heyworth certainly has it right. We now have a very good idea what is being eroded by the continued agricultural processes - nationally important archaeology. As I have said several times this should be considered in the conservation plan as the objective should be to preserve what is special about the site but it does appear that the area considered by the conservation plan has shrunk since i saw the tender documents about this time last year.
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The draft conservation plan is shockingly weak on the ploughing issue. It notes the destructive effects of ploughing, it suggests that 'possible measures should be examined' to convert arable land to pasture and 'remove important archaeological remains from cultivation'. However, when it comes to concrete ways of doing this, it only says:
Quote:quote:This whole process could perhaps be implemented within the DEFRA sponsored Environmental Stewardship Scheme.
As has been well discussed already, these schemes are voluntary and the financial inducements they offer are less than the farmer could make by carrying on ploughing. As far as I know, if a farmer wishes to continue ploughing, [u]nothing can be done</u>. The absence of any other proposals in the conservation plan seems to confirm this.
So, even if the conservation plan is extended to cover the remains at Ladybridge Farm, it advances the ploughing issue not one jot. Of course, the farmer may agree to stop ploughing because people ask him, but judging by what I have read on here thats not very likely!
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Pixie, You too seem to be assuming much.
This on top of Venutius conjecture that I argue that, ?so long as the developer can show the archaeology is being damaged, then a development should be allowed to go ahead regardless of its importance, (I?d like him to explain how he arrived at this conclusion) as well as his comments that myself and my co-workers have been conducting ?shoddy archaeology? (which he might care to explain also at some point) is rather annoying.
Forgive me if I?m wrong, but there seems to be an assumption that archaeologists employed indirectly via a consultancy firm by the quarry will be in the pocket of Tarmac and not impartial.
You quoted me saying,
"any chance to excavate as much of the archaeology in the area surrounding the Henges should be taken now"
and then you said
?do I need to elaborate??
Yes you do really, since you obviously have not read my very first posting when I said,
?It seems to me that the area around the Henges does contain valuable archaeology, which should continue to be studied and excavated over the coming years.
Therefore, both the quarrying and deep ploughing should be stoped in the area even if it requires legal protection in the form of a new law.? (Posted - 19/11/2005 : 18:11:14)
For the record I believe that a large area around the Henges should be the subject of a long-term study (similar to what is happening around Stonehenge) and that should begin ?now? ie as soon as possible.
And why should this study include excavation? Because we won?t be able to find anything out without it.
And why ?now?? Because the age old human activity of altering the landscape will eventually (and in our speeded up world , sooner rather than later) destroy the remaining archaeology.
You might note that I also suggested careful reading of the evidence gathered in recent archaeological reports (what ever the conclusion of any report) could well help the campaign to save the Henges.
Hence I said, ?the protesters need to realise that the present dig at Nosterfield (even if one only judges it from its web page) is a neutral and professional operation, as likely to throw up evidence that can support their cause as it might produce evidence which can be used by the Quarry side.? (Posted - 19/11/2005 : 18:11:14)
I think preventing the ploughing should be a high priority for any campaign because the ploughing will destroy the archaeology quickly without any recording.
We cannot know what the future holds, current insane plans to build more and more roads could well continue and pressure on the land is sure to continue not to mention the coming effects of global warming. You only have to look at Australia to see how sheep and cows have destroyed vast tracts of land.
Talk to farmers in Yorkshire to find out how much of the soil is being blown away by the wind each year.
That is why I want the area around the Henges studied and excavated now and believe in situ preservation is a pipe dream.
Now I might be wrong and certainly wouldn?t assume anything, but is it possible that some people who don?t want the quarry are using the unseen and unrecorded archaeology as an argument to stop Tarmac when they don?t want the quarry for other reasons.
Now I don?t want the quarry for these other reasons too, but I think it is dishonest to use the archaeology in this manner.
Therefore if protesters are not giving as great a prominence to the ploughing issue as to the quarry then they are in danger of being a dishonest mirror image of the advocates of quarrying who wish to use the ploughing issue to justify the quarry.
I admit I am not abreast of the tourism proposals, but I have expressed my caution over it because I have seen archaeological sites destroyed by tourism all over the world.
You ask me ?what are you going to do about it??
Well I am arguing my point of view with archaeologist and others whenever I can, I raised the importance of the site at the recent TAG (Theoretical Archaeology Group) conference in Sheffield during a session on Stonehenge, and I recently wrote to the web site Stone Pages to suggest they cover the issue of plough damage in their bulletins.
Frankly after eight hours a day spent digging in frozen soil its about all I can do since at the moment I am also spending whatever spare time I have trying to persuade people to attend the [u]Saturday, March 18th, Bring The Troops Home From Iraq, march in London </u>which I believe is very important too.
I between all this I like to have a laugh, hence my feeble attempts at humour in earlier postings.
But I don?t much like being annoyed by assumptions about my beliefs and you and Ventutius should fully realise that many archaeologists care passionately about the Henges and the potential archaeology surrounding them.
Arthus
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