Crowdsourcing Week: Save Flag Fen!

Crowdsourcing is going to play a big role in archaeology's future. This week I'm bringing you four projects that use it to harness the enthusiasm of ordinary people to fuel innovative research.

Digventures and Crowdsourcing at Flag Fen

The Museum at Flag Fen

Flag Fen is one of Britain's most important Late Bronze Age sites. Between about 1300 and 1000 BC a huge timber ceremonial  platform was built out into a marsh near Peterborough, surrounded by a palisade of around 60,000 wooden posts. Marshy conditions have preserved the timbers and other artifacts, which offer amazing insights into Bronze Age life. Drainage of surrounding land, however, threatens the site - if the wood dries out, it will immediately decay. Flag Fen has only a couple decades left, at maximum - making continued excavation urgent.

3000-year-old preserved timbers

Enter Digventures, who this summer will carry out 'Europe's first ever crowd-sourced and crowd-funded archaeological excavation'. They've got one month left to raise £25,000 to support the field season. A sponsorship gives you inside access to the project (you can even go in the field with them!):

Starting at the £10 level, you will have a ‘backstage’ pass to the Site Hut, a password-protected area on our website offering daily updates on the project, and loads of original content including apps, blogs, on site streaming, interviews, lectures from archaeological superstars, photos, finds news and more. This access is for the duration of one year, until the 2013 season gets underway next April.
The field school at Flag Fen (for those who purchase a benefit at £125 and above) will be really exciting this year. We’ve put a lot of thinking into making this the best experience possible, whether you are digging for a day, a week, two weeks, or the whole project. There will be dedicated staff providing orientation, training and instruction, as well as evening lectures, fun outings and plenty of time for questions. And some surprises, of course!
Places in the field school (from 23rd July – 12th August 2012) are limited and will be available on a first-come, first-served basis, and are only for those aged 17 and older.

This is a pilot project: Digventures plans to expand. It's mission is to provide

seed capital and build audiences for archaeology projects worldwide. We’re changing the game, by putting the public in the driver’s seat – and giving you the chance to get on site, digging with us. All of us here at DV mission control are archaeologists; we come from all aspects of the discipline, and have an international perspective on what’s working, and what isn’t. Let’s be honest: the economy isn’t great, and for lots of reasons that means that archaeology is under threat. We’ve joined forces to try something new.

Given the ongoing global massacre of funding for anything not controlled by a former Goldman Sachs employee, the idea is timely. It's also smart: there's a huge amount of enthusiasm and interest in archaeology but few ways to channel it productively into saving sites. I'm interested to see how it goes over the next few years, especially if Digventures expands into countries with less well-developed traditions of public giving and participation than the UK or the US. (In Italy, for instance, charitable giving by individuals is almost unknown.)

For a bit more, check out archaeologist Francis Pryor on the discovery of Flag Fen and the threats facing it today:

English Treasure Riots

In the irresistably titled post "On Treasure Riots and a Lust for Holes", the always excellent BLDGBLOG reminds us of a forgotten history of urban treasure hunting in the US and the UK:

During the so-called London treasure hunt riots, Londoners tore up properties all over the city "looking for one of 177 prize medallions which a Sunday newspaper called the Weekly Dispatch had planted around the UK." The paper used its first issue of the New Year to announce it had concealed a fortune in treasure medallions, the most valuable of which were worth £50 apiece. Each issue would carry a series of clues pointing to the prizes' locations. But these locations were incredibly vague, and, many readers thought, the only way to look was simply to start digging holes.

Quoting journalist Paul Slade at great length:

All over London, the story was the same. Crowds gathered outside Pentonville Prison and Islington's Fever Hospital, blocking the roads and attacking any scrap of loose ground. Hundreds of treasure seekers converged on a Bethnal Green museum and began digging there. One Shooters Hill resident said his area was "infested with gangs of roughs." Shepherd's Bush, Clapton and Canning Town were besieged too.

By the time [a 19-year-old Battersea labourer called Frederick Nurse] had his day in court, Luton and Manchester had also been hit. Luton residents seeking the town's single £10 medallion caused what councillors called "a gross disturbance" to the town in the early hours of Sunday, January 10. A week later, the Manchester Evening News found "some most extraordinary scenes" in its own city.

"From an early hour on Saturday night to late on Sunday night, various parts of the Manchester suburbs were the resort of men, women and children, people of all classes, drunk and sober, who had taken up what they thought to be the real clue to the spot where a medallion worth £25 lay hidden beneath the turf," the [Manchester Evening News] reported. “They seized upon vacant pieces of land and stretches of roadway, digging and delving until not a foot of the ground lay smooth.” In Blackley, it added, three hunters had arrived simultaneously at the same spot and “settled the matter by a three-cornered fight."

I love how deep runs the conviction that mysterious and wonderful things await us underground, waiting for us to uncover them. There's something beautiful about this mania to me - the normal world of London suddenly became enchanted with money, and everyone decided to seek it out. The shortcoming, of course, is that very few people got rich. But there's something about these moments where public consciousness of the environment is suddenly transformed that resembles the feeling I get from the process of doing archaeology.

Slade's whole article is wonderful, read it! For that matter, check out BLDGBLOG too, it's one of the best blogs period.

Digging Homelessness at Turbo Island

Via Bristol Indymedia

Turbo Island is a long-standing homeless encampment in Stokes Croft, Bristol. This week, archaeologists are leading homeless volunteers in the first excavation in the area. As The Beeb reports:

A team of homeless people are to begin excavating a derelict corner of Bristol which has been used by rough sleepers for more than 40 years... Archaeologist Rachael Kiddey, who developed the scheme, said: "This project seeks to break down barriers." Ms Kiddey and colleague John Schofield thought up the project after speaking to rough sleepers in the underpass.

Mr Schofield said a host of stories were attached to the traffic island including that it is the site of a bombed WWII building; that it was once a "Speaker's Corner"; and that it was "where pirates were hanged".

It's a joint venture of English Heritage, Bristol University, and, apparently, Marmite (!)

Archaeology has traditionally been used by the rich and powerful as a way of legitimating their tastes, interests and politics. There's been lots of theoretical discussions about "inclusive" and "multivocal" archaeology in the past 20 years, but very little work that is specifically designed to help local communities tell their stories. As Schofield observed,

Places that matter to homeless people and those who have a marginalised existence in society are significant in their own right.

I'd go further and say that places matter, period, and the point of archaeology is to tell stories about places. If we're not telling those stories with the consent and collaboration of the people who live there, we contribute directly to their disenfranchisement. Also (more cheerfully) people enjoy digging stuff and usually find archaeology pretty fun. Treasure hunting is part of human nature, and that impulse can be harnessed to all kinds of interesting projects like this.

I'm looking forward to the results of the dig! Here's some pictures of Turbo Island, looks like a cool spot. This one from the Bristol Graffiti blog:

More photos here!



From Canis Major on Flickr. Love the tiny Moai! Apropos the photo Canis Major notes: "The small plot of land in Stokes Croft Bristol called Turbo Island apparently got it's name from a strong brand of cider that street drinkers who regularly met there used to favour. It has now become a focus for the area's urban artists. These Easter Island style heads being a recent addition." Mmm, some cheap strong cider sounds good right now.

The Staffordshire Hoard Revealed

The hoard was revealed this morning, and it's a doozy: over 1,500 items, 5 kg of gold, and 2.5 kg of silver. Metal detectorist Tony Herbert called in experts after finding the first 500 pieces, and archaeologists uncovered the rest. They suspect there may be more yet buried. The location of the find, of course, is being kept fairly tightly guarded.

The BBC article is here, along with a photo gallery. A Flickr page has over 600 photos for you serious gold geeks out there. It's stunning stuff.

Conservator's comments here and video of the excavation here, behind short ads. (BBC won't allow embedding until October.) They apparently haven't cleaned many of the objects yet, which you can see in the photographs.

You can't highlight a find like this without also talking about the UK's Portable Antiquities Scheme. The PAS is a system of voluntary reporting of archaeological finds - instead of fighting the hobbyists and metal detectorists, the government decided to recruit them to report what they found, and where. Over 140,000 objects have been recorded so far (you can see some especially interesting ones here). The project is administered by the British Museum and was fully funded in 2006.

Unlike many countries, English common law allows the finder to keep archaeological objects. What the PAS does is encourage finders to record the provenance of objects and make information about them available to the public. It has helped promote education about and public involvement in archaeology on a wide scale. Read about the history of the project here.

Finds like the Staffordshire Hoard are governed by the Treasure Act 1996, which is the exception to the common law: it requires finders of gold and silver artifacts over 300 years old to report them to the government within 14 days. Local or national museums can take possession of the objects, but they have to pay the landowner and/or discoverer the market rate for the finds.

The Hoard was declared "treasure" today by the Staffordshire Coroner, which everyone expected: the declaration was needed for the British Museum to keep the objects. Tony Herbert and the unnamed landowner, however, will split the reward for the treasure and are likely to become very rich men.

The Staffordshire Hoard: Unveiling Tomorrow

According to the Beeb, a huge hoard of gold objects from the 6th to 8th centuries was found in July under a field in Staffordshire. Their ownership is yet to be decided, but in the meantime the hoard will be unveiled to the public tomorrow at the Birmingham Museum. Birminghamnewsroom.com reports:

A discovery that will redefine the Dark Ages is to be unveiled at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery tomorrow (Sept 24).

The Staffordshire Hoard is a stunning find of Anglo-Saxon gold discovered earlier this year. It is the largest such hoard ever found and of international importance.

It will be presented for the first time during a press conference at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery tomorrow (Sep 24) at 11.30am.

Experts will be on-hand to talk about the discovery and how it will help rewrite history. Important pieces of treasure will be on show and available to photograph.

Artefacts from the Hoard will be on display at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery from Friday September 25.

Stay tuned for more! Hopefully there'll be juicy pictures in the press tomorrow. Any English readers who care to report from the press conference?