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Debate: should we preserve ancient artifacts in place or dig them all up for study?
My local museum in Philly just had a 2,000-year-old vase crack during a humidity failure last spring, and it got me thinking - are we better off leaving stuff in the ground until we have perfect tech to handle it, or is the clock ticking on looters and climate change making recovery more urgent?
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phoenix24616d ago
The humidity failure at your museum reminds me of the time I dropped a Roman coin I was holding. It bounced off my sneaker and rolled under a vending machine, never to be seen again. So maybe leaving stuff in the ground keeps it safer than letting klutzes like me near it.
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cole_baker11d ago
Feel your pain, that's brutal luck with the coin.
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victor77916d ago
Yeah, "never to be seen again" hits close to home. My buddy works in an old warehouse and he told me about a time he dropped a 1920s silver dollar they found in a wall. It rolled into a crack in the concrete floor and disappeared. They spent two hours with a crowbar trying to get it back, but that thing was gone for good. It's funny how the ground just swallows stuff up like that, whether it's in a museum or under a vending machine.
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