16th August 2013, 06:54 PM
ginger Wrote:i .......if its easy and cheap enough to do it, then the reasons for not doing it ie..budget, time, are out of the window,
Thats the thing, it's not cheap! I'm often a big chunk of the px budget.......the processing and sorting can be done at reasonable costs, but what if you get the whole suite of artefacts and ecofacts from that one sample? Pot, cbm, fired clay, ind. waste, glass, charcoal, plants, fish bone, animal bone etc. that's just nine specialists in that one wee list. Then what if the site formation processes were not clearly understood on site, what if the feature is not/ can't be dated? That is then a waste of time and money and the data wasted. The data is only relevant if the feature can be dated, if not, it's just a pile of stuff!
i'm often trying to promote the relevance of charcoal analysis, but if a pit has got charcoal in it but not dated it's still just a pit with charcoal in it. If its in an isolated pit, then it's still just a pit with charcoal.....
if you've went to the effort of processing these samples then not get them analysed or even assessed then the sample is pointless.
One should never underestimate the cost of environmental archaeology, but one should also never underestimate the usefulness of it either!
The EH guidelines are good for on site procedures and report writing but the bit in the middle is only as good as your specialist. The soils and sediments, archaeology, type of sample taken and sample potential dictate processing procedures. What might work down south probably won't work up north (our lovely northern clays for eg).
Feel as though I could go on and on and on, it's like my favourite child!:face-approve: So I'll stop there in case it upsets the other one