Give this your best shot... Mommy or Mummy?

Question

I have had a question on this for a long time and no one has answer it.

When does digging up someones grave become an archaeological discovery?

Is there a time period? If so when?

Obviously not having a grave marker is not the answer or the great pyramids would not be a place of archaeoligical study.

So what is it that makes the difference?

Answer 1

I suppose the people who made these laws .are dead and buried.

So dig them up to find the answers. Yahoo..lol.

Answer 2

When the people doing the digging are TIME TEAM they give anything a history and get excited about it.

I don't know the official answer Interesting question though.

Answer 3

Most graves have a 99yr lease which is renewed every time it is used so any cemetery jaunts to dig up anything would be grave robbing. Archaeology is a study of things ancient and historical, some people still think its grave robbing. But the law allows it for the knowledge of ancient pasts. Its not graves usualy that are being dug up, they just happen to turn up at dig sites of other things.

Answer 4

mummy

Answer 5

Maybe in the beginning it was for treasure, then old ruins, now it is a mixture of everything. Best answer I can think of.

Answer 6

when they are too dead to sue you.

Answer 7

To have no living relatives to argue with?

Answer 8

What makes the difference is the approach. Archaeologists should always realize that human remains found are probably graves, and that those remains should be treated with respect. The goal of archaeology is, in part to illuminate the shared past and lifeways of humankind, and we seek to learn about such people by exhuming them. In many places, the people doing the digging are the descendants of those being dug up, so things are a little less complicated. In other parts of the world, the trend in recent years has been reburial of human remains. It's not unusual at all for archaeologists to excavate cemeteries that are only 100 years old. There are cemeteries not even that old that are completely buried and forgotten.

Unfortunately, archaeologists in the past tended to treat human remains with less respect than we do now (for many reasons, I'm not saying they were evil), and like it or not, that's a legacy current archaeologists have to deal with.

Also note that many archaeological sites do not contain human remains at all, and are just the remnants of an old settlement, or hunting area, or something like that.

EDIT: If you want a simple answer, (like Type A is a grave and Type B is a site, the difference is that orange peels are only at graves) you won't get one. This is a question that archaeologists still have trouble with today. Lots of times, Native American remains that are thousands of years old are still considered graves, and archaeologists do not excavate without permission from the descendants.

Answer 9

Could it be, an archaelogical dig is when a discovery of an ancient burial site is found in an area of historical value.

Graveyards as we know them are a fairly new occurance i.e. a few hundred years,  and on designated sacred ground, unlike some ancient archaelogical sites.

Don't know for sure, just a guess

Answer 10

tricky one but i believe that when no marker or grave stone denotes it as a grave then it can be claimed as a find.

Ancient burial grounds are known as such but still dug up for science and discovery, does it make it right? Who knows. Maybe it is one of moral conscience rather than a real definite answer.

Answer 11

I think its an archaelogical discovery when the person you dig up is important to the understanding of something. Like an acient culture or etc. Its probably only when its evidence to something or historical importance. I tried my best.

Answer 12

Digging up a grave is a archaeological discovery when something new is being discovered about a culture, the culture usually being one that has been extinct for a long enough period of time that little is known about it.

Answer 13

Anything of historical significance. Something that is written about in a history book. Something that can be used to prove or disprove something in history.

That's my best guess anyways.

Answer 14

your interest in digging up skeletons is common amongst

edinburgh  folk especially the teenagers who do it for sport

and recreation

ask one of them