Should archaeologists cover Pompeii back up when they're done with it? - eviltoast
  • Exocrinous@lemm.eeOP
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    11 months ago

    https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/11/29/pompeii-still-has-buried-secrets

    About a third of the ancient city has yet to be excavated, however; the consensus among scholars is that this remainder should be left for future archeologists, and their presumably more sophisticated technologies.

    Scholarly consensus is that part of the city should stay buried. There are all sorts of concerns about visitors damaging Pompeii. That article is full of them. During World War Two, a group of allied soldiers thought Pompeii was a nazi encampment and shot at it. Nobody wants Pompeii to fall into further ruin.

    • xmunk@sh.itjust.works
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      11 months ago

      Sure, leaving the rest to future excavation might make sense… But we already fucked up the portion we dug up… Reburying it will just fuck it up even more.

      • Exocrinous@lemm.eeOP
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        11 months ago

        Will it fuck it up more than, say, acid rain caused by excess CO2 in the atmosphere? Or soldiers in WWIII thinking it’s an enemy camp? Or just regular looters and vandals and tourists?

        • JJROKCZ@lemmy.world
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          11 months ago

          Looters and vandals of a millennia old ruin full of nothing but destroyed lives? Acid rain will cause damage but I believe our concern should be stopping that, not worrying about what it will destroy…

          Regarding soldiers, hopefully war never touches Italia again and the chance of Pompéi being bombed in a modern war is fairly low. We know where it is and the Geneva conventions list military actions on world heritage sites to be a war crime, no nation who recognizes that convention will intentionally target the ruins

          • Exocrinous@lemm.eeOP
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            11 months ago

            Oh, you’re a lemmy.world user. That explains why you didn’t read the article. You guys hate reading

              • Exocrinous@lemm.eeOP
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                11 months ago

                The workmen of that era, upon finding a mansion or other building, would extract any objects of obvious value, such as marble statues, bronze lamps, and decorative mosaics, without taking note of their location or of the architectural context

                Alcubierre operated with barbaric efficiency, especially when it came to wall paintings that his workers hacked off from their brick underpinnings. When a painting was deemed insufficiently different from those already unearthed, workmen pulverized it underground. These excavations were focussed on finding masterpieces to augment royal or aristocratic collections, rather than on discovering the mundane objects of everyday life—or material evidence of the complexities of Roman social structures.

                In late 2010, a stone building known as the House of the Gladiators imploded after heavy rains, severely damaging valuable frescoes inside. That disaster was followed by the collapse elsewhere in the city of several other walls.

                Like I said, .world users can’t read. It was right there in front of you, and you preferred to throw around ableist insults instead of using your eyes.