Professional Numismatist Publishes Lord Renfrew's Coin Collection

Lord Renfrew, a vocal critic of the antiquities trade, has graciously allowed his collection of Etruscan coins to be published in Italo Vecchi�s impressive new corpus. The work publishes thousands of specimens from private and public collections and includes many coins that cannot be traced back to the 1970 date favored by archaeologists and some museums.

In supporting this endeavor, Lord Renfrew has demonstrated a commitment to scholarship shared by many collectors and,  indeed, professional numismatists like Italo Vecchi.

New Work on Etruscan Coinage

I'm looking forward to coin dealer and scholar Italo Vecchi's new work about the enigmatic coinage of the Etruscan city states. I understand that Lord Renfrew collects this series.  One wonders if all Lord Renfrew's coins have a demonstrable provenance back to at least 1970.

Archaeologists Train Guns on Odessey Marine Again

Archaeologists-  this time in the United Kingdom- have once again shot a broadside at Odessey Marine-- this time with regard to its deal with the UK Government to salvage the wreck of the HMS Victory.  See http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/may/06/hms-victory-shipwreck-odyssey-excavation?newsfeed=true

For an interesting critique of the position of archaeologists with regard to Odessey's work, see http://www.culturalheritagelaw.org/blog?mode=PostView&bmi=711550

According to the author, Tom King, an archaeologist who was commenting not specifically about the Victory wreck, but rather generally in favor of Odessey's work: 

1. Shipwrecks are deteriorating, both from natural causes and particularly as a result of modern methods of fishing, which plow up the bottom as effectively as agricultural land-levelers have torn up the Mississippi Valley.

2. Academic institutions and museums lack the financial resources to excavate everything that's being destroyed, or even a small percentage of it.

3. There are commercial salvagers who conduct very high quality archaeological excavations, and who have technological and financial resources that the academic community can�t touch (See, for example, the two recent publications by Odyssey Marine Exploration here and here --- which are substantial archaeological survey and site reports, some of which also document my point #1 above).

4. The only difference between such �salvage� and the work of academic underwater archaeologists (other than that, in my experience, Odyssey at least does better work) is that a percentage of the recovered material gets sold after it is described and analyzed.

5. Odyssey at least has rather strict protocols governing what can and can't be sold; what gets sold comprises mostly manufactured items of limited research interest;

6. We archaeologists used to claim that we were interested in the data from sites, not the goodies. The violent and near-mindless standard archaeological reaction to responsible shipwreck salvage proves that we've been dissembling all these years, or simply don't understand our own motivations.