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Sell the dump. Yes, sell the dump!
Test the claim. Test the theory. That’s what science is all about, isn’t it?
BAR has recently been exploring the arcane world of the antiquities market. For the first time, we are asking where the high-end items—not the oil lamps and juglets, but the rare small pieces, such as seals and bullae—come from. The self-righteous clique that wants to solve all problems by outlawing antiquities dealers claims illegal diggers are looting sites and finding them.
But even expert archaeologists can’t go out looking for high-end items. And, alas, they rarely find them, even in large-scale legal excavations. High-end items rarely come from illegal digs, either.
So where do they come from? There is no single answer. One source is legal excavations: Workers simply pocket these finds at the moment of discovery. The dig director never hears of them. Then, one way or another, they come onto the antiquities market. These thefts occur more frequently at digs that use paid workers rather than volunteers, but even volunteers have been known to steal.
Talk to experienced field archaeologists in moments of candor and they will admit all this.
Take the famous inscribed ivory pomegranate, the only probable relic from Solomon’s Temple. No one supposes this was found in an illegal dig. Most likely, it was stolen by a worker from a legal Jerusalem excavation.
Or take the hoard of bullae (lumps of clay with seal impressions) from the time of the prophet Jeremiah that surfaced on the antiquities market several years ago and was subsequently published by the late archaeologist and epigrapher Nahman Avigad.
The hoard is amazingly similar to the hoard of bullae discovered in an excavation in the City of David led by the late Yigal Shiloh. Could it be that the hoard of bullae published by Avigad was discovered in an illegal excavation? Unlikely. More probably, it was quickly scooped up and secreted by a worker on a dig in Jerusalem.
Sometimes, archaeologists discover that their workers are stealing from them. For example, some digs produce lots of coins; others, from the same periods and in circumstances where coins would be expected, produce few, if any. Why the difference? The answer is clear. In one recent case, one of the largest digs in Israel was producing no coins. The reason became obvious when coins from the dig began appearing on the antiquities market.
A high official in the Israel Antiquities Authority told me that there is only one way to stop this kind of stealing by paid workers: pay baksheesh. That is, pay workers a bonus for significant finds. That used to be the way. But today, it’s not considered politically correct. It’s effective, but it’s not bureaucratic, so you can’t do it. Why be practical when you can stand on principle?
But there is another source of these high-end finds. Antiquities collectors claim that archaeologists’ dumps are a fertile ground for excavation of rare small items. The dump is the mound of excavated earth that must be piled somewhere so that the archaeologists can dig deeper. The dump is an especially rich source in digs that use volunteers, some claim. 077Volunteers, according to this theory, are less careful than paid workers, and therefore the dump contains more overlooked small artifacts. Villagers sift through these dumps and find rare objects that then go on the antiquities market. At least that is the claim.
If that claim is true, then obviously dumps should be selectively re-excavated. But is it true?
Take 1:
One of the world’s great collectors, Shlomo Moussaieff, is standing with excavators David Ussishkin and Israel Finkelstein looking over the much-excavated mound of Megiddo. Ussishkin and Finkelstein are once more excavating the site, and Moussaieff is helping support it.
“What’s that?” asks Moussaieff pointing.
The answer is the dump of the classic University of Chicago excavation of the site in the 1920s–1930s. Moussaieff offers to buy the dump. They all laugh.
End of take.
Why laugh? Why not test the theory? Why not sell it to Moussaieff?
There should be no obstacle to selling the dump, for it is abandoned property. No one wants it. It is nothing but a dirt pile that obstructs the site.
So let’s hear from the Israel Antiquities Authority. Is it OK to sell the Megiddo dump?
Sell the dump. Yes, sell the dump!
Test the claim. Test the theory. That’s what science is all about, isn’t it?
