Where to dig in Europe

Tom_in_CA

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Mar 23, 2007
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Salinas, CA
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Explorer II, Compass 77b, Tesoro shadow X2
from conversations I've had with guys who've hunted in Europe: They can pretty much hit any cultivated field, that has had continuous use for 1000 to 2000 yrs., and find things. Obviously the *best* fields will be locations where there was some sort of specific activity: village, market, traveller stopping spot, or something like that. But even if it was just cultivated fields, with 1k to 2k yrs. of use, go figure that even fumble fingers losses will eventually accumulate (mechanized field work didn't really begin till the early 1900's afterall. Prior to that was all handwork).

The mindset of USA hunters is to gravitate to standing ruins (foundations, etc...). Because those type things "catch the eye", of course. But in Europe, there is actually the mentality that any building that is still "standing", is by definition, "not that old" (relatively speaking, of course). You know, like a typical standing building might be 500 yrs. old, at best. And I guess people took the materials off of one buildings (brick, etc...) to build others, when one home or village or whatever went into demise. Thus there can be entire villages where there might be nothing left to see, since materials got re-used elsewhere.

I suppose that to know which fields are best, you can go out in fallow/plow time, to see where you find/see a preponderance of crockery, tile, brick, etc... ?
 

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