UNESCOs meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

[Alexandre]

UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

International Scientific Colloquium on the factors impacting underwater cultural heritage at the Royal Library of Belgium

On the occasion of the 10th anniversary of the Convention on the Protection of Underwater Cultural Heritage (2001), UNESCO prepares in cooperation with the Catholic University of Leuven a scientific colloquium at the Royal Library of Belgium (4 Boulevard de l'Empereur, B-1000 Brussels, Belgium) from 13 to 14 December 2011.

The scientific colloquium will bring together reputed international scholars, representatives from archaeological services and concerned enterprises for a high-level scientific exchange on the imminent factors impacting underwater cultural heritage. They will explore ways of developing positive collaboration in the mitigation of activities adversely affecting this heritage.

The topics of the sessions will be underwater cultural heritage and:

- commercial exploitation, commercial archaeological interventions and international cooperation,
- trawling and fishing,
- construction works,
- seabed development, resource extraction and renewable energy development,
- environmental impact, climate change and ocean pollution,
- tourism, and
- development led archaeology.

The colloquium will be immediately followed by a regional meeting for Europe in the same venue on 15 December 2011.

The working languages of the meeting will be English and French, with simultaneous interpretation in both languages. For any addition information, please contact Ms Egger from UNESCO (b.egger(at)unesco.org) or Ms Caressa Cornelis (rlicc(at)asro.kuleuven.be).

http://www.unesco.org/new/en/cultur...ral_heritage_at_the_royal_library_of_belgium/

 

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[VOC]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Culture Resource Managers (formally known as underwater archaeologist) are the biggest threat impacting our Underwater Cultural Heritage and they are not even discussing that at their meeting!

How they can they all sit back in their ivory towers and watch the natural destruction of historic sites, whilst having the resources available to recover and record "most" of the remaining historical information left in these sites astounds me.

Self-funded private groups and commercial companies are more than willing to do this work and underwater archaeologist should be forced by their paymasters to work with these groups rather than trying to stop what they do on purely unrealistic and ideological reasons.

In every other discipline from medicine, the arts, defence, music, antiques, heritage etc., academics happily work with for profit organisations for the benefit of mankind, but underwater archaeologist feel that is the world biggest cardinal sin.

Who do these un-elected people think they are representing? Their own minuscule community or humanity at large ?

Re-Post from another thread as it is relevant to this thread as well:

Alexandre, I am amazed you as an ex Underwater Archaeologist (now a Cultural Resource Manager CRM) that you go along with the flawed thinking of the un-elected fools at UNESCO that dreamt up all that crap.

If your Cult leaders said it was good to excavate all wrecks, you would excavate every good every wreck someone else found for you (and deep down inside you know it to be true).

In-Situ preservation is a temporary trend purported by many archaeologist with little or no real practical experience on historic shipwreck (you can get a MA Degree in Underwater Archaeology with as little as one week of field work), so we just have to wait until a new Guru makes his mark in the academic and legislative word who will then change things back for the better.

It has been shown on hundreds of wrecks that the sooner you excavate the more information you can get. All wrecks are on a timeline from a complete vessel minutes before sinking to a stage where no definable wreck material can be found.

This timeline will vary for all wrecks, and the curve from 100% to nothing may differ depending on the artefact, wreck material and location, but the laws of nature tell you that all substances eventually go back to their natural state, so some material is gone in hours, some in weeks, some in years, and some may take hundreds or even thousands of years, but the fact is all of our cultural heritage is disappearing by the day and your profession is now not doing enough to record it, so it is a good job that amateur groups and professional salvors are doing a better job at recovering and recording our past.

Archaeologist go on about context but the truth is it does not really matter as wreck assemblage is an infinite variable, and any findings can only produce a final report that is full of assumptions and theoretical happenings, that could not be proven as a matter of factual evidence or is of no importance or benefit at all to mankind (at best it might be mildly interesting to the few students that may ever read the report).

Having been involved in historic wreck for over 32 years and reading nearly every copy of the IJNA during that time, I feel that the current trend is fatally flawed and you will not be thanked by future generations for sitting back and letting these sites disappear when our generation have the resources and technology to record most of the remaining information on these sites.

The same goes for the hundreds of man hours wasted measuring and then drawing sections of wreck or areas of rock that that may look good in a report but in reality tells us absolutely nothing, when the same time, effort and resources could be used on recording the important or missing gaps in our knowledge that is contained on another site.

It is much better to get some relevant information from lots of wrecks than it is to gets lots of information from just a few wrecks, if we want to build up a fuller picture of our historical past.

Long live companies like Odyssey and the Fishers as we will all learn more from them than we will ever do from the academic community and the non-diving bureaucrat Archaeologist at UNESCO

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Just another organization to circumvent the god given and constitutional rights Americans have. Sort of like the EPA.

I wish the rest of the world would realize that we are (suppose to be) a self-governing country of the people.

What we have here is an organization whose members are countries that rule over their people by subjection. Who do not have the constitutional and god given freedoms that United States citizens have. So when they construct their "rules" they do not bring with them the thought of our freedoms and that which they encroach upon because it is not in their thinking, as they do not have the same.

We fought that war a long time ago and it is time that Europe, Asia, South America, Canada and the rest of the “ruled classes” stop trying to reverse that accomplishment. Even as that war began we had loyalists and since then they have been trying to recapture our country. I am afraid and sad to admit that I think they are gaining…

 

[piratediver]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Here is a nice alternative to the UNESCO B.S., hope we see more of it!


Deep sea gold rush could bankroll Bermuda
Untold wealth under the waves, says former Premier after landmark find



Divers uncovered corked wine bottles from the famous Civil War era wreck the Mary Celestia earlier this year. Far greater wealth could be found in Bermuda’s territorial waters by using sophisticated new technology to locate undiscovered wrecks and mineral deposits, says former Premier Dr David Saul. *Bermuda Sun file photo


WEDNESDAY, SEPTEMBER 28: Billions of dollars in gold and other precious metals lying beneath the ocean could fund the island’s economy for years to come, according to former Premier Dr David Saul.

Speaking after his international exploration company discovered 200-tonnes of silver on a World War II shipwreck off the coast of Ireland, Dr Saul said the deep-ocean off Bermuda harboured similar treasures.

He believes there are undiscovered shipwrecks thousands of feet below the surface that could be found using the same technology his firm Odyssey Marine — used to locate the SS Gairsoppa.

But he said shipwrecks formed just a fraction of the wealth waiting to be discovered in Bermuda’s territorial waters.

“The future wealth and prosperity of Bermuda is probably going to be under water. The real treasure won’t be defined in Spanish doubloons but in precious metal deposits.”

Odyssey Marine, of which Dr Saul is a co-founder, made world headlines this week for the $150million-haul of silver coins discovered on a cargo ship, that was sunk by a German U-boat 300 miles off the Irish coast in 1941.

Dr Saul, who also made hundreds of dives with pioneer of Bermuda wreck hunting Teddy Tucker in the 1960s, believes a new-era of underwater “prospecting” could generate enormous wealth for the island.

“There is incredible potential. Shipwrecks would be just a speck of what could be found. Copper, gold, zinc and manganese nodules are all incredibly valuable. You’re talking about 1,500 miles of ocean in Bermuda’s Exclusive Economic Zone. There has to be things down there.”

In the early days of ocean-exploration in Bermuda the favoured method was to drag two SCUBA divers, hanging on to a tow-rope, behind a boat for hours as they scoured the ocean-floor in search of relics from drowned ships.

Those rudimentary methods deployed to find shallow-water wrecks, most in no more than 60ft of water, have long been surpassed.

Dr Saul’s firm uses sophisticated equipment, including magnetometers and sonar side-scanners, to scour the ocean looking for wrecks as deep as 20,000ft — way beyond the limits of SCUBA.

Even more hi-tech equipment is then used to excavate the wreck.

Bermuda firm Ocean Projects Limited was granted a contract to explore within Bermuda’s 200-mile Exclusive Economic Zone in 2007. It is not clear how far they have progressed with the project and the firm’s founder Nick Hutchings was unavailable for comment yesterday.

But Dr Saul believes the potential is enormous.

“If this company is able to find a fraction of what I think is out there then this could be our third economic pillar.”

Dr Saul said countries like Vanuatu and Papua New Guinea were already leasing out large tracts of ocean-bottom within their economic zone to recover precious minerals and metals.

And he said Bermuda had prospered once before from finds under the ocean.

“Teddy Tucker was initially hired by the Government of Bermuda to go and pick up non-ferrous metals, such as bronze boat propellers, from fairly recent shipwrecks.

“The older shipwrecks and the treasure he discovered were adjuncts to that search for metal he was bringing up to be sold as scrap.

“For a number of years that was a bigger generator of foreign-currency for Bermuda than anything else, including tourism.”




Pirate Diver

 

[Alexandre]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

VOC, I am still an archaeologist. I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting. And I am engaging private associations in my archaeological projects.

 

[Red_desert]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

As long, as all they do is talk...I'd hate to see salvaging rights taken away on an International level.

 

[VOC]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

"I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting"

I cannot wait, what will be the topic of your lecture then ?

It will be very interesting to see what other “Ex Sperts” they get to talk.

I take it you are all paying your own way, and not wasting more tax payers money

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

VOC, I am still an archaeologist. I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting. And I am engaging private associations in my archaeological projects.

Will you be advocating private sector salvage in your speech?

 

[Alexandre]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Yes, VOC, I will be paying my way in, just as I am paying to be right now in Croatia, at IKUWA4.

I will delivering two presentations:

"The impact and extent of looting and commercial interventions - the Portuguese experience and the planned Portuguese / Spanish collaboration on the Nuestra Señora del Rosario, Alexandre Monteiro, Instituto de Arqueologia e Paleociências of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal and Veronica Walker Vadillo, Oxford's School of Archaeology, Spain/UK"

"Coastal developments and waterfront constructions: city, dyke, dam and marina building", Alexandre Monteiro, Instituto de Arqueologia e Paleociências of the Universidade Nova de Lisboa, Portugal

"I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting"

I cannot wait, what will be the topic of your lecture then ?

It will be very interesting to see what other “Ex Sperts” they get to talk.

I take it you are all paying your own way, and not wasting more tax payers money

 

[Alexandre]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

VOC, I am still an archaeologist. I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting. And I am engaging private associations in my archaeological projects.

Will you be advocating private sector salvage in your speech?

Salvage or archaeology? I hold no beef with the salvage that Odyssey intends to do on that WWII wreck.

If a private entity - like INA - does archaeology on a wreck according to best practices and does not sell the artifacts, I have no beef with that, either.

Anything else, I am against. As I am against archaeologists digging and not publishing their finds.

 

[Salvor6]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Very good Alexandre. I admire you and have been following your career since you attended Texas A&M. I hope one day to work with you on a shipwreck project. What do you think about all the Portugese shipwrecks that are being looted in Mozambique? Would it not be in the best interest for commercial salvors to rescue the remaining cultural patrimony before the local fishermen take everything? What do you thyink about the work of Arqenauticas?

 

[ScubaFinder]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Alexandre, I too have a certain amount of respect for you, and have never had a problem with most of what you post. You studied and abide by the rules of the archeaologists, but you also dwell in the lair of the evil salvors, I like that. Not all of us are evil, most of us are very much like you and your associates. Both groups have the drive, manpower, and equipment to go do the archaeology and recover and preserve the artifacts. Despite what your group thiinks, many of us salvors are equipped and educated enough to do that very well...just as well as those of you with diplomas hanging on your walls. Both groups also lack the funding to get much done....meanwhile, the wrecks (and cultural heritage that can be gained from them) sit wasting away on the bottom of the ocean.

If you want to impress me, figure out a way that we can combine our resources and get some actual work done towards saving the shipwrecks we all love so much. I and many of my colleagues can see middle ground, and we are willing to meet there. The same cannot be said for many of your clan. That is where the deficiency lies if you ask me. If you find 100,000 identical coins on a shipwreck, and you could sell 50,0000 of them for enough $$ to finance 5 more shipwreck expeditions, then you have made forward progress. In my opinion you have done it without loosing any cultural VALUE...maybe you lost a few redundant artifacts, but you didn't loose any cultural value. What is the problem with that if all other archaeological principles are followed?

Jason

 

[Darren in NC]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

maybe you lost a few redundant artifacts, but you didn't loose any cultural value. What is the problem with that if all other archaeological principles are followed?

It's not the above procedure that is problematic. The key problem is being labeled traitor by the few fundamentalist elite. I have spoken with a number of archaeologists who have privately told me they have no problem with the above protocol. But they can't make this known publicly or without risking their jobs. Sad to say, but most of us like to eat and are willing to make concessions for our family's welfare. Alexandre is no different. Who can blame them/him? But that doesn't stop the system from being broken.

Saving cultural heritage or jealous that someone has what they cannot have? Propaganda comes in many forms. The public falls for it hook, line and sinker.

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

VOC, I am still an archaeologist. I will speaking at that UNESCO meeting. And I am engaging private associations in my archaeological projects.

Will you be advocating private sector salvage in your speech?

Salvage or archaeology? I hold no beef with the salvage that Odyssey intends to do on that WWII wreck.

If a private entity - like INA - does archaeology on a wreck according to best practices and does not sell the artifacts, I have no beef with that, either.

Anything else, I am against. As I am against archaeologists digging and not publishing their finds.

To clarify I mean Salvage and I use it as the same as archaeology. You see it is with preconceived notions that you so divide them.

sal·vage   /ˈsælvɪdʒ/ Show Spelled [sal-vij] Show IPA noun, verb, -vaged, -vag·ing.
noun
1. the act of saving a ship or its cargo from perils of the seas.
2. the property so saved.
3. compensation given to those who voluntarily save a ship or its cargo.
4. the act of saving anything from fire, danger, etc.
5. the property saved from danger.

Where is the evil in that? Salvage is a good thing buy definition. saving, saved tis good, no?

ar·chae·ol·o·gy   /ˌɑrkiˈɒlədʒi/ Show Spelled[ahr-kee-ol-uh-jee] Show IPA
noun
1. the scientific study of historic or prehistoric peoples and their cultures by analysis of their artifacts, inscriptions, monuments, and other such remains, especially those that have been excavated. 2. Rare . ancient history; the study of antiquity.


ex·ca·vate   /ˈɛkskəˌveɪt/ Show Spelled[eks-kuh-veyt] Show IPA
verb (used with object), -vat·ed, -vat·ing.
1. to make hollow by removing the inner part; make a hole or cavity in; form into a hollow, as by digging: The ground was excavated for a foundation.
2. to make (a hole, tunnel, etc.) by removing material.
3. to dig or scoop out (earth, sand, etc.).
4. to expose or lay bare by or as if by digging; unearth: to excavate an ancient city.

So as I use the term salvage is just a form of excavation.

"If a private entity - like INA - does archaeology on a wreck according to best practices and does not sell the artifacts"

You do realize that archaeologists, museums and institutions of formal learning sell and trade artifacts don't you?

Which ties me into Jason's post....

As I have previously posted...

The 2011 Florida Statutes

Title XVIII
PUBLIC LANDS AND PROPERTY Chapter 267
HISTORICAL RESOURCES View Entire Chapter

(4) For the purpose of the exchange, ****sale****(emphasis mine), or other transfer of objects of historical or archaeological value, the division is exempt from chapter 273.
(5) All moneys received from the sale of an object which has historical or archaeological value pursuant to subsection (3) shall be deposited in the Historical Resources Operating Trust Fund and shall be used exclusively for the acquisition of additional historical and archaeological objects or the preservation and maintenance of any such objects in the custody of the division.

Pot meet kettle...

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

http://www.oceancommission.gov/publicomment/floridacomments/abt_comment.pdf

Some highlights...

To: Ocean Policy Commission
Date: February 13, 2002
From: Taffi Fisher Abt, President
Mel Fisher Center, Inc.
RE: “Oceans Act of 2000”

"It is of great importance that the general public be given the opportunity to experience, consciously and intelligently, the efforts and the results of scientific research. It is not sufficient that each result be taken up, elaborated, and applied by a few specialist in the field. Restricting the body of knowledge to a small group deadens the philosophical spirit of a people and leads to spiritual poverty." ………… Albert Einstein

Economically speaking, there is a domino effect that touches many industries not usually associated with salvage such as cultural tourism (including airlines, hotels, museums, rental car agencies, advertising, etc.) and the literary and film production fields and in turn many smaller industries are also affected. In the last decade, in the Sebastian, Florida area alone, my company has engaged employment for at least 1,500 people in fieldwork, systematically excavating the wrecks more than 8,000 days, recovering in excess of 38,500 artifacts with a monetary value in excess of $12,000,000 .00. From these artifacts, we donated more than 1,500 (most of the best) to the "People of the State of Florida" for their museums and collections valued in excess of $2,500,000. Tallahassee has a wonderful exhibit and the State sends exhibits all over the nation. We also have a traveling exhibition. Tens of thousands of school children and youth groups attend our exhibitions. We have also had hundreds documentaries, books, periodical articles, and even school texts written with this venture as their main subject. This in turn has generated substantial income to the industries of writers, news crews, TV and movie production companies, advertising agencies, moving companies, exhibit designers, etc. Copies of these books and videos such as Discovery Channel, National Geographic, A&E, etc. then get sold in bookstores, video stores, spreading not only economic gain but also knowledge and education of the general public.

In the last 8 years, we have enjoyed an attendance in excess of 105,000 visitors to our Sebastian museum alone (which showed demographically as an unsuccessful area for tourism) since opening in Dec. of 1992. More than $500,000.00 in attendance was generated back into commerce for expenses, employing another 80 people. Our museum/gift store has generated sales in excess of $2,600,000 over the last decade, and again, that money went back into the general mainstream of commerce. On this expedition alone in the past 8 years, our corporation has spent more than $2,600,000.00 in expenses at dive shops, marinas, fuel docks and grocery stores, welders, diesel engine mechanics, etc….again money that went back into the general mainstream of commerce.

Remember, ALL of the above facts are solely related to eleven shipwrecks in one small 60 square mile patch of earth



"The finding of a great treasure from the days of the Spanish Main is not the cherished dream of only the United States and Florida citizens; countless peoples from other lands have shared such thoughts. It would amaze and surprise most citizens of this country, when their dream, at the greatest of costs, was realized, the agents of respective governments would, on the most flimsy grounds, lay claim to the treasure."
---Judge William O.Mehrtens
U.S. District Court of the Southern District of Florida
August 21, 1978 Ruling Against the State of Florida

 

[FISHEYE]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

UNESCO just needs to be shut down.Im sure i can find some dirt on who or what runs it.Misappropriated funds,stealing treasure,etc.The list could be endless.Then contact the countries that signed up with them tell them all the bad stuff they are into.

 

[VOC]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

Alaxandre, I am glad to see you are self-funding. I have no animosity towards you and respect anyone actually doing practical archaeology underwater.

My main problem is the way bureaucrats have effectively put a stop to a large proportion of underwater archaeology by adopting the flawed UNESCO approach of in-situ preservation.

An interesting article and comments can be read on the blog: http://wreckwatch.wordpress.com/ "The Sunken Past: Shipwrecks Lost in Translation"

The biggest legacy we can leave our descendants on this planet is knowledge of our past, leaving them thousands of unexcavated wrecks that they have to monitor and protect is socially irresponsible and immensely selfish. (it is like leaving them governmental debt or environmental problems, it is not at all like leaving them oil or minerals for their future needs)

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

So which of these coins is historically important?

 

[FISHEYE]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

The quarter cause when the economy crashes it will make history as you wont be able to buy anything with it.The other 2 coins are pure silver can be melted down and traded for goods.

 

[Au_Dreamers]

Re: UNESCO's meeting on factors impacting underwater cultural heritage

The quarter cause when the economy crashes it will make history as you wont be able to buy anything with it.The other 2 coins are pure silver can be melted down and traded for goods.

Rofl...