Since 1998, a multi-national archaeological project has been investigating the Iron Age hill-top settlement of Monte Polizzo, in Western Sicily. Part of the team is Dr Cornelius Holtorf of the University of Cambridge's Department of Archaeology. His interest is, however, not so much the ancient settlement itself, as the way in which the modern excavations on the site are being conducted.
Since 1998, a multi-national archaeological project has been investigating the Iron Age hill-top settlement of Monte Polizzo, in Western Sicily. Part of the team is Dr Cornelius Holtorf of the University of Cambridge's Department of Archaeology. His interest is, however, not so much the ancient settlement itself, as the way in which the modern excavations on the site are being conducted.
Since 1998, a multi-national archaeological project has been investigating the Iron Age hill-top settlement of Monte Polizzo, in Western Sicily. Part of the team is Dr Cornelius Holtorf of the University of Cambridge's Department of Archaeology. His interest is, however, not so much the ancient settlement itself, as the way in which the modern excavations on the site are being conducted.
Dr Holtorf describes his unusual role in the project as a "participant observer". Rather than concentrating on finding and analysing particular features or artefacts himself, he is attempting to take a step back from the specifics of this particular project in order to gain a better understanding of the actual processes that underlie archaeological investigations.
Says Dr Holtorf: "When the reports are written about this investigation, I want to ensure that our own project is part of the overall story to tell about the occupation of this site. After all, we are only the last phase in a long history of human presence on this mountain."
This summer, Dr Holtorf followed the life of a pot sherd - a fragment of ancient pottery - from the moment of its first discovery on the site, through the various stages of cleaning, identification and classification in the project's "finds" laboratory, to its final deposition in the local museum.
He points out that the sherd's transition from simply "a found object" to "a possibly two-and-a-half millennia-old fragment of a large storage vessel (pithos)" was not caused only by analysing properties inherent in the sherd itself. It was the result of the progression of the sherd through a number of clearly defined routine processes, such as collecting artefacts on-site, classifying them and storing them.
Because they are considered routine, these processes are not always documented or thought about as carefully as they should be. One aim of Dr Holtorf's work is to help ensure that they are.
Further information:
The Monte Polizzo project's home page
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