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lexicality • yesterday at 10:07 PM • 3 replies • view on HN

I'm slightly surprised they're just holding these artefacts with bare hands. I thought that was generally a no-no for dealing with objects untouched for thousands of years


Replies

AlotOfReading • yesterday at 11:11 PM

Conservationists and archivists (sometimes) use gloves on cleaned samples, but not archaeologists. An archaeologist wearing gloves is almost certainly just cold.

There's no real reason to immediately protect the find from light handling when it's discovered. It's a dirty object that's still coated in whatever was floating around the environment for those thousands of years. The rock will be fine and probably handled multiple times before it gets back to an archive.

I think the only times I've worn gloves in the field were for a very rusty metal dagger and some especially sensitive human remains.

dieselgate • yesterday at 10:56 PM

Me too but presumably they’re not really that unique as there are hundreds? Or maybe the stone/hard artifacts are handled different than organic/soft.

thenthenthen • today at 1:15 AM

Thats one pretty arrowhead