Anti-Barford Again

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I feel discriminated against. At least when the Americans wanted to do a smear campaign against the elusive figurehead of Wikileaks, it appears he got a couple of free screws with two ugly slutty sex-on-first-date girls (one a "Christian") out of it. All I get is a decidedly unsexy balding obese coin dealing Jesuit-trained engineer from California attempting to misrepresent my professional biography in a post called " [Unidroit-L] Anti-Barford Blog [was RE: [Moneta-L] Arrests of 40 Spanish Coin & Antiquity dealers]" which has been cross-posted to an interesting selection of people: Tim Haines' Yahoo Ancientartifacts group, 'Moneta-L' (of course), Yahoo's CoinForgeryDiscussionList (eh?), dug-up scrap metal coin collector Scott Uhrick, and antiquity dealer 'Edgar Owen' . The text is extraordinary:

From what is reported in this blog, it seems that Mr. Barford left university with a “bac” after being enrolled in a graduate program that would normally lead to a doctorate. He has never publicly explained how that happened, nor has he published a CV detailing his education and subsequent contributions to archaeology.

Mr. Barford next was employed (rather briefly) in junior positions in archaeology in the UK before relocating to Poland in 1987, where he apparently has lived ever since. He was employed there in a junior academic position (assistant lecturer) and as an inspector of monuments. So far as I know, the above is all that is publicly recorded regarding his work as an archaeologist. If anyone can add to this, or correct any errors, I would be grateful for the information. Mr. Barford has a number of professional publications to his credit, including one book [The Early Slavs] with another in the process of publication.

To the best of my knowledge he is not presently employed in any sort of archaeological work, nor has he been so employed for a long time, although he did make a trip to Egypt not long ago where he had a chance to do some field work (it wasn’t clear whether this was as a volunteer). I have heard that he presently supports himself as a translator.

If the above is a fair appraisal of Mr. Barford’s actual professional credentials, one might question whether such a foundation is really in proportion to the critical edifice he has built upon it. Mr. Barford has been very free with criticism directed at those whom he sneeringly terms “coineys,” especially “coineys” who are also dealers.

In none of his remarks has he said anything about the professional qualifications of those whom he so freely criticizes. I think it’s fair to observe that many of his “targets” have resumes far more impressive than his own, and that Mr. Barford appears to know (or care) very little about numismatics.

Not a sex scandal in sight. Damn! I am not sure what a "bac" is, but I don't think I've got one - but if somebody explains maybe I have without knowing it...

Is it my imagination or has Mr Welsh 'accidentally' forgotten a couple of degrees that Candy mentioned, and it seems he's got the sequence of "events" wrong. Supposedly I was "employed (rather briefly) in junior positions in archaeology in the UK". He also does not know when I "relocated". Neither is the position of "Inspector of monuments" in the Ministry of Culture a particularly "junior" position. Mr. Welsh claims to know my current archaeological employment history. Sadly he obviously knows less about all this than he thinks.

It seems to me that the internet-scholars of the Candy-Tompa-Welsh ilk are not particularly adept at using the resources available, Google Scholar gives more than just a handful of items published by me and from what I can see, that's about one third of what it says on my CV (which does not list translations).

Frankly I do not think explaining how whatever-it-is "happened" or publishing a full CV is one of the qualifications for being a blogger (even an "archaeoblogger").

So far as I know, the above is all that is publicly recorded regarding his work as an archaeologist. If anyone can add to this, or correct any errors,
I would be grateful for the information.

You know, archaeology is a pretty small world, I think various people all over the place have come across me, worked with me, quarrelled with me about methodology in a conference beer bar, or got really angered off by things I write and say - not just about metal detectorists etc. (Got a long screed out of the blue this morning about a chapter in a multi-authored publication, which is odd because its still in press). Whether or not these people really want to make contact with dirt-digging coiney people like Mr Welsh of course is a different matter. What's in it for them?

If the above is a fair appraisal of Mr. Barford’s actual professional
credentials, one might question whether such a foundation is really in
proportion to the critical edifice he has built upon it.

One might I suppose. If it were a FAIR appraisal and one was interested in personal issues.

Frankly I think the words of the coin dealers speak for themselves about what lies behind them, and I imagine mine do too. Mr Welsh's various writings about how ancient coins are found have as much weight whether or not we have ever seen a recent full length photo of him cuddling his rabbits on the internet, or a date-marked photo of him as a young man getting his engineering degree certificate from the Jesuit University of wherever-it-was. What he says about sites and hoards and all the rest is just as much nonsense for the reasons I have set out on my main blog, points he has never actually answered. No amount of look-at-me self advertising will change that.

I do not think I build any "edifice" on any imagined "personal authority" (neither does Wikileaks, whether or not Julian Assange is in jail or not does not change the contents of the leaked documents themselves one iota). I base my comments on the antiquities market on observing and interpreting what is going on, and invite every one of my readers to do the same. You do not need an archaeology degree to see that what is happening out there is highly questionable.

I'd say lets start asking the questions of the no-questions-asked collectors and dealers and ignore the slings and arrows and false arguments they spew out to stop those questions being asked. Let us see them actually address the issues raised instead of saying that this or that member of Joe Public is not qualified to be asking these questions. These are clearly questions that ALL the stakeholders in the past should be asking.