Norman Kennedy Labels the Critics

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Personal coach Norman Kennedy has been mentioned here before, he seems to have a vendetta against people that talk about artefact hunting frankly and openly, now he is threatening to have me deported. Like that's going to happen, in Poland we lock people up for metal detecting and stealing archaeological artefacts, seriously. For more on Mr Kennedy (or is that "Bush"?) see an earlier post here. Now he writes:

As usual Paul Barford tells lies, says he lives in Poland and makes comments of no truth about Metal Detecting
in the UK.
Question should be asked" why do you live in Poland?
Why do you tell constant lies about metal detecting in the UK.
Why do you down talk about the good people of the UK who go metal detecting.
Why do you cause so much trouble.
I am going to ask the polish goverment if you are wanted.....you are wanted in the UK for liable.

If what Paul Barford is saying about artefact hunting , the artefact trade and a whole range of issues surrounding portable antiquities false then it is perfectly simple for the metal detectorists to demonstrate that. It is called debate. There should be open public debate about the way the archaeological heritage is being treated as a resource. I see my blog (open and public) as one element of that debate. Metal detectorists shut their words between each other away on forums which the public are blocked from seeing, and where they write anonymously using pseudonyms. That does not facilitate either debate with them, nor dialogue.

The only time they address the comments made by preservationists, is to call them "lies". But without stating the facts which they see as showing they are lies. They expect people to accept that what they say is true and what preservationists say is necessarily false. I say people should be able to look, consider both sides of the argument and the way they are put, and make their own minds up.

Unidroit-L has Another Commentator?

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Over on the Unidroit-L microforum for dealers in and collectors of dugup ancient artefacts (especially round ones with pictures on) the sole content these days has been a series of postings by its owner - coin dealer Dave Welsh, to which he appends his own "comments". Most of the other members of the forum apparently sleep through Welsh's monologuous renderings of why the entire preservation-orientated archaeological and museum world is evil. So it is a pretty quiet forum

There was the inevitable post about former CPAC member Korver's letter of resignation to President Obama leaked to the coiney press, and to my surprise I find that instead of Welsh's lengthy "comments" at the bottom, there is a whole post cut-and-pasted (without the embedded hyperlinks) from my 'Portable Antiquities Collecting and Heritage Issues' blog labelled "Commentary by Paul Barford in his Blog" (sic - should have read "one of his blogs").

Surely it would have been enough to insert a link?

Anyhow, let us see how many of his members are bothering to read to the bottom of Welsh's posts and feel constrained after reading my post taken from another context and provocatively inserted into Welsh's monologuous crassfest to join in the debate on whether resource preservation is about helping US commerce to profit from illegally exported antiquities...

I am sure there are many on that discussion list who think precisely in the same way as Korver .

Ffol Ebryll Farm in Wales - A "Chance not to Miss"

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A lot of English (only) metal detectorists are gearing up to descend on a farm, significantly called Ffol Ebryll Farm, in Wales this weekend as one of their members reports finding "6 roman dinari (sic), 12 bronze and 2 fibulas" there. He says:

Still shaking with excitement. Hapi days! Cheesy Cheesy Cheesy Cheesy Shocked. The frustrating thing is that the field I found them in is being dug up making way for 14 new houses. Would you believe it, the farmer tells me apparently they are starting on Saturday. Don’t know if I should tell FLO but one thing is for sure I’m going back there later today. If anyone is interested to come they are welcome as today is the only day available before the wagons come in.

Among all those eager to get down there looting away (some MD-ing thickoes still apparently so, despite the fact that several people have pointed out what Ffol Ebryll means) not a single one of them suggested alerting the FLO to the reported imminent destruction of a newly-discovered site. Such is the greed of the artefact hunter, no matter that a potentially significant 'productive' site is (reportedly) going to be destroyed unrecorded, any opportunity to get their hands on some collectable goodies is fair game for them. The effects of PAS outreach here to instil best practice are approximately - zero.

PS for those who "don't do Welsh", Ffol is a number and Ebril in the name of a month - sounds like....)