The Archaeology of Britain: An introduction from ... - waughfamily.ca

• 304 • Timothy Darvill
methodologies with which to investigate the past. Certainly that has been the experience of the
last few decades. The more fundamental interests related to this value set are perceptual rather
than functional:
• Stability: adherence to option values as the justification of action inhibits change and enhances
the perception of stability, timelessness and tradition. Recreation and restoration of times
past is an important dimension. Elements of the past become celebrated for what they might
be rather than what they are.
• Mystery and enigma: not knowing about the past may be as important as knowing about it.
The attraction of places such as Stonehenge is probably the fact that relatively little is known
about their use and social context.
Existence value
The third value system relates simply to the existence of the resource. The temporal context is
the present, although in this case the spatial context is not necessarily very clearly defined. Central
to the realization of these values is the recognition of feelings of well-being, contentment and
satisfaction: the so-called ‘feelgood’ factor. These feelings are triggered in people who may never
expect to use or see the resource itself, simply by knowing it exists. Thus at one end of the value
gradient is the elation of knowing that all is well because everything is safe, that viability and
diversity are being maintained, and that existence is assured. At the other end is despondency
because the resource is under great threat, viability and integrity are marginal, diversity is low, and
continued existence endangered. Two interests stand out for special attention:
• Cultural identity: there is an active reflection of feelings of belonging in the use of references
to ancient monuments in place-names and the periodic festivals and celebrations on
anniversaries and ‘special’ occasions.
• Resistance to change: every generation believes that the world is changing uncontrollably and
at a more rapid pace than ever before. Maybe this is true. But a predominant theme of protests
against change is the galvanizing of interest in some previously almost unnoticed structure or
institution. Such things are not recognized until they are threatened, but the force of the
arguments for their retention is a reminder of the latent strength of existence value.
Running through so many of these ideas is that values are supported by a constructive tension
between different systems in the minds of individuals. This carries through into the demands
placed upon archaeological materials. John Barrett has argued that the proper role for archaeologists
is the construction of histories (1995), and in many ways this is the most widely recognized and
obvious element of archaeological work, the things that archaeologists find are the props and
scenery for such stories. But is archaeology just a form of history? What archaeologists make
may be a kind of history, but what they actually see through their excavations, surveys and technical
studies is something else. In his Inaugural Lecture as Professor of European Archaeology in the
Institute of Archaeology, London University in 1946, Gordon Childe argued that archaeology
was a social science, in effect the recording of the longest-lived non-repeatable survey of social
change ever. Certainly what archaeologists record is a series of glimpses into the behaviours and
actions of individuals and groups at different times in the past. Such differences in what
archaeologists do impact on how they do it.
THE CONCEPT OF ‘MANAGEMENT’ IN ARCHAEOLOGY
The fact that archaeological remains are recognized and given value by society means that choices
have to be made about what to do with ancient sites, structures and finds. The contemporary