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To: rdl6989
Getting excited about digging up a cesspit? These archaeologists need to find a hobby.
3 posted on 04/06/2010 8:11:19 PM PDT by highlander_UW (Remember in November...vote the bums out)
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To: highlander_UW
Well, actually it's a lot of fun and one of the best ways to reconstruct everyday life.

Think about it. The dump is where people don't tidy things up and where almost everything winds up. Roman cesspits in Bath and along the Wall gave us actual leather shoes, wooden artifacts and other neat stuff.

It's an anaerobic environment and preserves stuff wonderfully. And after 500 years or so it's not stinky either. Just muddy.

5 posted on 04/06/2010 8:18:45 PM PDT by AnAmericanMother (Ministrix of ye Chasse, TTGC Ladies' Auxiliary (recess appointment)T)
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To: highlander_UW

It could be important. Maybe the Bard was sitting there one day and thinking “now this character who gets the head of an ass in this Midsummer Night’s Dream play—what should I name him?”


13 posted on 04/06/2010 8:57:56 PM PDT by Our man in washington
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To: highlander_UW

No, this is a great way to study the material culture of the past! My ancestors’ cesspit was excavated in rural Virginia and it revealed a goldmine of information about the way they lived. I drove out to see the dig a few times. It was fascinating to see the bits of old pipes, shoe buckles, buttons, combs, etc. they used. The best part: there were shards of dishes left there that were identified as being Wedgwood, and because Wedgwood hasn’t changed in the past 200 years I was able to go out and buy dishes in the same pattern my ancestors used.


15 posted on 04/06/2010 9:16:01 PM PDT by ottbmare (I could agree wth you, but then we'd both be wrong.)
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