Knocked over a 2,000 year old pot during a dig last spring

I was working a site near Santa Fe, just a small volunteer dig with the local university. We were clearing a storage pit from a Puebloan settlement, and I leaned over too far to grab my trowel. My elbow hit this big clay pot that was half buried in the wall, and it cracked right down the middle. The supervisor just stared at me for like 10 seconds, then told me to step back and log it as accidental damage. I felt awful, but they pieced it back together in the lab and said it was still usable for study. Turns out they had already photographed and 3D scanned it, so the data was saved. Has anyone else had a close call like that on a site where you thought you ruined everything?

2 comments

2 Comments

daniel85717d ago

Man that's rough, I feel for you. Accidents happen on digs, especially when you're just a volunteer trying to help out. Good thing they had the scans and photos done already, that probably saved the whole project from being a total loss. I've seen a couple close calls where someone tripped over a grid string or knocked a bucket into a test pit, but nothing as big as a pot that old. Your mileage may vary of course, but I bet in a year or two you'll look back and it'll just be a funny story about that time you made the supervisor's jaw drop.

caseym4817d ago

Pretty much sums up how life goes, one little slip and everything changes.