00:00.20 archpodnet Welcome back to episode two seventy seven of the serm archeology podcast we're talking about looting and I thought of a couple examples that came right off the top my head because I I actually think about them frequently whenever I hears a topic like this and they're of course crm related so to bring this back to. You know the serum archeology podcast have we ever been on looted sites or or had to deal with looted sites and things like that. You know what in my experience a lot of times. No right? because you're going out into places where sure there may be previously recorded sites and sometimes you don't find anything. 00:19.00 Andrew Yeah. 00:36.30 archpodnet But the site was also recorded thirty years ago is there anything to find you know it was it looting or you know what was it? So um, so a lot of times. It's just hard to tell if you're on a looted site or not and you know and and then other times you're finding stuff fresh and so my couple of examples that'll get to over the course of this segment is finding a a new site that wasn't recorded. 00:37.99 Heather A. 00:41.47 Andrew Um. 00:55.61 archpodnet But was clearly looted right? and 1 of them was a historic site. It was kind of a historic a small I don't want to say town site more like a company town site. It was near a big mining complex and there was several buildings some of which were still standing so it was actually in pretty good shape and there was. 00:58.90 Andrew Um, yeah. 01:12.28 archpodnet Glass everywhere from from the glass windows so you can tell where those were and there was glass bottle fragments all over the place as well. But I'll tell you what not a whole bottle or a maker's marking site across this whole thing. There was probably tens of thousands of shards of glass and not a single maker's Mark could be found not a single whole bottle. 01:22.79 Andrew Yeah. 01:23.93 Heather Ah. 01:30.68 archpodnet Ah, a single other artifact I mean that just doesn't happen. Naturally somebody came in there and now those now they're on display cases in Virginia City for tours to buy right? So it's just ah, it's crazy. It's absolutely crazy. Um, and and it's so obvious too and. 01:32.85 Andrew Um, yeah, right? yeah. 01:34.79 Heather No yeah, um. 01:48.21 archpodnet You know this? This was a more significant site just because of the structures and and some of the other stuff that was on there. But if there were no structures and there were just platforms. You know like cut and fill or something like that platforms and then just glass everywhere I mean. That's not very significant unless we can tie it to a person or we can tie it to an event. But if it's just mining and you can't even really tell what it was other than that who cares we got a thousand of those right? So it's It's just not significant enough and that just means it's going to be destroyed and I don't think people realize that when they go take stuff off of those. 02:03.51 Heather Right. 02:04.45 Andrew Um, yep. 02:09.11 Andrew Yeah, yeah. 02:09.33 Heather By. 02:15.51 Andrew Um, right? yeah. 02:17.76 Heather I Don't think people realize they don't even think of it as looting I I think a lot of people don't even think of it that way they're just and you know who knows when when that and who knows when it was taken too and you know I had these conversations This is not about looting. But although. 02:22.67 archpodnet Oh no, yeah, it's garbage. Yeah. 02:30.69 Andrew Right? right. 02:37.48 Heather It's another form of looting unintentional it's intentional but unintentionally harmful right? People aren't trying to harm. They're not trying to do something wrong. They see something cool right? and and they they take it so you know a lot of times when we come across historic sites during um. 02:45.61 archpodnet Ah. 02:57.10 Heather You know construction excavation ah grading of soils and you know people come across it and they and numerous times having these conversations with property owners and construction crews trying to explain to them. Why you. Why it's important why we have to take a look at it to them. It's just trash why we have to really you know, assess whether or not it. It is indicative of something ah larger. And yeah, it's It's a hard sell. It's a hard sell and so a lot of times you know they see something cool. The construction guys just grab it and take it and. 03:25.72 archpodnet Ah, yeah. 03:31.13 Andrew I. 03:33.42 Heather I I think it's harmless I'm not saying it's I shouldn't say it's harm. It's harmless. It's not harmless but it is not intentionally harm. Um, harmful yeah and it's a lot. You know that's why we do weep training. It's why we do. You know these trainings ahead of time to educate construction personnel. 03:40.77 archpodnet Right. 03:52.90 Heather And make sure that they understand that that's you can't do that right. 03:56.79 Andrew Right? And I've worked on projects too where the um construction personnel were really knowledgeable about that stuff too and they would point out stuff to me. You know what? I mean and like you know and that was like totally cool. So it it runs the gamut you know in terms of people and. 03:57.43 archpodnet Ah. 04:05.23 Heather Oh definitely. Yep. 04:12.76 Heather Um, yep, right. 04:14.54 Andrew Like you're saying some people don't realize what they're doing other people are really really, um, conscientious. You know so you just have this like super broad Super broad swath in terms of how people ah treat this stuff. 04:23.47 Heather Yep yep. 04:27.42 archpodnet Yeah, for sure. Yeah, it goes along with ah prehistoric sites as well because there's there's definitely a few that I can think of and I don't know if we were just in an area that was I don't know well traveled by um, you know again, like you said Heather we don't know when these things were looted right. 04:42.77 Andrew Yeah. 04:44.83 archpodnet Ah, because that brings up another interesting point too. Let me let me talk about this site first because we were we were on this ah native american prehistoric site right? and we have no idea how old it was because there were no points. no points No preforms no fragments of points. No nothing right? but there was probably thousands of flakes. There was at least several hearths. 04:46.74 Heather Um, yes, like. 04:57.60 Andrew Yeah. 05:04.46 archpodnet Um, lots of them all over the place. There was um, you know grinding stone. There was all kinds of stuff. But oddly enough, no points and our first thought when when you know my my crew was on. There was just like oh you know this has been looted the damn ranchers. You know that those guys took all the things and I'm not going to say it wasn't them because you know. Could have been right because they're out there. They see that stuff and they've got a whole every rancher talks about their coffee can full of projectile points sitting on the you know the heart the the mantle but I'm also like you know if this was like a several thousand year old site or even a several hundred year old site I'll tell you what if I'm a native american and I come across that. 05:27.82 Andrew Yeah. 05:39.96 archpodnet And there's things that I don't have to make and then they're already there and they're good I mean unless there's some sort of like bad ancestor juju on those things then I'm probably going to use them right? and I don't know there might be there might be cultural problems with using that kind of stuff right? I don't know. But. 05:40.69 Heather A. 05:48.28 Andrew Um, yeah. 05:48.47 Heather Right? might. 05:57.16 Andrew But of course and and I mean the depth that the depth of time on so much of that stuff is so vast that it's like if you happen to find something that's at the time a thousand years old. You know you're going to pick it up and you're like this is a good piece of obsidian. 05:57.44 archpodnet I Just feel like I'd use it because I got to feed my family. Ah. 06:06.70 archpodnet Right. 06:12.34 Andrew Those are some of my favorite artifacts The ones that were obviously picked up and reused they were something you know from much earlier but they were refashioned like those are great. Yeah, of course people are people. No yeah and they don't are are they supposed to be like right. 06:18.78 Heather But and how would they know honestly that it's not like they had typologies and yeah. 06:21.11 archpodnet Um, yeah. 06:28.35 Andrew They're not going to be like oh wait wait wait. That's a clovis point we can't we got to leave that like no no, it's yeah. 06:30.86 Heather Yeah I mean yeah I definitely think that they they can identify. Obviously I mean they they they probably looked and and were curious just like we were and we are and and they looked at things and that would identify something as being different than what they had writers. But I don't but have that to understand the depth of time like you said for them to know. Oh yeah, this was so you know nine hundred years ago that yeah. 06:56.50 Andrew Um, no Chris and plus it's plus it's going to be most likely broken. 06:56.34 archpodnet Ah. 07:03.83 Andrew And also not sharp anymore. So they're like well I'll use this as raw material I'll sharpen it up and it'll be great. You know like I love those examples of rios. You know they're they're so human. 07:04.96 Heather Um, right? Yeah yeah I came across oh go ahead. 07:07.51 archpodnet Sure. 07:14.70 archpodnet Yeah, people ah just on that point people you know, talk about how there's so few clovis points you know in the in North America because there was you know fewer people down there. But yeah, they're probably just all retouched and turned into something else. So. 07:27.17 Andrew Yeah, of course yeah hell yeah yeah, and plus do you want to walk fifty miles to the obsidian source or do you want to like take this right here I mean come on. Yeah. 07:30.25 archpodnet You know because they've been around for 10000 years yeah right yeah exactly 07:36.77 Heather Right? Exactly exactly I I came across that this was I thought it was so cool I came across it was ah a prehistoric site and came across a looter's stash. 07:51.27 Andrew Yeah. 07:52.81 Heather Um, this person had obviously stashed some looters. You know some some ah tools so we wouldn't have because where we were is pretty high elevation. It was a bit of a track to get up there and so whoever it was had stashed some tools that they could you know not have to trek in and. 07:54.55 archpodnet Um. 08:01.40 archpodnet Yeah, yeah. 08:12.43 Heather We came across and it was clearly I mean this stuff was clearly over 100 years old so you have a prehistoric site and then you have a historic site of looting which I thought was super cool like I just that was fat. Yeah, it was fun and and so. 08:15.46 archpodnet Choose. 08:15.51 Andrew Oh My god. Yeah, yeah, it's pretty fascinating. 08:22.20 archpodnet Right? That's crazy. Yeah. 08:30.85 Heather Yeah, it just makes you look at things that ah completely differently. So we yeah but but we recorded both. You know the prehistoric and then the looting evidence of looting as a historic site. Yeah, it was fun. 08:32.86 Andrew Yeah, yeah. 08:35.10 archpodnet Ah, yeah, welcome. 08:41.94 archpodnet It is go ahead and. 08:42.68 Andrew Right? you know I ah ah sure yeah you know I do find um, having come across so many sites over my career that were looted or messed up you know and in whatever way it does add this negative cloud. You know to kind of what you're doing but I I will say 1 thing that it has pushed me towards especially as I've gotten older in this field is actually doing more excavation at the time at the site. You know if you if you had interviewed me like fifteen years ago 09:11.57 Heather You. 09:13.16 archpodnet Ah, yeah, if you would get. 09:16.97 Andrew Would have been much more conservative in terms of like excavation kind of leaving it for the future. You know this kind of thing but I've seen so many things messed up that I'm like you guys we need to get it now because there won't be a tomorrow. 09:30.37 archpodnet Yeah. 09:31.53 Andrew You know so let's get this in a scientific measured manner instead of just letting it just get destroyed by looting. 09:37.62 archpodnet Yeah, that's so crazy too. Heather I was thinking about your example like when you know it's it's interesting like when does something become part of the archeological record I mean aside from like 50 years this kind of thing. But if if something has. 09:47.80 Heather And. 09:48.18 Andrew Yeah, yeah. 09:54.16 archpodnet You know had a significant impact on something that is one of the criteria for becoming part of you know, Ah, the historical record is you've had a significant impact on something right? So if your vandalism or your looting has well that becomes unfortunately part of the archeological record and one of the ah other good examples I can think of is. 10:08.67 Andrew Um, yeah. 10:12.39 archpodnet Ah, little petrick of canyon in rich crest on the China Lake Naval Weapons Center and nobody's been able to get on that base since the mid 40 s without you know a military escort. So it's been highly protected since then but before that it was all ranchers and. 10:17.85 Andrew Um. 10:29.78 archpodnet And other people and as soon as they locked off the base and and locked off this whole land. Well you know the the military obviously knew about that site because you go up there and there's ah, there's an equals mc squared etched into the rocks along with the petrolyphs thousands and thousands of panels by the way and. There's an equals mc squared's that's the one that really sticks out in my head. There's other clearly modern things you know from like the last century but these things are also probably from like the 50 s or sixty s when you know or even the 40 s for that matter when you know they just there was there was very little protection from the base of that site now there's. 10:51.63 Heather Okay. 11:07.19 archpodnet Heavy protection from the base on that site like you literally can't go up there without like the base archeologist and escort you know and and everybody knowing that you're there. So and it's one of the few places they won't just indiscriminately bomb. So you know that's good. 11:15.89 Andrew You know, right? You know Chris I'm tired of your lies because that's obviously proof of aliens they wrote equals MCSquared ten thousand years ago ah I mean and you just you know, stop keeping that from the general public is what I'm trying to say. 11:26.88 Heather Cheese. 11:28.37 archpodnet Ah, it's clearly true. So not only did they did they give us you know the formula for the speed of light but they also gave us our alphabet and number system. So ten thousand years ago that's pretty impressive. Ah. 11:35.73 Andrew Yeah. Um, yeah exact I Just it's It's been hard for all of us to keep this from the general public for so long. 11:50.84 Heather You heard it here. Folks see our M podcast. 11:51.70 archpodnet Ah, right right? All right. 11:53.69 Andrew I Did It's the the Pseudo Archeology podcast man it bleeds in you know. 11:56.88 archpodnet All right? Well while while we work on our cover story and more lies. Let's take a break and come back on the other side back in a minute. 12:03.16 Andrew Ah, it's good.