Home : Book details : Book description

Description of  Sins of the Shovel: Looting, Murder, and the Evolution of American Archaeology

0226822389 pdf An incisive history of early American archaeologyfrom reckless looting to professional scienceand the fields unfinished efforts to make amends today, told "with passion, indignation, and a dash of suspense" (New York Times). American archaeology was forever scarred by an 1893 business proposition between cowboy-turned-excavator Richard Wetherill and socialites-turned-antiquarians Fred and Talbot Hyde. Wetherill had stumbled upon Mesa Verdes spectacular cliff dwellings and started selling artifacts, but with the Hydes money behind him, welltheres no telling what they might discover. Thus begins the Hyde Exploring Expedition, a nine-year venture into Utahs Grand Gulch and New Mexicos Chaco Canyon thatcoupled with other less-restrained lootersso devastates Indigenous cultural sites across the American Southwest that Congress passes first-of-their-kind regulations to stop the carnage. As the money dries up, tensions rise, and a once-profitable enterprise disintegrates, setting the stage for a tragic murder. Read more