That one pottery expert told me I was cleaning artifacts wrong

I was scrubbing some pottery shards from a site near Santa Fe with a stiff brush, you know, thinking I was being thorough. A visiting archaeologist from UNM saw me and said 'stop, you're stripping the residue data.' She showed me to use just a soft toothbrush and distilled water with no soap (and only if absolutely necessary). Now I leave most dirt on until the lab analysis, it's wild how much more information stays intact. Has anyone else gotten handed a totally different method mid-dig?

2 comments

2 Comments

angela_wilson781mo ago

Huh, that reminds me of the time I was helping a buddy clean up his garage find and used a wire brush on an old tin sign. A collector walked by and just about had a heart attack. He said I was basically sandblasting the paint off.

gavinwood1mo ago

Used to think scrubbing hard was best, but @angela_wilson78 that wire brush story got me rethinking everything.

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