From Spadework, by Sir Leonard Wooley, excavator of Carchemesh and Ur:
"...what I want to do is to show how very alive the science of archaeology is. As in all science there is in it a vast amount of laborious detail which is of interest only to the worker; there are any number of false trails that have to be followed and dropped when they are proved false, conclusions that at first seem absolute are later found to be but partially true; the dull routine, the mistakes and the disappointments are part of the day's work.... Spreading mortar and laying on it brick after brick would be a dull job if it were an end in itself, but it is the essential process of building, and it results in what may be a great work of art; so out of our broken pots and pans we hope to build up a vision of a vanished world. To that vision everything contributes, the pots and pans themselves, their position in the ground, their association, all that, but also the country with all its natural features and the men who today live in it and work for you; one can neglect none of these if the past is really to be recalled to life, and it is the all-roundness of field archaeology that makes it the fascinating study which I have found it to be."
[For an explanation of the photo, feel free to speak to someone who attended tonight's class.]