Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunter's Campfire Artifact? Or just a rock?

I'm a criminal worthy of prison. Recently, I was out looking for a suitable target and I spotted a free ranging rock across a draw. I immediately dropped to a sitting position and shot it. I removed a chip from the publicly owned rock so apparently I'm guilty of destruction of public property, destruction of an artifact (assuming someone can prove that an Indian observed the rock before I did), and polluting public land with lead and a copper alloy.

Well, damn... Lee jr will be posting your dirty panties shortly...

Kent

Darn, I was going to excavate this, take it home & rent it out...





or haul this out & restore it...



They are both in Death Valley, by the way...

Seems here like "Global Warming" must be trancending Politics, and Frying ALL of your partisan brains.

THIS dicourse has evolved into a heated discord that is NOTHING but a Tempest In A Tea Party.

Much Ado About Nothing!

A "rock" ??? ??? ???

I think I am in big trouble! Had to drive my big truck on a fresh gravelled public road today. 26 truck tires can pick up a lot of rock off public land. Anybody know where I report for euthanasia?

The reason he's a liberal is he wants to control others with propaganda and misrepresentation of the law. Unsolicited he accused the OP of breaking Federal law... yes, because of a rock, that he said was just a rock. 'HE' took umbrage at my setting the record straight and escalated his lies to try an intimidate me... like that would work.

Mini microcosm, that he is, of our socialist leaning society just in this thread. He can't find proof to refute my stance and bolster his, so he spends all day trying to dig up dirt on me personally, including going through all my posts and running a county/state search on my name. Only way he came up with the wrong address. Like all government idiots, they can't understand they have my info wrong so I quit trying to correct it.

I pegged him dead center and he wants to belittle me like I did him... what he doesn't realize is he did it to himself... He can't refute one thing I've said because it's the truth and that cuts deep.

I'm sick of people (government) thinking they can just lie to me about laws that effect us, even picking up a rock, and expect me to ignore it.

it's one thing to be mistaken... another to knowingly lie.

Kent

lol

For the record, the OP laughed out loud at him. I tire of people who are intent on conjuring up the details they don't know, just to parade their "expertise."

Steve

Well, here's my expertise and I'll let it rest for now.

There is a huge subculture of artifacts/antiquities, especially southwest pueblo as there are literally hundreds of thousands of sites, millions some say, just in the four corners region.

I have relatives and friends that own property with sites, from Anasazi, Salato to Hohokam. I know people that have dug illegally on public, been caught and paid the price.

When one polychrome pot can go for thousands, even tens of thousands if it has an effigy, obviously the incentive is there for robbing sites.

The incentive for abuse in the archaeology profession is strong also, for many it is a license to steal public property for their own gain, highgrading the best pots for black market sale is common. Reminds me of a politician. If nothing else the archs need to find things to justify their jobs and procure for paying museums. Taking from sites for benefit, even museums, even 'legally' is a travesty. Once disturbed a site will not go back to natural, whether you put the dirt back or not.

So there is an underground war so to speak, involving millions of dollars, whether selling or Federal sponsor dollars. laws enacted and in continual change.

So it's a big deal whether that is a rock or artifact in some minds and the federal government is one.

All joking aside, that is a rock, or at the most the discard of waste from the original rock used for something. If it was a grinding stone the edges would have been rounded from use, not sharp enough for a scraper.

Kent

KRP:

Many years ago, I wrote a series of investigative articles for the Tucson Citizen about illegal commercial looting of prehistoric sites that was occurring on public land in Arizona and New Mexico then.

There were some well-known-at-the-time people involved. The stuff they stole from the sites then usually wasn't sold by a looter to a collector. Instead it was a tax scam. Here's how it worked:

Let's say you were in the highest income tax bracket and I came to you with an offer you can't refuse.

I have a highly decorated Anasazi pot, a letter from a qualified, well-known artifact appraiser stating the pot is so rare that it is worth $150,000.00, and a letter from a respected museum's curator saying his facility would be happy to receive that pot.

Now that you know all this, I'm willing to sell you that pot for $10,000.00 -- in cash.

In most cases, the guys who bought such pots never saw them. They received only letters from curators thanking them for their generous donations.

The scam developed because the looters were digging up hundreds of
"rare" pots and there was (and probably still is) a limited market for high-end
artifacts. If they sold their stuff only to collectors they quickly would have flooded the market.

In truth, that pot probably was worth a lot less than $10,000.

I couldn't say it, but the appraisers must have been involved somehow. It was difficult to blame the curators of the museums for wanting the stuff for their facility's collection, but they also had to know where all the stuff they were getting was coming from.

My series resulted in Arizona Congressman Morris K. Udall rewriting the U.S. Antiquities Act with stiffer penalties for looting sites on federal land, and I won some press awards, but the people I wrote about were never prosecuted.

Bill Quimby

Bill, that's interesting and a good account of the transition of law.


Many looters were just good old boys, ranchers in the areas, all walks of life, including archaeologists. In the distant past it was poo pooed away as most were community stalwarts.

Some of the biggest collections I've seen are in generational ranch houses in central Az. Also, much of the farm land in SW Colorado i.e. DoveCreek, have huge ruins and is private, unreal some collections in old farm houses off of just one average ruin.

The joke in DoveCreek is that the monster ruin that was excavated and restored in Delores has only a few pots, what happened to all the high dollar ones. The museum can't come close to some collections that are in an old farmhouse taken from a small ruin. They all wink the eye.

I truly don't know anyone digging or buying anymore, not for many years, the penalties are too great as is the stigmatization. I would say you were a part of that transformation and did a good service.

Mesa was a hub of the market, plenty of good old boys, middlemen buyers and the end buyers were some of the top community leaders including judicial and political. Also many of the pots were shipped to Europe as there was a huge market over there.

I grew up with good old boys and had some in my family and worked with some in construction. I heard pot talk all the time, digging/buying/selling, I didn't want to be digging in a grave so never participated, though I have been present as others dug a ruin on private property when it was legal.

Hundreds of thousands of ruins have been looted legally or illegally, I see no difference whether it's a good old boy or our government. You can't find a ruin that is close to a road or easily seeable by scout plane, that hasn't been hit.

One of the greatest joys I get is finding a hidden ruin, untouched. I spend a minute or more and look around.

Why were they here, What was it that made it home, what did they laugh about, cry, this was their whole life, probably twenty miles was their life's range. So many questions, what happened to them? I absolutely get a spiritual feeling on a 1000 year old ruin. I'm someone that gets off the beaten trail. I find many.

Here's a small two roomer I found right under the Rim last year, always makes my day.











Makes you wonder...

Kent

That's coz they was democrats!

Dan

Has anyone thought this might be a bannerstone?



I had a chief from an Indian tribe in West Virginia tell me today that this is a bannerstone. Bannerstones were part of an atlatl, used to give weight and momentum when throwing the spear from the atlatl. He demonstrated one for me.

Most bannerstones you see are more ornamental than this. But, the tapered edge he said was to lock it in place on the shaft. Others were designed differently, and some were designed to adjust to different positions on the shaft.

I'm not totally sure, but he was very sure. I talked to him for about a hour, and he had some amazing insights into the tools his ancestors had and how they used them.

Steve

In New Mexico, we'd fine mano's and matate's. They work as a pair; the matate is the bigger rock on the ground, the mano was the one held in the hand. You'd grind stuff between them. We had a matched mano and matate in our yard (the mano was worn into the matate). They were quite common.

That sure looks like a mano, to me, but... hard to say on a computer screen.

No doubt about that. I'll still be looking for opinions -- it's nice when I can show it to someone in person.

Steve

I'm a Democrat so everything I say is a lie, huh?

Well yeah...you knew the job was dangerous when you took it,...