Class Central is learner-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. In this class, we will ask and answer a series of questions about the role and practice of archaeology in the world today. If archaeologists are trained to investigate the past, what is left for us to study? Who gets to be an archaeologist? What can we know, and not know, about people in the past? Why are people entirely willing to murder each other over the fate of archaeological sites?
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Over the course of his career, he served as Director of both the National Museum of Wales and London Museum , Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India , and the founder and Honorary Director of the Institute of Archaeology in London , in addition to writing twenty-four books on archaeological subjects. Born in Glasgow to a middle-class family, Wheeler was raised largely in Yorkshire before moving to London in his teenage years. During World War I he volunteered for service in the Royal Artillery , being stationed on the Western Front , where he rose to the rank of major and was awarded the Military Cross. Influenced by the archaeologist Augustus Pitt Rivers , Wheeler argued that excavation and the recording of stratigraphic context required an increasingly scientific and methodical approach, developing the " Wheeler method ". In , he was appointed Keeper of the London Museum; there, he oversaw a reorganisation of the collection, successfully lobbied for increased funding, and began lecturing at UCL. In , he established the Institute of Archaeology as part of the federal University of London , adopting the position of Honorary Director. In he was appointed Director-General of the Archaeological Survey of India, through which he oversaw excavations of sites at Harappa , Arikamedu , and Brahmagiri , and implemented reforms to the subcontinent's archaeological establishment. Returning to Britain in , he divided his time between lecturing for the Institute of Archaeology and acting as archaeological adviser to Pakistan's government. In later life, his popular books, cruise ship lectures, and appearances on radio and television, particularly the BBC series Animal, Vegetable, Mineral? Wheeler is recognised as one of the most important British archaeologists of the twentieth century, responsible for successfully encouraging British public interest in the discipline and advancing methodologies of excavation and recording.
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Inscriptions and etchings documenting an ongoing sexual relationship between two men in Ancient Greece were discovered on the Greek island of Astypalaia. Archaeologists believe it is the oldest record of erotic graffiti ever found. The etchings included racy inscriptions and phalluses carved on a rock, dating from the mid 6th century BC. In an interview with The Guardian, Dr Andreas Vlachopoulos, a specialist in prehistoric archaeology was surprised to find such sophisticated inscriptions in such an unlikely place.
Underwater archaeologists It's that time again ladies and gentlemen. Time to get our archaeology funny on and make light of our profession. Got a funny one-liner or joke about archaeology?
