Excavation versus sustainability in situ: a conclusion on 25 years of archaeological investigations at Goose Rock, a designated historic wreck-site at the Needles, Isle of Wight, England

Assurance , a British warship of 44 guns, was lost on the Needles of Wight, UK, in 1753. Pomone , a British 5th rate 38-gun frigate of the Leda class, followed in 1811. Designated a'protected wreck' in 1975 this multi-period site was investigated under a UK Government licence. Despite her total disintegration, Pomone left artefact scatters attesting to her size, character, resting position and evidence of her cabin plan. This archaeological evidence is compared with two surviving sister ships, and the presumption of incomprehensible 'scrambling' on Muckelroy Class 5 wreck sites is robustly challenged. The licencee reviews the organization and methodology of 25 years of licenced activity on this site and concludes that the UK policy of promoting invasive investigation of historic shipwrecks cannot be readily reconciled with the principles of sustainability which are now embodied in European Agenda 21.     

Managing the maritime heritage: the National Maritime Archaeological Museum and National Centre for Underwater Research, Cartagena, Spain

The rapid developmental work of the Museum-Centre and its policies within a limited budget are set in the context of world-wide problems of management and preservation of the underwater heritage in the face of accelerating threats to its survival. The impact of engineering projects and lack of official control or supervision of developer-funded maritime archaeological interventions is something of which governments are insufficiently aware. The construction of a marina at Mazarron has resulted in progressive denudation of the bay, exposure of two Phoenician wrecks and thousands of Phoenician potsherds, necessitating the annual resurvey of 70,000 m² of seabed. Among protective measures an iron 'strongbox' has been designed and successfully used on small wreck-sites. © 2000 The Nautical Archaeology Society     

On not being Dubai: infrastructures of urban cultural policy in Istanbul & Beirut

ABSTRACT

This paper compares how Istanbul and Beirut both attempt to underline their cultural and developmental uniqueness today in contrast to a metonymic menace – Dubai, standing in for spectacular yet supposedly cultureless Gulf cities. Even amid their own speculative construction frenzies that threaten local heritage, Turkish and Lebanese city-shapers assert theirs are ‘real’ cities because they have ‘civilization’ and ‘history.’ By addressing their own efforts to build, defend, or oppose physical infrastructures related to local urban culture, Istanbullus and Beirutis rely on and reassert strategic, phatic discourses that frequently reference Gulf cities as counterpoint. Analysis focuses on how each city crafts a distinctive urban profile via civilizational appeals to historic senses of culture, inflecting infrastructural developments related to bridging (Istanbul) and bordering (Beirut). Historical truisms are deployed with marked flexibility to showcase these cities as ‘not Dubai.’ This study offers lessons on the particular worlding of Middle Eastern cities and the role of discourses in the material-symbolic infrastructure of implicit urban cultural policy.     

An Industrial-Archaeological Approach to the Mineral Loading Docks in Rande Strait,North-Western Spain

During the 20th century, the need for raw material promoted a commercial transportation trade of iron ores from the deposits in north-western Spain, where Vigo city was considered one of the most important ports. The global energy crisis in the 1970s, as well as the strong competition from other exporting countries, dented the prolific activity of companies dedicated to the extraction and trading of iron ore. The main goal of this article is the evaluation of one particular element of the mining and industrial heritage — two old mineral loading docks in Ría de Vigo in the Rande Strait, linking the municipalities of Redondela and Moaña. Their development as a tourist resource would add to the cultural and economic activities already developed in the area.     

Whose Heritage? Immigration and Place Narratives in Denmark

Questions of heritage, of ownership of discourses of past and present are important elements in present‐day struggles over identity and belonging, not least those related to immigration policy. None the less, the perspective of immigrant groups is often overlooked when decisions are taken concerning preservation of heritage sites. Since the late 1960s the area around Frederiksværk, Northern Zealand has become the home of large numbers of immigrants, notably from ex‐Yugoslavia, who were brought to Denmark to serve as rank and file in the then booming steel industry. In spite of their undeniable contribution to the development of the town, the cultural heritage of this relatively large immigrant population takes up very little space in the official branding of the town as a key site in the industrial history of Denmark. This article discusses the various place narratives in relation to immigrants in the case of Frederiksværk. We take as our point of departure the Danish notion of kulturmiljø (cultural milieu), which is more material than the notion of heritage. This discussion focuses on the ability of kulturmiljø to capture and incorporate the multiple and often contradictory cultural practices of different groups of actors and not the least to transgress the often rather static and confined view on local history, which often results from the heritage perspective. We analyze how different actors, notably the Yugoslavs, are represented in the narratives of the town, and how Yugoslav immigrants themselves perceive their position in Frederiksværk. Furthermore, we attempt to register some of the imprints made by immigrants on the material and cultural fabric, possibly useful to include in a kulturmiljø of Frederiksværk. The conclusion assesses the potentials and limitations of the kulturmiljø approach with regard to making visible the place narratives of immigrants.     

The Roads of Andalusia and Valencia. A Spanish Transport Legacy of the 18th and 19th Centuries

Roads designed by civil or military engineers for animal-drawn vehicles before the arrival of the railways constituted an essential factor for the movement of goods and people and for the economy and trade in different countries. The improvement in road construction techniques over the 18th and 19th centuries, following the creation of the first civil engineering colleges and institutions, allowed greater transportation at diminishing cost. Despite its significance, this heritage has received comparatively little attention from industrial archaeologists. As such, the object of the present article is to provide an overview of the development in road planning and construction in Spain over the 18th and 19th centuries, in order to demonstrate the historical and technological value of these roads. The article also presents two sections of Spanish roads corresponding to the start and end of the study period, and identifies some of the main archaeological elements dating to their time of construction that prove the evolution in road technology. This process has made it possible to create an inventory which incorporates the main elements that characterise this type of infrastructure.     

Colonial Australia,the 1887 Colonial Conference,and the Struggle for Imperial Unity

ABSTRACT

For historians interested in the settler colonial world, one of Professor John Darwin’s most important interventions has been to argue for the reintegration of the dominions into the wider history of the British empire. In re-engaging with the history of Britain’s white settler colonies in North America, Australasia, and South Africa, Darwin’s work has sought to emphasize the place of the dominions in relation to the rise and fall of the British world system, as well as their value as vantage points from which to consider imperial and global history more generally. In this regard, Darwin’s systemic approach has encouraged a more dynamic conception of ‘British world’ history – one deeply embedded in a series of overlapping imperial, regional, and international contexts. This article focuses on a particular moment in imperial history where some of the internal dynamics of the late-Victorian British world system, and the changing place of the settler colonies within it, were brought into sharp relief: the 1887 Colonial Conference. It argues that we might look to the conference as a valuable window onto the impact of Anglo-Australian relations upon the wider struggle for imperial unity in the 1880s.