Evidence in the Private Sphere: Assessing the Practicality of Amnesties to Record Lost Information

Archaeological sites on land and underwater have long suffered from human impact in the form of looting, souvenir hunting or treasure hunting. Some countries have declared archaeological amnesties to either acquire lost or stolen artefacts or to document collections and information held in private hands. Very little information has been published to date on archaeological amnesties around the world. For maritime-related or submerged sites, there have been three amnesties declared around the world: in Australia, in the United Kingdom and in Bermuda. Whilst there are obvious benefits to having amnesties, they can also prove costly if little thought has been given for the short- and long-term consequences. How much information is derived from these private collections is dependent upon how much information the collector is able or willing to provide and how much effort is made to document information before they are permanently lost.