Rituals, Rubbish and Retrieval: new approaches to Roman river finds

从王者之剑到尼伯龙根，扔进水里的物品激发了诗意和大众的想象力，从潮湿的环境中发现的东西代表了一个重要的考古研究主题。在罗马时期，进步一直受到理论和方法问题的阻碍。我们的项目将汇集德国学者和英国考古学家所采用的方法，德国学者通常倾向于对罗马河流发现（如垃圾处理或意外损失）的“理性”解释，而英国考古学家通常倾向于宗教沉积。关于以前的工作，有德国的区域概述，但没有英国的，而英国的申请者最近发表了第一份完整的河流组合的出版物，与附近定居点的发现直接比较，突出了陆地和水中的沉积是如何变化的。我们将把在皮尔斯桥学到的经验应用到特里尔的罗马世界中最大和最重要的河流组合之一，特里尔是一个主要的城市中心，拥有一系列记录良好的桥梁。私人收藏家在低潮时期（20世纪70年代至90年代）收集了数千件物品，但只有最壮观的物品被发表，这是一种扭曲的解释。对于英国，我们将首次概述所有河流发现，探索河道变化的影响，与河流交叉的联系，并将选定的组合与附近陆地上的材料进行比较。我们将通过将这些河流材料与泉水和沼泽中的发现以及已证实的水神的分布进行比较，进一步将其背景化。我们将探讨各省之间沉积做法的差异，例如，英国河流的武器产量远低于德国河流。特里尔也提供了一个难得的机会，第一次检查收藏家的动机。对于所有时期的河流发现，很少有关于恢复情况和发现者的信息。长期以来，德国的考古学家一直不信任业余爱好者，因为有些人提供的信息不可靠，甚至是伪造的，但英国考古学家经常与侦探家密切合作，探索他们的动机和收集偏见。没有对河流发现的收集者进行过类似的研究。我们已经获得了八位收藏家的许可，可以记录他们的发现，记录他们的行为和动机。我们将回顾上世纪70年代报纸对“淘金热”的报道，并将其与当前泰晤士河上的“淘金热”进行比较。我们将培训中理论和方法上的差异视为灵感和创新的源泉，并将开发一种新的、综合的方法和理论框架，以改变对罗马河流发现的研究。这项研究将揭示古代人工制品沉积、祈愿实践和仪式与过去景观的关系，并产生与所有考古时期相关的河流收集的详细社会史。

From Excalibur to the Nibelungen, objects thrown into water have exercised the poetic and popular imagination, and finds from wet contexts represent a major archaeological research theme. For the Roman period, progress has been hampered by both theoretical and methodological issues. Our project will bring together approaches taken by German scholars, who usually favour ‘rational’ explanations for Roman river finds (such as rubbish disposal or accidental loss) and British archaeologists, who generally lean towards votive deposition. Regarding previous work, there are regional overviews available for Germany but not for Britain, while the UK applicants recently produced the first publication of an entire riverine assemblage in direct comparison with finds from a nearby settlement, highlighting how deposition on land and in water varied. We will apply lessons learned at Piercebridge to one of the largest and most significant riverine assemblages in the Roman world at Trier, a major urban centre with a sequence of well-documented bridges. Thousands of objects were retrieved by private collectors during periods of low water (1970s-90s), but only the most spectacular were published, skewing interpretation. For Britain, we will produce the first overview of all riverine finds, exploring the impact of changing river channels, associations with river crossings and comparing selected assemblages to nearby material on land. We will further contextualize the riverine material by comparing it to finds in springs and bogs and to the distribution of attested water deities. We will explore differences in depositional practices between provinces, with British rivers, for example, producing far fewer weapons than German ones. Trier also provides an exceptional opportunity to examine, for the first time, the motives of collectors. For river finds of all periods, there is very little information on the circumstances of recovery and the finders. Archaeologists in Germany have long distrusted amateurs as some provide unreliable or even falsifying information but British archaeologists often work closely with detectorists, exploring their motivations and collection biases. No equivalent research has ever been conducted on the collectors of river finds. We have secured permissions from eight collectors to document their finds and record their practices and motivations. We will review the newspaper coverage of the 1970s ‘goldrush’ and compare it to the current boom in ‘mudlarking’ on the Thames. We see the theoretical and methodological differences in our training as sources of inspiration and innovation, and will develop a new, integrated methodological and theoretical framework to transform research on Roman river finds. The research will shed new light on ancient artefact deposition, votive practices and ritual engagement with past landscapes as well as produce a detailed social history of riverine collecting -findings relevant to all archaeological periods.