The exploitation of archaeological sites for commercial gain is a serious problem worldwide. In peace and during wartime archaeological sites and cultural institutions, both on land and underwater, are attacked and their contents robbed for sale on an international 'antiquities' market. Objects are excavated without record, smuggled across borders and sold for exorbitant prices in the salesrooms of Europe and North America. In some countries this looting has now reached such a scale as to threaten the very survival of their archaeological and cultural heritage. This volume highlights the deleterious effects of the trade on cultural heritage, but in particular it focuses upon questions of legal and local responses: How can people become involved in the preservation of their past and what, in economic terms, are the costs and benefits? Are international conventions or export restrictions effective in diminishing the volume of the trade and the scale of its associated destruction?

The exploitation of archaeological sites for commercial gain is a serious problem worldwide. In peace and during wartime archaeological sites and cultural institutions, both on land and underwater, are attacked and their contents robbed for sale on an international 'antiquities' market. Objects are excavated without record, smuggled across borders and sold for exorbitant prices in the salesrooms of Europe and North America. In some countries this looting has now reached such a scale as to threaten the very survival of their archaeological and cultural heritage.
This volume highlights the deleterious effects of the trade on cultural heritage, but in particular it focuses upon questions of legal and local responses: How can people become involved in the preservation of their past and what, in economic terms, are the costs and benefits? Are international conventions or export restrictions effective in diminishing the volume of the trade and the scale of its associated destruction?


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Trafficking Culture outlines current research and thinking on the illicit market in antiquities. It moves along the global trafficking chain from 'source' to 'market', identifying the main roles and routines involved. Using original research, the authors explore the dynamics of this 'grey' market, where legal and illegal goods are mixed and conflated. It compares and contrasts this illicit trade with other 'transnational criminal markets', such as the illegal trades in wildlife and diamonds. The analytical frames of organized crime and white-collar crime, drawn from criminology, provide a fresh perspective on a problem that has tended to be seen as archaeological, rather than criminological. Bringing insights from both disciplines together, this book represents a productive discourse between experts in these two fields, working together for several years to produce the evidence base that is reported here. Innovative forms of regulation are the most productive way to explore crime control in this field, and this book provides a series of propositions about practical crime reduction measures for the future. It will be invaluable to academics working in the fields of archaeology, criminology, art history, museum studies, and heritage. The book will also be a vital resource for professionals in the field of cultural property protection and preservation.

The Cycladic Islands of Greece played a central role in Aegean prehistory, and many new discoveries have been made in recent years at sites ranging in date from the Mesolithic period to the end of the Bronze Age. In the well-illustrated chapters of this book, based on the recent conference held at the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research in Cambridge, international scholars including leading Greek archaeologists offer new information about recent developments, many arising from hitherto unpublished excavations. The book contains novel theoretical insights into the workings of culture process in the prehistoric cultures of the islands. It will be an indispensable resource for students and scholars interested in the prehistory of the Aegean and in the contributions made to its development by the prehistoric inhabitants of the Cyclades.

The subject matter of archaeology is the engagement of human beings, now and in the past, with both the natural world and the material world they have created. All aspects of human activity are potentially relevant to archaeological research, and, conversely, the ways in which others, especially artists and anthropologists, have investigated the world are of interest to archaeologists. Archaeological artefacts and sites are also used by groups and nations to establish identity, and for financial gain, both through tourism and trade in antiquities. Colin Renfrew has actively engaged with art, with politics and with the antiquities trade, and has presented his ideas to broad audiences through accessible books and television programmes, as well as championing the cause of archaeology in many public roles. The papers in this volume, which have been written by colleagues and former students on the occasion of his retirement, relate to all of these subject areas, and together give some idea of the complexity of the issues raised by critical engagements with the material world, both past and present.

Trafficking Culture outlines current research and thinking on the illicit market in antiquities. It moves along the global trafficking chain from 'source' to 'market', identifying the main roles and routines involved. Using original research, the authors explore the dynamics of this 'grey' market, where legal and illegal goods are mixed and conflated. It compares and contrasts this illicit trade with other 'transnational criminal markets', such as the illegal trades in wildlife and diamonds. The analytical frames of organized crime and white-collar crime, drawn from criminology, provide a fresh perspective on a problem that has tended to be seen as archaeological, rather than criminological. Bringing insights from both disciplines together, this book represents a productive discourse between experts in these two fields, working together for several years to produce the evidence base that is reported here. Innovative forms of regulation are the most productive way to explore crime control in this field, and this book provides a series of propositions about practical crime reduction measures for the future. It will be invaluable to academics working in the fields of archaeology, criminology, art history, museum studies, and heritage. The book will also be a vital resource for professionals in the field of cultural property protection and preservation.

The Settlement at Dhaskalio is the first volume in the series The Sanctuary on Keros: Excavations at Dhaskalio and Dhaskalio Kavos, 2006-2008, edited by Colin Renfrew, Olga Philaniotou, Neil Brodie, Giorgos Gavalas and Michael Boyd. Here the findings are presented from the well-stratified settlement of Dhaskalio, today an islet near the Cycladic island of Keros, Greece. A series of radiocarbon dates situates the duration of the settlement from around 2750 to 2300 BC. The volume begins with a discussion of the geological setting of Keros and of sea-level change, concluding that Dhaskalio was in the third millennium BC linked to Keros by a narrow causeway. The excavation and finds (excluding the pottery, discussed in later volumes) are fully documented, with consideration of stratigraphy, geomorphology, organic remains, and the evidence for metallurgy. It is concluded that there was a small permanent population of around 20, increased periodically by up to 400 visitors who would have participated in the rituals of deposition occurring at the Sanctuary at Kavos, situated opposite, on Keros itself, for which the detailed evidence (including abundant fragmented pottery, marble vessels and sculptures) will be presented in Volumes II and III.

Archaeological artifacts have become a traded commodity in large part because the global reach of Western society allows easy access to the world's archaeological heritage. Acquired by the world's leading museums and private collectors, antiquities have been removed from archaeological sites, monuments, or cultural institutions and illegally traded. This collection of essays by world-recognized experts investigates the ways that com-modifying artifacts fuels the destruction of archaeological heritage and considers what can be done to protect it. Despite growing national and international legislation to protect cultural heritage, increasing numbers of archaeological sites-among them, war-torn Afghanistan and Iraq-are subject to pillage as the monetary value of artifacts rises. Offering comprehensive examinations of archaeological site looting, the antiquities trade, the ruin of cultural heritage resources, and the international efforts to combat their destruction, the authors argue that the antiquities market impacts cultural heritage around the world and is a burgeoning global crisis.

Subtitled a critical review of some archaeological and craniological concepts', this is an innovative and controversial study of the Beaker Culture problem; diffusion or migration into Britain. The first part of the book critically reviews previous work on the problem and suggests that the processualist revolt against migrational explanations might have been an error in this case. The second part presents an original study of English Neolithic and Bronze Age crania which, although inconclusive, moves a step nearer to a migrationist explanatory framework.

Volume II describes the excavation and finds from the Special Deposits at Kavos at the sanctuary on Keros lying opposite the settlement on the islet of Dhaskalio (described in Volume I). The finds of marble from the Special Deposit South are described in Volume III, and the pottery in Volume V. The sanctuary at Kavos, dating from c. 2700 BC to 2400 BC has yielded the richest ritual deposits of the early bronze age Cyclades. The finds are presented here in their excavation contexts, and the significance of the Special Deposit South as a ritual deposit is examined in the context of Aegean prehistory.

As Saddam Hussein's government fell in April 2003, news accounts detailed the pillage of Iraq's National Museum. The museum's looting grabbed headlines worldwide and public attention briefly focused on Iraq's threatened cultural heritage. Less dramatic, though far more devastating, was the subsequent epidemic of looting at thousands of archaeological sites around the country. Illegal digging on a massive scale continues to this day, virtually unchecked, with Iraq's ten thousand officially recognized sites being destroyed at a rate of roughly 10 percent per year. This book contains the first full published account of the disasters that have befallen Iraq's cultural heritage, and it analyzes why the array of laws and international conventions; the advocacy efforts of cultural heritage organizations; and the military planning and implementation of cultural protection operations all failed, and continue to fail, to prevent massive and irreversible loss. Looking forward, the book identifies new planning procedures, policy mechanisms, and implementation strategies capable of succeeding, so the mistakes of Iraq will not be replicated in other regions in crisis whose cultural heritage are at risk. Both archaeologists and policy-makers will benefit from this detailed study.

As Saddam Hussein's government fell in April 2003, news accounts detailed the pillage of Iraq's National Museum. The museum's looting grabbed headlines worldwide and public attention briefly focused on Iraq's threatened cultural heritage. Less dramatic, though far more devastating, was the subsequent epidemic of looting at thousands of archaeological sites around the country. Illegal digging on a massive scale continues to this day, virtually unchecked, with Iraq's ten thousand officially recognized sites being destroyed at a rate of roughly 10 percent per year. This book contains the first full published account of the disasters that have befallen Iraq's cultural heritage, and it analyzes why the array of laws and international conventions; the advocacy efforts of cultural heritage organizations; and the military planning and implementation of cultural protection operations all failed, and continue to fail, to prevent massive and irreversible loss. Looking forward, the book identifies new planning procedures, policy mechanisms, and implementation strategies capable of succeeding, so the mistakes of Iraq will not be replicated in other regions in crisis whose cultural heritage are at risk. Both archaeologists and policy-makers will benefit from this detailed study.

During the 1960s large numbers of Early Cycladic sculptures of marble, often broken, appeared on the illicit market. These were usually of the strikingly simple form of the folded-arm figure of marble long-known from the Early Cycladic cemeteries. Excavations at Kavos on the island of Keros revealed a location later named the 'Special Deposit North', from which these had been looted. During the years 2006-2008 systematic excavations at a location 110m to the south revealed a hitherto undisturbed location, the Special Deposit South, from which hundreds more of these broken Cycladic figures were recovered. This volume describes in detail the marble sculptures and marble vessels, almost always broken in the course of ritual practice, which formed the key part of the systematic depositions undertaken at this time during the Early Bronze Age from ca. 2750-2300 BC. Details of the excavation were reported in Volume II. Here in Volume III the remarkable marble finds from the systematic excavation are fully described and illustrated. The volume offers a systematic discussion of the Special Deposits at Kavos in relation to the adjacent settlement at Dhaskalio, seen in their Aegean perspective at the conclusion of the excavations in 2008. The sanctuary on Keros is recognized as a key site for the emergence of ritual practice in the Aegean.