Page 26 - Manual for Activities directed at the Underwater Cultural Heritage

 © J. Carpenter / Western Aus- tralian Museum. Diver mapping the HMS Bounty, Pitcairn Islands, British Overseas Territory, United Kingdom.
The HMS Bounty is famously associated with one of the most notorious mutinies of British history.The mutineers deliberately burned and sank the ship in the waters off Pitcairn.The Pitcairn Island was first settled by the mutineers and their Tahitian companions in 1790. Even today the current island population traces back its roots to them. It
is therefore important that the community can identify with authentic remains preserved in the original context.
The Bounty and mutineer village sites on land are significant for
a number of other reasons as well.The wreck, although often exposed to extreme ocean swell and scavenged by later generations, has yielded valuable information about what the mutineers took from the ship, providing a baseline of what was available at the inception
of the settlement. For Pitcairn’s population the Bounty was for many years an irreplaceable resource of European materials such as fastenings, copper sheathing, rope, canvas, and planks. Structurally, the vessel is an example of an 18th century ship modified for the transport of botanical specimens.
in-vestments engaged in these projects would be difficult to afford repeatedly. However, this is not the sole reason for which full recovery projects are not necessarily the best option. Appropriate practice varies significantly, depending on the specific circumstances of each site. Accordingly, wide acceptance of the cautionary approach prevails, promoting in situ preservation, in preference to the recovery of artefacts and in preference to partial or complete excavation of the site.
It will never be possible to preserve all sites in their status quo. This is not just a matter of insufficient funds, limited capacities of heritage agencies, or the limited number of qualified archaeologists. There is a range of processes on site and impacting developments on the immediate surroundings that cannot be stopped. Since not all sites can be protected and managed, a pragmatic choice needs to be made, based upon the assessment of all heritage sites and their archaeological, historical and artistic or aesthetic value. In making a reasonable choice, with regard to the finiteness of heritage resources, as well as the importance of authenticity and context, many sites are being preserved for future generations, including future generations of researchers. In this respect, the importance of inventory cannot be overestimated.
Other options
Rule 1 indicates that in situ preservation shall be considered as the first option and that in authorizing any activity, this possibility should be considered first as well. However, ‘first option’ is not the same as ‘only option’, or ‘preferred option’. Partial or total excavation may be necessary under certain circumstances and preferable for a number of reasons. Reasons may be external, such as development projects for which many sites need to make way. If their character is fully understood, some sites will be considered sufficiently significant to warrant their preservation in situ in spatial planning processes. This is very unlikely, however, to be the case for sites whose existence or significance is unknown or only vaguely indicated until development is well underway.
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General Principles