Page 48 - Manual for Activities directed at the Underwater Cultural Heritage

 This authorisation process
is indispensable for all actions
that are necessary to further protection, knowledge and enhancement. In authorising activities directed at underwater cultural heritage, the competent authority sets the standards for archaeological interventions, demands for competent and qualified staff, and regulates the standards of documentation.
The Szent Istvan is interesting as
a subject of study to researchers from all of countries that emerged from the fall of the Austro- Hungarian Empire and has been the subject of several international research campaigns.
With its length of 153 m, the battleship Szent Istvan, of the Tegethof class, is numbered among the largest warships sunk in the Adriatic Sea. It was built in Rijeka in 1914 and was, along with two other vessels of the same class, the Tegethof and the Viribus Unitis, the pride of the Austro- Hungarian Navy in World War I. Equally impressive are its twelve 305 mm cannons. It was sunk on 10 June 1918, by Italian torpedo boats. Indicative of the measure
of this military success is the fact that the day was declared Italian Navy Day.The ship turned 180 degrees while sinking and lies now at a depth of 68 m with its keel pointing to the surface.
In conformity with this, the simple wording of Rule 5 stresses that one should respect other people’s feelings. It extends this respect to all human remains and to all venerated sites. These sites may be venerated for any kind of reason, by any kind of group. In planning or authorizing activities directed at underwater cultural heritage where such feelings may be at stake, they should be taken into consideration. Interested parties should not only be informed but involved. It is a topic that is dealt with in more general terms in Chapter XIV. Unnecessary disturbance should be avoided. If possible, these sites should not be meddled with at all. The preference for in situ preservation as the first option presents itself strongly in such cases.
The need for regulation
Rule 6.
Activities directed at underwater cultural heritage shall be strictly regulated to ensure proper recording of cultural, historical and archaeological information.
Rule 6 requires that any activity impacting under- water cultural heritage be properly recorded. Con- ditions and observations that are left unrecorded will never be part of the activity documentation, let alone part of the wider record of archaeological observations that can inform other research. Also, if left unrecorded there will be no account of the impact and damage caused to the site, however well- intentioned the activity. Unless recorded, what has been destroyed will not be available for future study. To this end, activities directed at underwater cultural heritage must be subject to strict regulation.
As such, Rule 6 reiterates what much national le- gislation states concerning the authorization of interventions at archaeological sites. Authorization is indispensable for all actions that are necessary to further protection, knowledge and enhancement; moreover, it is limited to organizations with qualified and competent staff, who are fully familiar with the wider context of research questions, in which the significance of the site and the proposed intervention
- Documentation is
the cornerstone of heritage management.
- Documentation is the cornerstone of archaeological research.
- Insufficient documentation is destruction without compensation.
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General Principles