Looting and Salvage, A Typological Distinction

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Material Aspects of Global Conflict" session, at the 90th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

Here we take the position that the systematic destruction of archaeological sites, often referred to as looting, should be understood not only as a site formation process that obscures the object of archaeological analysis, but also as an archeological behavior that can elucidate the social conditions of past peoples. Here we propose a modest typology that centers the goals of looters and demonstrates that the strategies each of these goals entail produce distinct archeological signatures. With in our typology, we propose the following distinction: Looting, the destruction of the site for objects that derive value from historicity, Salvage, the destruction of a site for raw materials, Scavenging, opportunistic removal of already disturbed materials, and Destruction, the intentional erasure of a site. Here we hope to demonstrate how the intentions of the looter can be reconstructed in part by the clear material signatures of the different types of looting. And, through this discussion, provide tools for any who are interested in reframing the recent depositional history of archeological sites as an object of analysis.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Material Aspects of Global Conflict   •
• Society for American Archaeology 90th Annual Meeting, Denver, CO (2025)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 51907