Today my friend tells me a detail about her job that mine will never measure up to, no matter how many papers I publish or mechanisms I discover. She's working on a dig at ----, in southwest ----, for the summer. Her degree is in history, and she studies ancient texts and peoples for her PhD thesis. We've talked together about ancient basalt grinding stones she's studied and how information like that can tell you about the people and ways trade routes take, based on basalt availability in the region (check out this unrelated but cool dig blog that I found). It's pretty fascinating what historians and archeologists are able to infer from the limited data they can collect--where artifacts lie after centuries or millennia in repose.
She told me earlier this week that the area they were working in was home to some tough customers.
In response to her assertion I ask if they've found human remains or bones with knives stuck in the ribs before, or other such dastardly discoveries. She responds that their neighborhood could have made a good Law and Order episode. I like it, but don't know if NBC would go for something like that.
A day after she mentions this, she drops a knowledge bomb on me: there is a skeleton. It's out of the ground after all the proper procedures. But not only that...he was buried beneath a floor and may have been bound, with hands between his knees or feet! They of course can't tell if he was a victim or criminal, but...um, that beats the pants off any job I've ever heard of. Finding an ancient skeleton is just part of the job for people like her. Not a bad day job, time spent scrutinizing ancient texts notwithstanding.
[Some details edited/removed out of respect for the site and dig ethos--3/3/15]
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