3 replies to this topic

[Maju]

I haven't visited in a while (my apologies) but today I must call your attention to a most horrendous crime against history and the archaeological patrimony of Basques and Europeans.

Brief intro:

The city of Veleia, later known as Iruña ("the city" in Basque), in the Western Basque Country was an important town in the road between Asturica Augusta (Astorga) and Burdigala (Bordeaux), the modern St. James Way, which became news in 2006, when the archaeologists in charge (led by E. Gil) were forced by rumors to prematurely announce most important findings, including evidence of early Christianity and texts in Vulgar Latin and Basque.

Soon the discovery became controversy, with some linguists (led by J. Lakarra) rejecting the findings as "impossible" and starting a rumor mill of accusations of falsification that have never been proven and that have also been rejected by important authorities. The affair eventually resulted in a sudden and forced replacement of the archaeological team by another one led by Prof. Núñez, who was one of the accusers, and AFAIK the only one among them with the title of archaeologist.


The destruction that began this week

Regardless of the controversy the real problem now is that Núñez has authorized a mechanical excavation up to 50 cm. (the agricultural layer only has 20-30 cm) that is in fact going quite deeper than that on visual assessment, which began a couple of days ago.

The effects of this atrocity (removal and disturbance of archaeological layers) can be seen in the images at SOS Iruña-Veleia (main page). In some cases it seems they have even reached the rocky base layer, what implies the total destruction of the archaeological material or at best of the stratigraphic context.

It's a total nonsense, a barbarity, a crime against history without even a half-good pretext at all. They are doing this out of mere arrogance and feeling of impunity.


What can be done?

I really don't know but I can't just stand passive, so I am proposing to send emails of protest to the Provincial Government of Araba/Álava, which is the relevant authority. It is known that politicians sometimes yield to public pressure.

Provincial Government (Arabako Foru Aldundia - Diputación Foral de Álava): dfa@alava.net

Museums - Service of Historical-Artistic and Archaeological Patrimony: patrimoniohaa@alava.net

Also if you can help expand the sad news by whatever mean (blog, publication, tweet, other forums...), please do. Thanks.



Further extensive background info in English at my blog - category: Iruña-Veleia. Some info in English can also be found at SOS-Veleia (link above) but it is mostly in Spanish and Basque.

[Maju]

This video really shows how bad is what Prof. Núñez is doing: digging mechanically through layers and layers that we know are very rich i archaeological remains and dumping them. (Narration in Spanish).

I am every day more persuade that all he wants to do with the complicity of the authorities is to destroy all archaeological evidence.

[Pete G]

thats terrible Maju!
If you are on Facebook start a group to raise more awareness,
good luck,
Pete

[Maju]

I'm not in Facebook (social networks are not for me I believe, plus I like to keep my privacy under some check and Facebook has been accused a lot of privacy snooping). Anyhow, there's already an organization SOS Iruña-Veleia, though it was created to raise awareness on the previous controversy they have naturally stepped in with a judiciary denounce and some media diffussion. With some success it seems because I have word that they are now excavating mechanically the top 30 cm or so.

However a new video shows the damage already done: layers excavated and dumped thoughtlessly, the bottom street damaged by the excavator, tons of archaeologically worthy earth piled up in a corner...

I understand that Núñez really wants merely to destroy all the possible evidence that might support the original exceptional findings rather than research the matter independently. Obviously, after they have put such a huge effort in creating a myth of falsification, without any scientific support whatsoever, finding more stuff that could support the original findings would backfire. Núñez is not any neutral archaeologists but he was in fact the only archaeologist involved in the institutional persecution of the former archaeological team and that's why he got this post.