A Matter of Interpretation - Rusty Metal

What is the truth about those pieces of metal? Are they the remains of shackles, or are they bits of rusty guttering?

I'm not convinced we will ever know the truth. The evidence is so patchy that - as it stands - it is open to several interpretations.

If we can look back by analogy at the "Venus figurines" which have been found at archaeological sites, and which date from the Upper Paleolithic, the first explanation is that they were votive depictions of a goddess. This can be seen in the work of Marija Gimbutas - in her books The Goddesses and Gods of Old Europe (1974); The Language of the Goddess (1989), which inspired an exhibition in Wiesbaden, 1993/94; and her final book, The Civilization of the Goddess (1991).

Later archaeologists such as Peter Ucko were more critical, and saw that the interpretation of the artifacts could be distorted by the frame of reference in which the archeologist viewed it. For instance, if the archeologist assumes a goddess culture, then the figurines are goddesses. They could equally be fertility charms, or even toys. Certainly it was arguable that the idea that they demonstrated worship of a single "mother goddess" was something brought to the material, not taken from it, and there could have been a pantheon of deities, if that is what they were.

Ian Hodder, commenting on Gimbutas, noted that "She looks at squiggles on a pot and says it's a primeval egg or a snake, or she looks at female figurines and says they're mother goddesses. I don't really think there's an awful lot of evidence to support that level of interpretation." Instead, Gimbutas has a habit of habitually presenting debatable assertions as fact. Ruth Tringham, another archaeologist, says the evidence from early societies is far too incomplete to allow such definitive statements. "I would never write, 'This is the obvious conclusion' - there is nothing obvious about what we write. Whatever we write is always, 'it could be this, it could be that'. Our problem is that the public isn't attracted by that kind of ambiguous thinking."

When we look at the evidence for the pieces of metal found at Haut de la Garenne, the evidence is even more open to interpretation. The metal has degraded over the years, and there is little certainty over what it could be.

Lenny Harper's reasoning over the finds is plain enough. We can see the logical steps by which he arrives at his conclusions because he is basing the interpretation on the location of the metal, and the witness statements which tell of shackles in an underground chamber. Whether this is valid or not is open to question; it is possible that his interpretation is conditioned by the statements he has heard. Questions clearly need to be asked. What should have happened is for the evidence to be submitted double-blind to suitable third parties, to see what interpretations they could place on it. That this does not seem to have occurred is a failing, but not one which occurred in Warcup's presentation.

David Warcup's reasoning is not so clear. His review identifies the metal as corroded parts of a guttering drainpipe, but he has not given us the chain of reasoning by which he places the metal in its location, although it might be taken as part of builders rubble as infill (in which case, the builders clearly did some shoddy work). What is amazing is the certainty in which he boldly states that the metal cannot be shackles, when as Harper correctly points out, the metal has degraded to the point where positive identification is near impossible. Moreover, no comparative materials have been brought to light from other building sites which could be positively identified as part of guttering, and so make this case firmer.

In conclusion, I can see weaknesses in Harper's identification of the metal as shackles, but it also appears that Warcup's review is also seriously deficient. The most blatant example of spin is the seeming certainty, bordering on arrogance, in which it has been presented - contrast with Ruth Tringham's comments on archeological finds. Either this is because Warcup is not trained in archaeology, and hence is making statements outside his field and beyond his competence, or it is a deliberate attempt to discredit the original interpretation for political reasons.

The only good thing about it is that it does highlight the dangers of bringing one's own views to interpretation of evidence, but the failure to conduct a double-bind identification, or to provide comparative materials, makes it as deficient as Harper's original interpretation. The certainty with which it is presented is not warranted, and if questions should be asked about Harper's presentation of the evidence, Warcup's presentation is equally flawed.