Assessment of Archaeological Collecting
April 2011 | MLA Renaissance Yorkshire
PJO Archaeology has produced a report for MLA (Museums, Libraries and Archives Council) Renaissance Yorkshire which assesses the capacity of museums in the Yorkshire and Humber region to deal with the financial and managerial pressures arising from the deposition of archaeological archives. It also looks at the whole process of generating and curating archaeological archives and makes recommendations for changes in the practices of archaeological contractors, local authority planning departments and museums.
The project was prompted by the demise in 2009 of ARCUS, the archaeological contractor based in Sheffield University which raised the possibility that other contractors might, in times of recession, cease to trade leaving their archives incomplete and lacking curatorial input.
Patrick Ottaway's completed report is now available on-line from Renaissance, Yorkshire.