The valley that time forgot

Another report on that isolated time capsule of a valley in Utah in today's NY Times, which suggests that the site is not being adequately protected now that its secret is out. While some may cite this as an instance where an archeological site was better preserved though private ownership than public, the case is not quite so simple: keeping intruders out is much easier when it looks like nothing's there, and it's difficult to keep a site secret after opening it up for study.

Archaeologists pulled aside a curtain on Wednesday to reveal what can only be called a secret garden: the pristinely preserved ruins of an ancient civilization that was long ago lost to the mists of time in the remote cliffs of eastern Utah, then resolutely protected over the last 50 years by a stubborn local rancher who kept mum about what he knew.

The ruins, called Range Creek, are spread over thousands of acres, much of it in inaccessible back country and reachable only through a single-track dirt road once owned by the rancher and recently bought by the State of Utah. Preliminary research dates the settlement from about A.D. 900 to 1100, during the period of the Fremont Indian culture. . .

What mostly distinguishes Range Creek is that through quirk of fate and human will, it escaped both the ravages of looters and, until recently, the spades of archaeologists. Cliffside grain-storage vaults have been found here with their lids still intact, the corn and rye still inside. And while many sites in the West can still produce an old stone arrowhead or two, researchers found whole arrows here just a few weeks ago, apparently lying in the dust just where they were dropped 10 centuries ago at the time of William the Conqueror.

Posted by David on July 1, 2004 9:38 AM