Warum es einer archäologischen Berufsethik nicht nur um den Schutz von archäologischen Quellen gehen kann: oder, frei nach Mortimer Wheeler: The archaeologist is digging, not for things, but for people!

When studying for their degree, prospective archaeologists are disciplined to adhere to a particular ethics. We all have internalised that it is our first and foremost duty to protect archaeological heritage from damage, to preserve it for the future. We have equally internalised that we have to work scientifically correct and make no mistakes, so that we don’t inadvertently destroy information or – perhaps even worse – distribute false information about the past. All of this serves the protection of archaeological sources and archaeological scholarship itself. This, however, is not a professional archaeological ethics. Just like archaeological research, which should not primarily be about things, but people, a professional archaeological ethics must also be concerned with people. Whether it be other archaeologists or archaeology students, volunteers, hobby archaeologists, museum visitors or clients of archaeological service providers: they all can expect professional archaeologists to behave according to professional standards which are defined by professional archaeological ethics.