Channel 4 - Lost Worlds :The Story of Archaeology (2000) Part2 Treasure Seekers

This six-part series presents the definitive history of archaeology, a 250-year worldwide odyssey that began with the unearthing of the ruins of Pompeii buried beneath the ash of Mt. Vesuvius. In a short time, archaeologists started pursuing very different objectives: some were treasure-seekers hoping to plunder antiquities of the ancient world; others sought to prove theories about the origins of civilization or the historical accuracy of Homer or the Bible; still others focused on humans themselves, trying to determine the age of the species. The series also looks at how archaeology has been misused as an instrument of foreign policy and where the study is going in the future with new technologies and methods.

Part 2: Treasure Seekers

Archaeology Turns from Passion to Plunder

Archaeology was born of treasure-seeking, but it became the stimulus for rampant pillaging of antiquities in the 18th and 19th centuries. This program charts the escalation of archaeological acquisition from gentlemanly passion to national plunder, from Lord Elgin and the marble friezes of the Parthenon to Richard Lepsius and his Egyptian collection that took sixty barges to transport to Berlin. Also examined is how greed gave way to altruism and preservation, most notably under August Mariette, the acquisitions expert for the Louvre who curtailed the sacking of Egypt and created the Cairo Museum.

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