Same old story? Why archaeological discoveries are so often unexpected? What is wrong with preventive archaeology?

Despite the extraordinary commitment and economic resources made available by developers and construction companies we still learn, almost every day, of ‘remarkable’ and ‘unexpected’ archaeological discoveries made on development sites, often with consequent work-stoppages. In the debate on pre-development evaluation, it seems weird that nobody has yet had the temerity to shout out loud, like the little boy in the fairy story, that “the Emperor has no clothes”. It is time to acknowledge the unacceptable frequency with which we have to respond to seemingly fortuitous or ‘unpredicted’ discoveries made when construction work is already in progress. What we see before us is surely clear evidence of a paradox: often during the planning phase for development projects we are faced by a sea of emptiness, both in our local archaeological knowledge and in our experience concerning the methods now available to us for making valid predevelopment impact assessments. As a result, when the construction work begins we are often overwhelmed by a flood of unanticipated archaeological data. The problem does not lie just in the presence or absence of relevant archaeological data but also in uncertainty about how to identify and implement customised and effective strategies to deal with this important and complex sphere of archaeological practice.