A) proper digging shouldn’t destroy the monument. B) removal of parts of the structure is how we know what’s in it at all. The same is true for any othe other monuments that are structures. We had to dig through the valley of the kings to find the tombs. If we don’t breech the obstruction, we won’t understand the thing.
There are new techniques for discovering things. Once we know there is a void, at present, no number of muons will help us see details. Perhaps we’ll learn how they built the thing. There are a great many marvels from Egypt that defy our current understanding of their tech.
Except 'grave robbing' implies a malice and questionable morality. There is great value in doing this and well documented/controlled excavation can minimize destruction to the very minimum.
This entire planet is one mass grave. We only respect the dead for a limited period of time. (No one who died over 20k years ago has much in the way of cultural defenders...) At the 3k+ range, I think we can get a pass...
I was also there in april, and I am surprised the tourists and kids are left unattended, taking selfies, touching everything. It's an accident waiting to happen. Most tourists (ashamed to admit, but this includes me) don't actually appreciate or care about ancient art, it's more like been there, done that.
I'd encourage people to chide tourists that touch historic objects in museums. People should know better and while I suspect they dont care (from when I've done this many a time), it's worth trying!
Art is restored all the time. The places these labels were put are not where the valuable details rest. I grew up around antique collectors all my life. You are overreacting.
Indeed, plenty of famous art pieces have been 'fixed' and if you really wanted to revert a statue back to it's original form removing the number plate would be an easy job and do wouldn't take away from the real artistic parts of it. As they were placed on the flat base of the pedestal, not touching the primary artwork which is the statue itself.
Sure they could find far better solutions, and very likely would today. But I don't think this is a particularly big deal that it was done in the past.
I don't think that a 12 inch hole drilled big enough for a drone in a section of the pyramid that is protected from the weather and not visible to the public is "Destroying a monument".
Do you think that the DNA test of King Tut was also destruction?
Given the wholesale robbery that early Egyptologists got up to (mummy-unwrapping parties were a popular social event in 19th-century England), one can perhaps excuse the Egyptian authorities for being a bit overprotective.
100% agree. Let's wait, been waiting for millennia already. Otherwise, next year another team has another curiosity that requires just a small hole...and 2000 years later the thing is crumbling.
