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Field Notes
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Volume 49 Number 4, July/August 1996
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 Treasure Trove Amended
England's 1,000-year-old law of Treasure Trove has been reformed after pressure from the British archaeological community. Enacted in the Middle Ages, the law provided Crown protection of artifacts only if they were made of gold or silver, and then only if the owner could not be found. The revised law addresses all finds regardless of their precious-metal content.
Luang Prabang Cited by UNESCO
The historic section of the Laotian city Luang Prabang has been named a UNESCO World Heritage Site. One hundred eleven buildings and 34 Buddhist monasteries have been targeted for preservation, which will be undertaken jointly by the Laotian Ministry of Culture and a French restoration group.
Hadrian's Villa Restoration
Hadrian's Villa and other monuments in Tivoli, near Rome, will receive much-needed restoration thanks to $13.5 million donated by the European Union and Italian national, regional, and local governments.
Indian Heritage Hotels
The state government of Madhya Pradesh, India, is planning to offer 14 protected buildings to private developers of heritage hotels. Tourism officials have defended the plan, arguing that the state does not have the resources for the monuments' upkeep; local archaeologists say the hotels will end free access to these sites for Indian citizens.
Sticky Tools
Bitumen found on two 36,000-year-old stone tools from Umm el-Tlel in Syria has pushed back the date when adhesives were first used in tool-making. Anthropologists had previously believed the technique was no more than 10,000 years old.
Shiva Head in Dispute
The Metropolitan Museum of Art has begun negotiations with Cambodia for the return of a Shiva head allegedly stolen from the site of Angkor and now in the museum's Southeast Asian collection.
© 1996 by the Archaeological Institute of America
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