4 ms·

Perhaps I can share a different perspective. I like unrestored ruins. I perceive a restoration as admixture of modern techniques and fresh touch onto an old and

by avz 6y ago

Perhaps I can share a different perspective. I like unrestored ruins. I perceive a restoration as admixture of modern techniques and fresh touch onto an old and genuine core, and a recreation as a modern construction made to look old. When I explore those without having noticed or been forewarned about their true origins I feel cheated. When I do notice or someone tells me they really are new, I still feel they are inauthentic. I suppose I expect to see not just how people lived in the past, but also to see the effect that time has had on what they made. I like looking at a fragment of a wall and contemplate the amount of time that separates me from the folks who put it up. Knowledge that the wall was built in my lifetime just completely ruins it for me (no pun intended). That said, I did see some great recreations and I learnt much more about the past from them than I had from ruins. Some folks do impressive amount of research about what life used to be like and recreations are probably the best way for them to share what they learnt.

bklaasen 6y ago
Agreed. The 'reconstruction' at Knossos on Crete[1] is a tragedy. Reinforced concrete everywhere, truncated walls capped with cement and an entirely invented upper storey. The reconstructed fascia on the Neolithic burial mound at Newgrange in Ireland[2] is almost as bad: "a bit brutal, a bit overdone, kind of like Stalin does the Stone Age". In contrast, the slowly-eroding, uninterpreted mud-brick Khorezm fortressess in the Karakalpakstan region of Uzbekistan are highly evocative. The scale of the defensive fortresses tell you so much about the wealth and organization of the clans who built them. They stand magnificently alone in the desert. There's no interpretive centre, no gift shop. You'll have an entire fortress to yourself, where you can spend hours picking through millions of ancient potsherds. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knossos_(modern_history) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knossos_(modern_history) [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newgrange https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newgrange [3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorezm_fortresses https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorezm_fortresses

by avz 6y ago

bklaasen 6y ago

Agreed. The 'reconstruction' at Knossos on Crete[1] is a tragedy. Reinforced concrete everywhere, truncated walls capped with cement and an entirely invented upper storey. The reconstructed fascia on the Neolithic burial mound at Newgrange in Ireland[2] is almost as bad: "a bit brutal, a bit overdone, kind of like Stalin does the Stone Age". In contrast, the slowly-eroding, uninterpreted mud-brick Khorezm fortressess in the Karakalpakstan region of Uzbekistan are highly evocative. The scale of the defensive fortresses tell you so much about the wealth and organization of the clans who built them. They stand magnificently alone in the desert. There's no interpretive centre, no gift shop. You'll have an entire fortress to yourself, where you can spend hours picking through millions of ancient potsherds. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knossos_(modern_history) https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knossos_(modern_history) [2] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newgrange https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Newgrange [3] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorezm_fortresses https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorezm_fortresses