What issues are involved in cleaning artifacts?
Artifacts from wet sites have the advantage of being wet already, so in most cases will not be harmed by immersion in water to clean them. If it is determined that surface mud or other deposits should be removed, sometimes dipping the object in a container of water is enough to dislodge the deposits. If the object is particularly large or fragile, loose mud can be cleaned off with a gentle stream or spray of water. The material being washed off should be inspected to make sure no diagnostic deposits are removed. The mud that preserves artifacts so well on waterlogged sites also preserves all kinds of micro-botanical and micro-faunal remains, fatty tissue deposits, and other materials that might not be easily visible or recognizable. It is common to save the mud that is washed off of artifacts, for further analysis. Muddy contents inside ceramic vessels, glass bottles, leather shoes, and other such closed contexts should not be removed without assessing the sampling potential, as these
