Transcript
Speaker: You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. On the targeting of Ukrainian archaeological heritage.
Speaker: The unprovoked Russian attack on Ukraine in the end of February 2022 marks the largest armed conflict in Europe since the Second World War, and at least 6 million Ukrainians had to flee their home country.
Speaker: Unfortunately, we've gotten too familiar with daily reports of human suffering by nightly drone attacks or missile strikes, and at the same time I'm still horrified with what happened in Buccha or the airstrike on the Marupol theater, for example. However, this war also damaged or destroyed many archaeological sites and museums featuring the rich cultural heritage in eastern and southern Ukraine.
Speaker: In all this tragedy, one could maybe say that archaeology shouldn't matter so much. However, I would argue that the archaeological study is an encounter with the unknown, which in turn can significantly affect our understanding of the diversity of human behavior.
Speaker: Attitudes towards archaeological sites could be seen as a litmus test of civilization. It reflects tolerance and respect for other cultures. For this reason, archaeological knowledge is a very effective tool in the struggle against xenophobia, as my friend and one of the guests of today's episode, Dr. Pavlov Shidlovsky so eloquently wrote. And here's already a teaser of our conversation.
Speaker: A lot of values were stolen, not by illegal groups, but by the politics of Russian state. Because such big museums, such big museums as Herzog, Meditopol, Mariopol, these big museums were robbed by the Russian state. It was the program
Speaker: It was special soldiers who took away all the exhibits, and these exhibits were transferred to Crimea to occupy Donetsk and Russia.
Speaker: Before we get into it more specifically, it is important to keep in mind that Russia has signed the Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in the event of an armed conflict. This convention requires states to take steps to protect cultural property in the event of war.
Speaker: However, as we will explore in this episode, since 2014, Russia systematically neglects the requirements of this international treaty. Because in this ongoing war, cultural heritage has become one of the most vulnerable segments of social life.
Speaker: most notably the looting of museum collections in the occupied territories, as dozens of regional museums were looted among the most famous are the ones of Gerson, Melitopol and Marupol. For example, the Melitopol Museum was previously known for having an important collection of Scythian gold artifacts, which we actually covered in an earlier episode of this podcast.
Speaker: and the Mariupol Museum held a collection of archaeological objects from the excavations of the famous Mariupol Neolithic cemetery. This site was found in 1930 during the construction of the now famous Azovstal factory and became eponymous for a whole type of Neolithic graves in the region.
Speaker: The Mariupol Museum suffered significantly during the fighting that took place in the city, and those unique artefacts from the Neolithic cemetery that remained were looted, as it was reported that they were transported to occupied Donetsk. In addition, Russian claims have already appeared that they, quote, rescued the mentioned Scythian gold artefacts or the objects from the Mariupol Museum.
Speaker: In addition, in the territories currently undergoing military operations in Ukraine, also active and extensive landscape transformations are taking place. This is associated with both the direct consequences of damage by mines, artillery shells or rockets, as well as with the constructions of fortifications, most notably extensive trench systems.
Speaker: This has direct impact on archaeological sites as my guests of this episode published some really striking pictures of archaeological monuments like burial mounds, ramparts and hill forts being used for military positions or being covered with modern craters from artillery hits.
Speaker: However, one needs to also keep in mind that the mentioned landscape transformation can also lead to the discovery of new archaeological sites. But due to very understandable reasons, archaeological fieldwork and research has largely stopped in Ukraine. In addition, in the now liberated areas there is a huge risk of landmines.
Speaker: Nevertheless, my guests of this episode are actively working to address this and many more issues, and I am very happy to welcome Dr. Pavlov Shidlovsky and Dr. Marta Andrijevic. They are both archaeologists originally from the Tarasz Shevchenko University in Kiev,
Speaker: and I know them since many years as we were part of a joint research project trying to bring together archaeologists from Switzerland, Russia, Macedonia and Ukraine starting all the way back in 2015.
Speaker: Pablo and Marta, thank you very much for taking the time for this conversation. First, if you don't mind to share, how has this conflict so far affected your personal and also professional lives?
Speaker: Yes, thank you. Of course, the start of R influenced a lot of other lives. Also, even for me being abroad, that was a huge life event with change everything.
Speaker: And I would like to start that also for the 21st of February, 2022, for this day was scheduled at my PhD defense. And that was, you know, like, any PhD defense is quite emotional event in personal terms and in academical terms, you know, like, it's quite a day for everyone.
Speaker: And that was such a coincidence, you know, like I was nervous a week before my defense about defense, but in the same time, we already had a context because Paulo also to come to us in Bern to be present in during my PhD defense in person, it was hard to believe. Yeah. But, you know, people,
Speaker: not always expect something better and sometimes the decline reality. But unfortunately, during those week of beginning of war, before war, before a PhD defense, all planes to Ukraine and from Ukraine were canceled. So when you
Speaker: in three days before that, for example, Pablo can't join us in Bern. But can you imagine all other emotional feelings in the morning on 24th February? That was a shock and surprise for everyone because all cities in Ukraine were
Speaker: under attack, but with all organizations and a bit of luck, we were able to make my PhD defense quite successfully.
Speaker: Yes, but also, congratulations. Thank you very much. But also, you know, like, it was absolutely not typical day for PhD defense, because besides those one hour of defense, I was also provided with other questions, which were related to my family safety, to safety of my close friends. And Pablo, how have you experienced this this day?
Speaker: As for me, the impact of the war for me, I have no difference between personal and professional life. In fact, because as any scientist and as any teacher, you see that your work is coming to your personal life anyways. When this war starts in 24th of February last year,
Speaker: It was a shock for me, and I was asked by Swiss colleagues to be present on modern defense, and that is why we held this event, we held this defense, and the rocket flying upon my head, and the obolone upon our district in Kiev, and first,
Speaker: uh, strikes first, uh, uh, in Oberloin. So after this defense, I very quickly, we gathered our things, uh, our children go to the car and go escape out of here because, uh, on the outskirts of Eve, uh, there wasn't buttons in the first days. So, uh, that is why it was, uh, very, very stressed and very
Speaker: complicated time to combine the professional and personal life. So, of course, the science stopped. The first time the science stopped at all and science stopped in archaeology. Of course, all
Speaker: field works were canceled. So maybe only several field works that was connected to the building processes was canceled last summer. In other way, in other way, so in education, in field work and in science, there was like a collapse. But after when I returned to PF in autumn, we need to,
Speaker: start the process with archaeology to understand, just understand what impact of war to archaeology, what was the impact of hostilities, what were the impact of bombing, rocket fire, and so on on archaeological sites. And we start to communicate, to think with different people, with different people from
Speaker: different organizations to start the process of monitoring, recording the damage, recording of the damage. And now, in Ukrainian archaeology, we can observe some shift, some shift from academic science, from academics research, from academic expedition, expeditions to monitoring, recording and
Speaker: to heritage protection expeditions and heritage protection activities. So this is the main vector for the moment in Ukraine, Ukrainian archaeology. The situation from one side is quite difficult. On the other side, we try to elaborate some algorithms, algorithms for protection, algorithms for evacuation of museum forms.
Speaker: Yeah, that actually brings me to my second question. Pavlo, you wrote that one goal of Putin's war against Ukraine is the destruction of your identity, history, and also public memory, and that therefore objects of cultural heritage have become a special target.
Speaker: Which are, for you, the prime examples of such a specific targeting? Examples, a lot of examples. Because we know from the front line, the evidence of people who lived on the nearby front line, we know that the churches is the first target in the village. So, firstly, enemies shoot on churches.
Speaker: The next, when some territories were occupied, first target is the local museums and libraries. It's like a program of our enemy. They take off all Ukrainian literature from the libraries. And from other side, they bring their Russian literature to our library. So in occupied territory.
Speaker: We know the special examples when the U .S. Library in Chernigov was bombed by several very, very powerful bombs. I don't know exactly because I'm not military soldiers. It's as a half of a ton bombed
Speaker: Monasteries, Orthodox monasteries became a target. And the special example is a special bombing of Sotahirsk Monastery in Donetsk region. And several days before, there was Odessa Cathedral destroyed by the direct target. So as for me, for the moment, we can say that
Speaker: all international laws about like a blue shield system and so on, that we need to mark on the maps that cultural heritage buildings, they not, for the moment, these laws not work here because any target on the map or any mark on the map, it's a target for the enemy.
Speaker: And we know that museums, historical buildings, churches, is the first target because they have the GPS. And that is why, yes, we understand that Putin told that Ukrainians are absent, that there's a common people, common nation, Russians and so on, that Ukrainians are not exist at all.
Speaker: And that is why our heritage, our Ukrainian heritage, yes, it is in target and under the bomb between the first case, yes.
Speaker: I would like to add several words to show you even worse case of this, because they would like not only vanish Ukrainian nation and Ukrainian heritage. Some churches, you know, like Russia is quite orthodox country. Their value of religion is very high. So, you know, like people quite respectful about their church.
Speaker: And in Ukraine, for a long time, a big conflict between the churches. We also have Orthodox Church, but we also had Ukrainian Orthodox Church, which is in direct connection to Istanbul, like, World Orthodox Church. And that was a conflict that
Speaker: Ukrainians don't want to be under the Church of Moscow, which also had direct connection to the Istanbul Church. And we did this separation because, you know, church is a very important machine which influences human minds. And what I would like to tell is that some of historical monuments, like churches, like Fyatogorska Lavra,
Speaker: they were under Moscow, so under Moscow Church. And you need to understand that they not only would like to finish those part which belongs directly to Ukraine, the objects which had double history, so you know, history, not linear sink, it is Ukrainian period, Moscow period, conflicts between
Speaker: Kiev and Moscow, it's like more than 400 years. And for example, this Tszatogorska Lavra was quite in respect for Russians for a long time. And they not only destroyed Ukrainian value, Ukrainian history, but they don't want to have anything in common with us. So they destroyed those churches and cities, which like 10 years ago, they told a high
Speaker: respect and you know like they declare a lot of people from russian came to ukraine to visit these places to pray in these places you know but now they prefer to vanish all country just to tell that nothing was there no churches no respect the same what happened with odessa on 20th july
Speaker: of July. They target the church which was also under Russian, like under Moscow church. They target UNESCO center of the city. I think that the question is not what a kind of church, what a patriarch belongs on direct church. It's a question about
Speaker: The attitude for our culture is a question to destroy all social values, to destroy infrastructure, to destroy economically important objects like a Kafka hydroelectric plant, and to destroy important symbolic building, symbolic
Speaker: things and so on. It's like a shantash, I don't know on English, like shantash. And to show the powerful of Russians, yes, the power of Russians, a big country, we are a country civilization, as Putin says, to show this powerful machine which destroys everything. So I think that the message is in this and that.
Speaker: And maybe coming from the more to the archaeological heritage. In the same sense, you wrote that during the Russian attack and now in the now occupied territories, activities of criminal groups who illegally obtain archaeological artifacts with the intent of selling them to private collectors or
Speaker: whatever you want to call them, have risen significantly. Do you have some cases where people were actually caught for stealing artifacts or of stolen artifacts that re -emerged somehow? I have no real examples because I'm not a specialist in this moving of cultural values abroad and so on.
Speaker: The first thing that we can tell that we have enough information the more. We know that, you see, maybe you heard about Samuel N. Jihardi who traced the movement of different ecological things abroad and so on. And he told us that, sorry, but these guys who are criminals, war criminals,
Speaker: warfare sellers and so on. So these names are quite known by different organizations such as Interpol and so on. So the market of illegal ecological things, it's a very criminal market compared to drug market compared to people market.
Speaker: And he told me that he knows the names of these people, but sorry, he cannot speak because he gathered information for another organization. But anyway, we can say that this is, yes, such groups are working on occupied territory.
Speaker: A lot of values were stolen, not by illegal groups, but by the politics of Russian state. Because such big museums, such big museums as Herzog, Meditopol, Mariopol, these big museums were robbed by the Russian state. It was the program.
Speaker: It was special, special soldiers who took away all the exhibits. And these exhibits were transferred to Crimea to occupy Donetsk and to Russia. And now even they speak about some excavations of Crimean artifacts in Saint -Petersburg. Excavations of some artifacts from
Speaker: Skitian gold in St. Petersburg or in Moscow. So it's a politics, it's not an illegal groups, it's a political groups. Yes, official groups and of course it's a big damage for our archaeology, loss of archaeology, because all collections
Speaker: collections. You see this is not just a so -called black archaeology when some groups with metal detectors going on burial mounds and so on, but this is total collections which are transported to another country.
Speaker: and they transported it and they use these actions as a propaganda because they told that they are, they have a rescue, they have a rescue actions for these collections, for these exhibits. But in fact, this is not a rescue. Yeah, maybe.
Speaker: You mentioned it before already. You created a working group to address the issue of archaeological sites being discovered during this ongoing conflict. Can you maybe describe some of the work that this archaeological landscapes monitoring group is currently carrying out? Yes, the main focus of this group is to firstly understand
Speaker: the scale, the scale of destructions, the scale of damage to the landscape. Psychology, firstly, is the landscape. We have several initiatives. Some of these initiatives, they tried to fix, tried to record damage from the satellite, from the Google Earth, but
Speaker: Our group, archaeological landscape monitoring group, focused on the field war. Firstly, we can say that archaeological sites destroyed by the direct bombing, direct fire, direct hostilities. Even around here, we have big territories which were damaged by direct fire.
Speaker: The second case, it's even not only on the territory which was on the front line or under occupation, it's the whole territory of Ukraine was covered by different dugouts, trenches, and so on. Even in the western part of Ukraine, we have checkpoints, we have dugouts, and so on, because in the first months of war, we didn't know in what directions
Speaker: our enemy will go. And that is why our country was covered by the network of these fences. And of course, of course, the mostly significant places in topography was damaged. And these significant places in topography, it's usually there's burial mounds,
Speaker: hill forts, walls, and so on. So this is archaeologically places. And we know that even now we compare the maps of medieval hill forts.
Speaker: And the map of front line in Second World War and front line in modern days war, we see that this front line sometimes goes by the same points. And that is why many ecological site was damaged, hill forts, burial mounds and so on.
Speaker: because they used as fire points, observation points in modern war. And first focus was to go in field and to check because I was here, now I'm in Kanyev district and I was here in territorial defense service. And I made these dugouts and made these trenches or military proposed
Speaker: And now I am here to check for the presence of cultural layers in these branches and the gout. And firstly, it was a checking of medieval hill forts around Kiev and Chernigov. In Kiev and Chernigov regions, some parts of them was occupied and it was damaged due to hostilities.
Speaker: And yes, we focused on fieldwork. We're going directly to the site. We know that there was a bombing of this site, or there was a dugout, so branches and so on. Sometimes we do the 3D model of damage and hill forts. So we made this work. And for the moment, we have two branches. One branch is a cave, a regional branch.
Speaker: And another is the Chernigiv Regional Branch. And now, this year, we're trying to scale our work. We have, for the moment, appeared at the Kerson branch of this archaeological landscapes monitoring group.
Speaker: And contrary to other groups, contrary to other projects, we are focusing on field work. So as for us, we need to not only to record the changes of landscape, which can be made from the satellite, yes, but we need to make a cultural and chronological attribution of that layers that was damaged.
Speaker: So this can be done only by direct presence on site. So in the beginning of the war, you helped to build these trenches and fortifications. And now you're actually going back to the same positions to record archaeological discoveries. Yes. In the first months of war, I occurred here in Kanyev region with my family because it
Speaker: This region is south from Kiev, so it was a quite calm region, contrary to Kiev territory. But anyway, here is by Kanyev Hydroelectric Station, Kanyev Hydroelectric Plant, and this plant also was one of the important infrastructure objects
Speaker: of Central Ukraine. And we organized here with the local people, with the local peasants, farmers, and workers, and so organized territorial defense surveys. And we made different fortifications around this Kanyuk hydroelectric station. Yes, it was armed.
Speaker: I need to train to use different armory. Yes, we have trainings, we have shootings and so on. And organized in different groups, different checkpoints. And I tried to combine.
Speaker: online education with students and working on checkpoints at night, around kind of region. So I guess that was quite hard to combine education and military work, but anyway, all our country was like this. And many archeologists, you asked me about
Speaker: personal and professional impact. But as for me, it's both. I cannot make a difference when you started a conference about protection of archaeological sites in Kiev. And this conference interrupted by the rocket fire to Kiev. And there was a first blackout in Kiev, 23 of November. And no internet
Speaker: No light, no electricity, no heating, and so on. Totally blackout in university in the center of here. Yes, of course. And you tried to understand what happened with your family, tried to phone, to wife, to children, and so on. But first plan was to hold all the conference.
Speaker: How can we make the difference between personal and professional when your friends, your colleagues go to the front line and now many, many archaeologists and many, many of my colleagues and my friends now are in armed forces of Ukraine, directly on the front line, and some of them, some of them, unfortunately, died.
Speaker: cannot explain. We used to be in this situation more than one year. We are in war, and each day we and our children listen information, read about deaths, about losses of civilian people. It's everything. It's everyday life at the moment in Ukraine.
Speaker: because every day we have shooting by different means of civic objects. People can do nothing. Military service is doing their best job ever. They're doing everything they're able to do. And that's true, like each Ukrainian has someone from family who are in front lines in the most horrible places ever.
Speaker: There are no person in Ukraine who told you that they lost nobody. Everyone lost someone. And that's horrible because it is today 519th day of war. And even now I am in archaeological expedition here in Kanyev region. And I know many guys around who was in territorial defense service and many local people goes to frontline now.
Speaker: And yesterday, or maybe two days ago, our expedition gave him money for a local peasant, a local farmer. His son now in Siversk, directly near Bakhmud, directly on the front line, and he asked, you know,
Speaker: It's unusual for us because our scientific organization, Center for Polynological Research, this scientific organization gives money even for uniform and now for binoculars. So just people from our expedition gives money for the arm.
Speaker: In 2015, we were excavating together a wetland site in the swamps of Smolensk in Western Russia. And in 2017, you organized a really interesting workshop in Kiev with archaeologists from many different countries, including some researchers from Russia. Do you think something like this will be possible again in the future once this terrible war is over?
Speaker: As for me, I will be not ready. The conversation with the scientists will not escape from Russia. Because as for me, Russia represents a narcissistic and absolutely Nazi regime.
Speaker: And each scientist, each historian, in common sense, historian, because archaeologist is a historian, too. Each historian, he serve the Parinda machine of this Nazi state. So if they don't live, if they don't escape from Russia, as for me, they just, you see, in our countries, as in Ukraine, and it is in Russia, there is not a private archaeology
Speaker: All archaeology is governmental. It's a state organization, state institutions, such as Hermitage, such as the Russian Academy of Science, and so on. So they are included in this NASI, in this fascistic machine, this system. They are representatives of this machine. That is why I will not be ready to speak with them anyway.
Speaker: Even I will not ready to explain them why. Another case when scientists are escape and they go away from these organizations, state organizations and escape from Russia, it's another case.
Speaker: Even the head of Hermit, in 1914, we have a joint expedition with Hermitage. You remember? No, yes. The other was expedition organized by Hermitage, but we know exactly that the head of the Hermitage, Piotrowski, is a quite propagandistic figure. He made the messages that
Speaker: He also on the war, he also made his cultural war for the Russian world. So how can I speak with the representatives of Hermitage? Yeah, in the same time, they continue excavation in Kersones and Crimea, for example.
Speaker: despite the war. They're just doing their job and like their job is their propaganda, unfortunately. People who left and who stayed, you know, because that's not only people, scientists should escape from Russia, but they should state that they not support Russia because this pro -pancantistic way in which
Speaker: They kind of continue in manipulation, but they're not agreed on the world. Their own words and beliefs that say the Russians doing bad stuff and this war is
Speaker: unreasonable and there's no, no, when only people who are able to tell that this is wrong, did not support, we don't want to be linked, you know, we don't want to use affiliation. Maybe these people, we can continue work. You know, there are a lot of people who are in Russian and they do nothing. They just pretend
Speaker: that they have no access to news, they would like to change nothing, unfortunately. And another aspect is just a scientific aspect. We know that Russia is a very totalitarian, autocratic state. In this state, there is no any research which can be, contrary to the official version,
Speaker: How can we believe for the results of their scientific research? And how can we use the results when we understand that all scientific and media are included in the propaganda system?
Speaker: For the moment, for me, it's a question, how can I use information about neolithic pottery or calibration by the Leningrad or St. Petersburg laboratory for C14 dating? I don't know exactly. How can I believe the results? Because if these results included, build it in the whole system of propaganda machine.
Speaker: That was very, very interesting. Thank you. Thank you very much, Marta and Pavlo, for taking the time to speak with me. And I wish you the best of luck. And I hope that we can meet again in the future soon, hopefully, in course. Thank you.
Speaker: Thank you, Noah. Thank you for organizing for us this meeting. It is very important to share our experience.
Speaker: Alright, that's it for this episode. Given the ongoing situation, I thought it was an important aspect to highlight, especially as this war enters its third year already. In that sense, I want to thank again Pavlo and Marta for sharing their experiences and insights, and just for reference, we recorded the interview in August of 2023.
Speaker: I'm sorry it took me so long to release new episodes of this podcast, but I was busy finishing my PhD thesis. But now, season 2 is ready, and as the new episodes will sometimes be over one hour long, I decided to rename the podcast to Archaeological Context. In addition, I am very happy that it is now part of the APN, the Archaeology Podcast Network.
Speaker: In that sense, I hope you will tune in in about two weeks for another edition of Archaeological Context with Dr. Noah.
Speaker: This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www .archpodnet .com. Contact us at chrisatarchaeologypodcastnetwork .com.
