Creative Writing Prompt: Archaeology Stories

Archaeology is the study of human activity in the past. Usually, archaeologists find objects and think about them. They look at the environmental data that people of the past have left behind. This can include artifacts or objects, and even buildings.


Archaeologists often have the puzzle pieces, but no picture: they don't know what some objects were used for, or what some details might mean. For example, the Egyptian Pharaoh Tutankhamun died very mysteriously at the age of 19, over 3000 years ago.

There were hundreds of weird stories about his death, including snakebite, murder, and many others. To add to the weirdness surrounding his death, when they opened his sarcophagus in the early 1900s, they discovered his body had been burned! It wasn't until 2013 that they figured out why: a combination of chemicals in the embalming fluid and the linens that wrapped his body created friction and caught fire. The Egyptians would not have understood why that happened, so they would have made up stories to explain it. However, archaeologists were able to figure it out!


Can you imagine what an archaeologist 3000 years in the future might think of the things you own? Their lives will be so different! Maybe they won't have electricity, because they'll have replaced fuel with solar power, or some kind of battery. Maybe there won't be any children, because they've figured out how to beat the effects of ageing. Maybe everyone will live in space, and no one will know how to garden. Maybe they have never seen snow.

Your job today will be to tell the story of a future archaeologist discovering something from today and trying to ask questions to figure out what it is. You will have to think about how their life has changed from yours, and then try to think how a total stranger to your every way might ask questions about the object:
What does it look like? (does it still have all of its original colours? Has it been damaged by weather?)
What was it used for? (how can he or she tell?)
Was it important? (maybe people used it for worship, or to vote, or to count, or eat, or play, etc)
Who owned it? (kings and queens? Children?)
Was it a toy or a tool?
Remember when you tell your story that an archaeologist doesn't always have all the information, so sometimes they get things wrong!
What kinds of details might they get right?
What might they get wrong?


Here are some weird and random objects that just might stump an archaeologist from the future. You can pick one of these, or anything else you think might make an archaeologist from 3000 years in the future really scratch their heads!

• silly putty
• a picture of a polar bear
  
• a toy from a sandbox
  
• an Ipod / IPad
  
• an origami frog
  
• plant labels from a garden
  
• a Barbie doll shoe
  
• a yo-yo
  
• a CD
  
• a pencil
  
• a potato peeler
  
• an empty tube of lipstick (the lipstick would be all gone, probably!)
  
• a picture of you in a frame
  
• a snowshoe
  
• a fork
  
• a pair of earrings made of keyboard letters
  

How do you explain purple??!!

What if all you ever found was Cilantro?

Imagine if ten years AFTER you find this, you find a picture of people crossing the a white expanse with big long sticks attached to their feet. Do you instantly make the connection? How do you explain the white stuff?