Archives of the Earth: towards a historiography of the concept of excavation between Antiquarianism and the beginning of Archaeology in Portugal (18th–19th century)

Abstract

This paper seeks to discuss the evolution of the act of excavation for the recovery of the Past between the 18th and the 19th century and its impact on the transition between antiquarianism and archaeology in Portugal. By conceptualizing long-term excavation and through case studies of excavations from both centuries, carried out by antiquarists, societies, naturalists and archaeologists, we intend to analyze points of contact between objectives, techniques and methods, as well as the role that the recovered materialities have both for the constitution of cabinets, for the eighteenth-century panorama and the beginning of the establishment of collections for Museums, already at the turn of a new century.