Should Metal Detecting Be Legalised In Ireland Too?

If it's illegal then it doesn't seem to be enforced as I've seen a few people out with metal detectors over the years

Maybe he is the metal detector, he can find metal by holding out his hands, and he's worried he might get arrested for accidentally detecting metal 😂

Could there be a limited licensing system through clubs? Some sort of middle ground between free for all and none.

It is legal, but regulated. Just like driving.

The problem is the damage done when digging up the metal. Something of major archeology importance, timber or leather etc, might be destroyed to get something that isn't, an old nail. So it's better to leave it in the ground than have people destroy our history.

What is a "proper hobby?" Are you the hobby police?

Nothing. But any land apt for farming or gardening has already likely been used for that many times. Metal detectorists choose land precisely because they think there may be artefacts of interest there, so they pose a risk to artefacts, and sites, that haven't already been damaged by agricultural, gardening use, etc.

And what about what they destroy before they realise that they have found something of importance?

I'm not trying to hold them to the standards of archaeologist, I'm saying that they shouldn't be digging because they aren't archaeologis.

There's a couple of differences. One is that metal detectorists are specifically looking for artefacts of interest in order to dig them up. The chances of their damaging artefacts/sites by digging them up are therefore somewhat higher than random damage from farming land. Another is that farming use actually has a value that needs to be taken into account; we all like to eat food, and agribusiness is a major economic force in this country. So the risk of damage to sites/artefacts has to be set against that. I don't see any similar countervailing factor to set against the risk of damage from amateur detectoring. Sure, the dectorist himself derives satisfaction/pleasure from pursuing his hobby, but that doesn't have quite the same weight.

Someone specifically looking for something is more likely to damage it than someone destroying the whole field? You get why I'm not getting that argument. Someone walking through a field with a metal detector and using a trowel to dig up and around something is more dangerous than a plough or a digger?

And you say that because farming generates money it's ok? So this priceless heritage that you say we can't trust amateurs with, you're ok with destroying it for spuds? Because apparently you're fine with ploughing up a field but not letting someone with a metal detector at it.

I think you just don't like amateurs and are a bit of a snob. Let people do this. Get a course that they can do. Get a register that they have to fill out before they do it so that it can be tracked. Get an escalation process in place so they can contact archaeologists when they find something and the site needs to be examined. They can be a valuable addition to the archaeology community. Don't gate-keep and look down on them.

Why does the UK accomodate it legally? Don't the same concerns apply there about contextual damage?

Are they prepared to take on more regulatory oversight?

https://www.newforestnpa.gov.uk/visiting/visitor-information/metal-detecting/#:~:text=Under%20UK%20law%20there%20is,you%20find%20on%20their%20land.

Wow, that was certainly a cunning plan!

Could he be looking for lost keys or something?

I have a little spade which I use when camping, basically to sh*t in the woods. Or bury greenwaste like banana skins at the roadside.

Never found any archaeology! Because I usually choose a bit of ground where somebody has dug already, eg, edge of a ploughed field or off the path in woodland.

Am I destroying heritage? Don't think so...

I also have a metal detector - have used it on the beach. Mostly bottle tops and rusty nails, a couple of small coins like 2p.

Also in a garden to find a lost engagement ring.

It is nonsensical to propose that I'm some sort of Indiana Jones, throwing vital ancient finds over my shoulder as I mine for treasure. It just isn't so! A trowel or small spade? Anyone digging foundations for a shed will go much deeper!

The vandals who would do so, are doing so already, by night, with dark torches and dogs.

Much better if it was sensibly regulated - like by a simple training course, a certificate, a licensed club. Or something reasonable like this - not just a diehard change-phobic NIMBY!

Meanwhile, in County Carlow: there is a huge, amazing, massive cromlech called the Brownshill Dolmen. Biggest one in Ireland. Never been excavated.

It used to have near neighbours in the form of two other monuments - in the fields nearby. These are now gone - just disappeared. Presumably ploughed under by the owner, to gain more land, with never a word said by anyone about preserving ancient remains or anything cultural like that.

Seriously doubt if it was metal-detectorists who managed to bury two megalithic sites with their little trowels.

i didnt say there was.😏

I just said the lad was walking the whole beach....

Can you point out the location of the other two on the old OSI historical map viewer? That map is from the 1840's and there is no mention of any other one that I can see.

Or are you blaming farmers ploughing the land pre-1840 for the disappearance of an old monument? Your confident anecdote presents it like these monuments disappeared within living memory. They may have - I'm just asking you where they are on that old map

Ewan McGregor did well out of it though

It was a silly argument to begin with but looks even sillier if it is effectively - "there used to be something there a few thousand years ago. It disappeared somehow at least more than 180 years ago. Therefore I am attributing that to some farmer ploughing his land and that consequently entitles me to go off on a "treasure hunting" spree damaging the sh1t out of any historica monument I like because I watched too many issues of Time Team on the telly and bought a metal detector in Lidl for 20 quid"

It's ok, they forgot to bundle it with a spade...

Yeah. He's a demon for it.