SEAArch - The Southeast Asian Archaeology Newsblog

17 May 2006 (Mail & Guardian Online) -

Cambodia’s tomb raiders threaten Iron Age heritage

As tomb raiders plunder Iron Age treasures — beads, gold ornaments and even the bones from burial mounds — archaeologists warn that Cambodia’s rich pre-Angkorian heritage will be completely lost within three years.

Hundreds, if not more, of the 4 000 or so documented sites across the country have already been torn apart, most often by desperately poor farmers urged on by middlemen who sell the artefacts at huge mark-ups in Cambodia’s cities or on the black market abroad.

Related Books:
Archaeology and archaeozoology of Phum Snay: a late prehistoric cemetery in Northwestern Cambodia by D. J. W. O’Reilly

Tags: Cambodia archaeology, Iron Age Cambodia, looting

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