The Roman mosaic I fumbled with a garden hose in my own backyard

So I found this loose tile in my garden in Bristol about 3 months ago, and I got all excited thinking it might be Roman (you know, because of the Bath connection nearby). I started digging around it with a trowel, real careful like, and I uncovered a small patch of what looked like a real mosaic floor. I was so stoked I called the local museum and everything, and they told me to keep it damp and wait for an archaeologist. But then I got impatient, grabbed my garden hose to spray off the dirt, and I blasted the thing at full pressure. The water hit that old mortar and the whole section just crumbled apart into little pieces right in front of me. I felt like such an idiot standing there with the hose still running. Has anyone else accidentally wrecked a find by using the wrong cleaning method or tools?

3 comments

3 Comments

ben_fisher7d agoMost Upvoted

You found it yourself, so it was yours to wreck however you wanted.

perry.jesse7d ago

Did you ever have a friend who found an old guitar in their attic and just went at it with spray paint without even checking if it was valuable? Right after they painted it hot pink, someone told them it was a vintage 1960s Martin worth like four grand. Man, they were crushed, but I mean, it was theirs to mess up from the moment they found it.

kimdixon7d ago

Man, that guitar story is brutal... @perry.jesse it's like the sparkly paint version of me blasting that mosaic to bits. I can just picture someone doing that with a vintage instrument, not realizing they're sanding off the original finish or something. It's always the stuff you don't know that gets you, right? Makes you wish they came with warning labels...