Against Gandalf the Grey: towards a Sherlockian Reading of the History of Archaeological Thought

Contemporary archaeologies are complex and diverse. It was New Archaeology which clearly showed the crucial role of theory in archaeological research (e.g. Binford 1962). Although post-processual archaeologists have been opposed to many ideas of New Archaeology, they have never questioned the need of theories in archaeology (e.g. Thomas 1996; Tilley 1997; Sørenson 2000). However, there are fields of archaeology which do not seem to be closely enough touched by theory. Without any doubt, one of them is the history of archaeological thought (but see Gillberg 2001; Gustafsson 2001; Jensen 2002). When one compares books which deal with the history of archaeology, one can discover that they are structured in a very similar way (e.g. Abramowicz 1991; Baudou 2004; Trigger 2006). In accordance with it, one sees chronological and linear way of writing about the history of archaeology, following hand in hand with cause and effect thinking. Surprisingly, the very same observation concerns theoreticians of archaeology too (Schnapp 1996; Shanks 1996; Thomas 1996; 2004). They are eager to present new ways of doing archaeology, always ready to criticise previous archaeologies, at any moment tempted to theorise on a particular topic. Nonetheless, the history of archaeology is unproblematic, something what resists theoretical reflection. That is why the goal of this paper is to discuss this allegedly unproblematic understanding of the history of archaeology.