ELi5 : Why does it seem a lot of archeology began so recently in the 20th and 19th centuries? Why weren’t we digging up stuff much earlier?

Question

It seems many of the most important archeological findings were in the 20th and 19th century. Why did humans wait so long to start digging stuff up?

In: 961

Answer 1

Ancient Egyptian society already studied even older Egyptian society. We’ve always been interested in the past. There are museums that are themselves archeological findings. Maybe your impression comes from politics and economics. What we found in the last two centuries feels more important, because what we found before has been forgotten again, or is considered boring common sense.