C is for Context

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"Context" is surroundings in which an artifact is found. It can provide important clues about how people used it and why it was important to them.

Without context, an artifact has little meaning to an archaeologist (for example, it might not mean much if you found an empty soda can along the side of a busy highway, but it could very important if you found one inside of a ancient Egyptian tomb that you believed had been sealed and undisturbed for thousands of years).

When archaeologists excavate a site, they remove artifacts from their context, so it's very important that they record as much information as they can about where the artifacts were found. This can be used later when the archaeologists analyze the data to look for patterns ...