ABSTRACT
There are two major directions when managing underwater cultural heritage: preservation for knowledge and market place for profit. However, there is a dilemma when something falls in the middle. This conflict will be explored in this chapter: underwater cultural heritage management is mainly concerned with preserving the historical and archaeological values of sites and artefacts against the forces of development and the commercial market. However, the use of underwater cultural heritage artefacts for purposes other than historical research raise questions about the ethical management of these heritage sites and artefacts. Recently, this controversial question has been raised, considering that underwater cultural heritage could present a double value: the inherent historical value of the objects and the unique chemical and physical properties of the materials that constitute the object. A prime example of this duality is ancient lead: lead from the Greek and Roman eras that has been under water may provide information on early metallurgical processes as well as commercial routes and ancient manufacturing companies. However, ancient lead also retains extremely high levels of purity which is difficult to achieve by modern materials or commercial means.
