Heritage Victoria’s Conservator Susanna Collis explains how an archaeological excavation in itself damages the artefacts it produces. The bone toothbrushes were a particular challenge to conserve.

Click Here to listen to archaeologist Dr Sarah Hayes talk about nineteenth century toothbrushes.

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TRANSCRIPT

SUSANNA COLLIS: I guess bone, it's classed as an inorganic material, but in saying that, it came from an organic source, so it's very fragile. It's likely to warp and crack and split, and therefore, you'll lose the object completely.

So with the bone element, when the objects are excavated, it's unavoidable, but they do dry out. And so the change in the conditions very quickly takes it out of equilibrium, and therefore, the material suffered. So the material can be damaged slightly by excavation, by the process, but that's to be expected.

And 150 years old, they're not doing too badly now. They're very nicely housed and stored in a stable environment. So that's the best that can be done for those.