Merrell :

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After 175 years? But surely there could have been various forms of contamination from other sources during this time?

We're not talking DNA testing here.

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This is a false quandary. Your question is formulated in such a way as to presume that an unwillingness to encourage anyone to engaged in unwarranted disturbance of delicate archaeological artefacts is to be interpreted as an unwillingness for the 'truth to be known'.

Yes, I see the difference. Archaeologists can dig up, remove, tag, and stuff in a drawer, human skeletons because they aren't "delicate". How much wood, jewelry, pottery, bones, etc, do they "disturb" in the name of history ? Well that must be "warranted" since none of those items are "delicate". BUT taking a 1/2" swab of paint from a hieroglyph would certainly disturb the delicate artifact. Lets remove the skeletons from ancient graves, but heaven forbid we take a dab of paint.

Illogical