Inscriptions of Nature:: Geology and the Naturalization of AntiquityIn the nineteenth century, teams of men began digging the earth like never before. Sometimes this digging'often for sewage, transport, or minerals'revealed human remains. Other times, archeological excavation of ancient cities unearthed prehistoric fossils, while excavations for irrigation canals revealed buried cities. Concurrently, geologists, ethnologists, archaeologists, and missionaries were also digging into ancient texts and genealogies and