The partially preserved body provided information about health and physical condition.

The woven materials offered evidence of technical skill.

Food remains and environmental evidence helped reconstruct subsistence.

Dating associated objects helped refine chronology.

But the process also demonstrated a weakness in archaeological practice: once a collection enters a museum, the meaning assigned to it can change dramatically as new techniques emerge.

When the Wheelers found the burial in 1940, they could not perform accelerator mass spectrometry dating, isotope analysis, genome sequencing, or many of the other methods available today.

They collected according to the standards and expectations of their time.

Decades later, scientists could ask questions no one in 1940 imagined.

That means old museum collections can become scientifically more valuable over time.

It also means retention can become self-perpetuating.