Riddle of the Sphinx: Problems in Archaeology

The Sphinx's Riddle of Today: 

Sphinx in the Metropolitan Museum

With pointed fangs I sit in wait

With piercing force I dole out fate

Over bloodless victims proclaiming my might

Eternally joining in a singe bite

What am I?

What do you think? A vampire, perhaps? No, its a stapler!

      Archaeology appears to be quite similar to solving such riddles, as we are offered clues from which we hope to divine answers about the past. This little riddle demonstrates to me the problems associated with  archaeology, showing how different things may produce similar results or, in this case, attributes. The vampire and the stapler seem to be quite similar when described this way, without without an intrinsic knowledge of the context, and can be interpreted as completely different things. In my case, I placed my own interpretations and  experiences of  seeing movies, such as Dracula, into the riddle, to come up with the vampire answer, which was entirely different than a stapler. The same may happen in archaeology of the dead, as assumptions are made about the people of the past, based upon clues we find in their graves, yet if we don't know enough about the cultural context and do not take in account individual variability, we may arrive at conclusions which may not be accurate, as they may be biased, due to our own experiences and expectations.