Diligent Excavator
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Magic: The Gathering
Mana cost
DominariaDOM · #51
- Card type
- Creature — Human Artificer
- Rarity
- Uncommon
- Indicative price
- 0.11 € · ★ 0.43 € · 0.31 $ · ★ 0.33 $
- Mana value
- 2
- Power
- 1
- Toughness
- 3
- Colour
- Blue
Card text
Whenever you cast a historic spell, target player mills two cards. (Artifacts, legendaries, and Sagas are historic.)
Format legality
- BrawlLegal
- CommanderLegal
- DuelLegal
- GladiatorLegal
- HistoricLegal
- LegacyLegal
- ModernLegal
- OathbreakerLegal
- PennyLegal
- PioneerLegal
- TimelessLegal
- VintageLegal
Legalities follow the imported catalogue; check format rules before a tournament.
Data imported on 2026-10-06 (UTC).
Indicative Scryfall prices, updated daily. ★: foil; ★ E: etched foil. EUR and USD represent different markets.
Printing information
- Illustrator
- Mark Behm
- Card language
- English
- Release date
- 2018-04-27
Flavour text
Archaeologists don't just dig in the dirt. They excavate time, scraping off the years grain by grain.
Rulings
A card, spell, or permanent is historic if it has the legendary supertype, the artifact card type, or the Saga subtype. Having two of those qualities doesn’t make an object more historic than another or provide an additional bonus—an object either is historic or it isn’t.
An ability that triggers “whenever you cast a historic spell” doesn’t trigger if a historic card is put onto the battlefield without being cast.
Lands are never cast, so abilities that trigger “whenever you cast a historic spell” won’t trigger if you play a legendary land. They also won’t trigger if a card on the battlefield transforms into a legendary land, as the Ixalan and Rivals of Ixalan double-faced cards do.
Some abilities trigger “whenever you cast a historic spell.” Such an ability resolves before the spell that caused it to trigger. It resolves even if that spell is countered.