If you answered, "the valuable one showcases some artistic talent," you'd be wrong. The difference, of course, is age. Pure age. I'm guessing the artist who drew that petroglyph on that rock was about six years old, and was justifiably spanked by his mother for doing it. But because it happened a thousand years ago, it's valuable. Priceless, in fact.
Second example. Here are two bits of litter I picked up this morning, more-or-less in my front yard:
One is a collection of small pottery shards, with examples of at least four ancient Hopi styles from widely-separated periods. (Not the dime, though. It was just in my pocket.)
The other is an old beer can, the pop-top style dating it to the very late sixties to mid-seventies.
One is an interesting, if locally common, archaeological find. The other is litter that sat out too long. What's the difference? Age again. I may have actually damaged the cultural inheritance of future generations this morning, when I picked up that beer can and chucked it in the trash. If I'd let it sit another thousand years or so, it might have been transmuted into a priceless archaeological artifact.
Of course, both the pot shards and the beer can were laying in the same rubbish heap, and for exactly the same reason. Somebody was done with them, and carelessly chucked them onto the ground.
I don't really know where to go with that: It just struck me while I was whiling away an hour looking for pot shards, and I thought it was kinda funny.
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