The pristine morphologies created during an impact event comprise a template for constraining how various environmental parameters influence the mechanics of crater formation. Identification of pristine morphologies used in defining and/or evaluating models of crater formation can be complicated or precluded, however, by the effects of post-formation degradation. Field and/or remote examination of simple, unglaciated impact craters on the Earth (e.g., Meteor Crater, Arizona, and Roter Kamm crater, Namibia) can yield results that help to define characteristic degradation signatures for use in placing first-order constraints on the number and intensity of processes that have been active. In turn, the presence of a suite of these degradation signatures can be used to define the amount and style of crater degradation that has taken place, thereby providing a tool for possible distinction between pristine versus secondary, post-formation characteristics.