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Modeling Métis mobility? Evaluating least cost paths and indigenous landscapes in the Canadian west

Posted on May 28, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 27 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Kisha SupernantGeographic Information Systems (GIS) analyses in archaeology have been criticized by archaeologists for being reductive, environmentally deterministic, and reproducing a disembodied experience of the landscape. However, research over the past 20 years has demonstrated the power of GIS data and analyses to explore complex social questions about past human experiences. Indigenous knowledges of landscapes have not often explicitly informed GIS analyses in archaeology, even though archaeologists and indigenous communities around the world are forging collaborative relationships. This paper proposes an integrated approach GIS-based least cost analysis, where Indigenous traditional knowledge, historical documentation, and archaeology can be brought together for a more nuanced and locally-grounded model of past landscapes. A case study from the movement of the Métis people of Canada is used to test typical models of cost path movement used in archaeology against known historic trails information, followed by a discussion of possible future applications of movement models and variables related to local Indigenous knowledge of current and past landscapes.

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Echoing landscapes: Echolocation and the placement of rock art in the Central Mediterranean

Posted on May 28, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: July 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 83 Author(s): Tommaso Mattioli, Angelo Farina, Enrico Armelloni, Philippe Hameau, Margarita Díaz-AndreuMany societies give special importance to places where echoes are generated, and often these places receive special treatment including the production of rock paintings in them. The identification of the exact places where echoes come from, or echolocation, is an ability only shared by a few individuals in each community. Unfortunately for archaeologists, however, their activity leaves no trace in the archaeological record. In this article we propose that the Ambisonics technique, a method developed in the field of acoustical physics, can be applied to identify the likely use of echolocation among societies for which no ethnographic information remains, such as most of those who lived in prehistoric Europe. A description of how this method has been applied in two case studies, the rock art landscapes of Baume Brune (Vaucluse, France) and Valle d’Ividoro (Puglia, Italy), is provided. In these two echoing areas only a few shelters were chosen to be painted with Schematic art, leaving around them many others undecorated. In the description of the fieldwork phase of the test, issues related to the sound source, the sound recorder, and spherical camera and how the Impulse Response (IR) measurement was made are discussed. The processed results indicate that there was a positive relationship between sound-reflecting surfaces and the location of rock art. This leads us to propose that in both areas there is a strong probability of echolocation having been employed by Neolithic people to select the shelters in which to produce rock art. The results obtained in our study also have wider implications in our understanding of how prehistoric peoples perceived the landscape in which they lived in, understood not only on the basis of tangible elements but, perhaps more importantly, because of intangible aspects such as sound and, in particular, echoes.

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Visualising scales of process: Multi-scalar geoarchaeological investigations of microstratigraphy and diagenesis at hominin bearing sites in South African karst

Posted on May 25, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: July 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 83 Author(s): Tara Edwards, Elle Grono, Andy I.R. Herries, Frank J. Brink, Ulrike Troitzsch, Tim Senden, Michael Turner, Aleese Barron, Lauren Prossor, Tim DenhamMulti-scalar geoarchaeological investigations were conducted on several samples of sediment (dolomite cave sediments, ferricrete ridge, speleothem, tufa and tufa cave sediments) from four early hominin fossil-bearing sites (Taung Type Site, Haasgat, Drimolen Main Quarry, Elandsfontein) in different South African karst environments. The study was designed to test the value of geoarchaeological techniques for identifying and characterising environments of deposition and diagenetic processes involved in site formation within different mediums and different karst environments. The traditional petrographic method is weighed against two relatively new methodological contributions to site formation and diagenesis: Computed Tomography (CT) and automated Quantitative Evaluation of Minerals using Energy Dispersive Spectroscopy (QEM-EDS), employing QEMSCAN® technology. An integrated micro-sampling approach is outlined for successful cross-correlation between techniques. The study demonstrates that different analyses vary in their ability to visualise different types of process – primary and secondary. Thin section petrography remains the ‘gold standard’ for analyses conducted at the micro-scale, while QEM-EDS and CT offer exciting potential to perform meso-scale analyses and are best utilised as complementary rather than alternative techniques to petrography.

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Editorial Board

Posted on May 24, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: June 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science, Volume 82

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What can GIS + 3D mean for landscape archaeology?

Posted on May 23, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 22 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Heather Richards-RissettoUntil recently Geographic Information Systems (GIS) have held center stage in the archaeologist’s geospatial toolkit, and there is no doubt that archaeologists have moved beyond the map—but into what? In the early years, criticisms voicing GIS as environmentally-deterministic were abundant. What methods and tool have archaeologists used to overcome these criticisms? New geospatial technologies such as airborne lidar and aerial photogrammetry are allowing us to acquire inordinate amounts of georeferenced 3D data— but do these 3D technologies help overcome criticisms of environmental determinism? Together—GIS + 3D— can link georeferenced 3D models to underlying data adding a ground-based humanistic perspective lacking in the bird’s eye view of traditional GIS. This paper situates GIS and 3D within a semiotic framework to offer some ideas on using 3DGIS to intertwine environmental and cultural factors to work toward new approaches for landscape archaeology.

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Mapping liminality: Critical frameworks for the GIS-based modelling of visibility

Posted on May 23, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 22 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Mark GillingsSince the widespread adoption of GIS by archaeologists in the early 1990s, analyses of visibility have steadily gained traction, becoming commonplace in landscape and regional analysis. This is in large part due to the routine way in which such products can be generated, bolstered by a raft of landscape-based studies that have placed varying degrees of emphasis upon human perception and direct bodily engagement in seeking to understand and explore the past. Despite this seeming popularity, two worrying trends stand out. The first is the lack of any coherent theoretical framework, applications preferring instead to seek justification in the very first wave of experiential landscape approaches that emerged in the early 1990s. Needless to say, the intervening 20 or so years have seen considerable development in the conceptual tools we draw upon in order to make sense of past landscapes, not to mention considerable finessing of the first-wave developments alluded to above. Second is the tendency to relegate viewshed analysis to certain types of predictable problem or question (i.e. viewshed analysis has become typecast). These trends have been compounded by a host of other issues. For example, whilst there have been refinements, tweaks and variations to the basic viewshed (and the frequency with which they are generated and combined), not to mention establishment of robust calibration criteria for controlling them and statistical approaches for assessing the patterns tendered, these have yet to be brought together in any coherent fashion and their veracity critically assessed. Likewise, a failure to establish an agreed vocabulary has resulted in a number of proverbial wheels being reinvented time and again. The argument presented here is that viewsheds have considerably more to offer archaeology but to realise this entails confronting these issues head on. That this is possible and desirable is illustrated through discussion of a new theoretical framework for visibility-studies that draws upon developments in assemblage theory and the author’s own work on affordance and relationality. To demonstrate the value of this approach in encouraging different ways of thinking about what viewsheds are and how we might begin to draw creatively upon them, a case-study is described where viewsheds are folded into a detailed exploration of landscape liminality.

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It must be right, GIS told me so! Questioning the infallibility of GIS as a methodological tool

Posted on May 23, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 22 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Marieka Brouwer BurgWhile the benefits of GIS are widely touted among archaeologists today, less attention has been paid to the potential pitfalls and drawbacks of this undeniably important methodological tool. One of the greatest challenges of geospatial modeling is unbalanced data: due to the nature of the archaeological record, we can never assume that the remnants of past behavioral processes we are working with constitute a fully representative sample. Rather, our datasets are reflective of differential social and natural preservation conditions, as well as research biases. Most regional geospatial studies must collate diverse data collected over decades by researchers with varying backgrounds and goals, using assorted spatial scales and levels of technological sophistication. Such factors contribute substantial uncertainty to our models, uncertainty that should be recognized, quantified, and mitigated. If GIS techniques are to continue shifting the way we conduct archaeology and improve our abilities to answer questions regarding past behavior, then we must question the infallibility of GIS as a methodological tool and direct more attention toward developing robust geospatial applications that can meet the idiosyncratic needs of archaeological analysis. This paper explores one example of how such uncertainty investigation can be conducted.

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Spatial History, deep mapping and digital storytelling: archaeology’s future imagined through an engagement with the Digital Humanities

Posted on May 20, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 19 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Tiffany Earley-SpadoniGeospatial technologies are transforming the practice of the Digital Humanities, and these developments have direct relevance to the practice of scientifically oriented archaeology. The most recent “spatial turn” among digital humanists can be attributed to both the prevalence of tools like ArcGIS that facilitate such investigations as well as an interdisciplinary convergence upon theoretical models that conceive of socially constructed space. This article will briefly review the current state-of-the-art in the field of Spatial History as well as discuss a number of emerging trends such as deep mapping, digital storytelling and data visualization, utilizing examples from a variety of applications. Moreover, archaeologists can benefit from the substantial investments by the academy in the Digital Humanities, particularly in the United States and Canada. In sum, the article proposes that the scope of archaeological applications of geospatial technologies would be productively broadened through an increased engagement with the Digital Humanities.

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Significance and context in GIS-based spatial archaeology: A case study from Southeastern North America

Posted on May 19, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 17 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Eric E. JonesOver 30 years ago, Kintigh and Ammerman (1982) outlined and applied a heuristic approach to spatial archaeology that balanced quantitative analyses and culturally and historically contextualized archaeology. The theoretical and methodological messages were that we need to do more than “eyeball” spatial patterns, we need to apply the proper analyses based on the characteristics of our datasets, and we need to ensure that our models, quantitative analyses, and resulting interpretations are based in the proper cultural and historical contexts. My goal in this paper is to examine how two of the concepts in this approach, significance and context, apply to a modern spatial archaeology that heavily utilizes geospatial computing tools. Although these tools help to solve several concerns that existed in the field 30 years ago, they can also cause others, such as mistaking autocorrelation for correlation or confusion about which of the multitude of available analytical tools is appropriate for particular questions and datasets. In this paper, I present a simplified version of the methodology I have used to address these concerns. I use archaeological, historical, and GIS-modeled data to compare the regional patterning of hierarchical and egalitarian societies in southeastern North America to examine why hierarchical sociopolitical organizations may have arose where they did. I end with a critical review of this approach and a discussion of how such research can be improved moving forward.

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Geospatial analysis as experimental archaeology

Posted on May 19, 2017 by ARCAS

Publication date: Available online 18 May 2017Source:Journal of Archaeological Science Author(s): Thomas G. WhitleyIn the more than 25 years since Allen et al. (1990), GIS and other kinds of geospatial analysis have become tools used almost as ubiquitously in archaeology as the trowel and the total station. However, can we consider it a “paradigm-shifter?” One fundamental distinction between archaeology and other scientific pursuits is the lack of a formal experimental procedure for testing large-scale hypotheses. We can experiment with some material culture methods or archaeological ‘models’ on a 1:1 analogue scale, but we rarely examine ideas about larger mechanisms; particularly those that encompass wide geographic areas in a formal experimental way. Geospatial technologies give us new tools and abilities to recognize patterns in archaeological sites and landscapes. Nevertheless, have they truly changed the way we make the transition from material remains to interpreting human behavior? We tend to present geospatial research that is either descriptive or methodological in nature rather than interpretive or explanatory. What is missing is the recognition that the ‘patterns’ we can see are an incomplete and abstract product of past human agency or behavior that cannot be worked backwards from, but must be envisioned as mechanisms in action. Within a mechanistic framework, we can experiment with archaeological research questions in much greater depth and detail, in a manner more akin to psychology than the ‘harder’ sciences. Although these techniques bring with them some theoretical assumptions and methodological challenges, their outcomes can provide logical and convincing visualizations of dynamic phenomena in enlightening ways. Presented here are several brief examples.

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