Sam Turner, Jim Crow, “Unlocking Historic Landscapes: Two
Pilot Studies Using Historic Landscape Characterisation” in Antiquity 84(2010): 216 – 229
This article explains how GIS is being used to recreate
historic landscapes and to analyze and interpret their development. Historic Landscape Characterisation (HLC) is
the term for “mapping landscape with particular reference to its historic
character and development”. The
archaeologists in this example are using GIS to explore two locations in the
Aegean, focusing on field systems and how they evolved over time.
Recently there has been a shift to focus less on either of
the two prevailing approaches to the study of past, present and future
landscapes - economic/functional or social/symbolic, and instead to look at “multifunctionality”. HLC uses satellite images, aerial photography,
and historic maps to “map, analyze, compare and contrast the perceptions of a
wide range of people working within the landscape” using GIS.
HLC is not new, but in the past data storage had been an
issue when working with such large projects.
GIS provides a solution, allowing a range of map sources, the ability to
adjust scale, and the analysis tools which enhance interpretation. With GIS, features of the historical
landscape at a particular period are bundled together, creating visible
groupings and patterns that characterize that period. It is possible to do retrogressive analysis, and
to add explanatory text connected to a database. Also, GIS is flexible and adaptable to
projects and research questions of any size or topic.
The two examples of the use of GIS in HLC in this article
are from Greece and Turkey. In Greece, the
fields are terraced, and modeling can expose patterns of land use over
time. In Turkey, coaxial fields were
used, and again, maps show a chronological progression of land development.
I chose this article for this assignment because it is along
the lines of a project I’d like to put together once I’ve learned enough to do
it.
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