Current climate and environmental changes have brought unprecedented rates of change to mountain ecosystems. These changes are impacting the provisioning of ecosystem services. Despite the... Show moreCurrent climate and environmental changes have brought unprecedented rates of change to mountain ecosystems. These changes are impacting the provisioning of ecosystem services. Despite the increase in academic publications on ecosystem services, research on cultural ecosystem services (CES) and their availability in mountain regions has largely been neglected. Here we analyse how important different CES are for inhabitants and visitors in the Lower Engadine region (Switzerland). We use questionnaires and maps to identify the most important CES for individual and collective wellbeing as well as their geographical location in the region. We had 48 participants in this study of which 28 grew up in the Lower Engadine. Our results show that the most important (i.e., ‘Highly important’) CES are: ‘The view of mountains, rivers or glaciers’; the presence of plants typical for the region, for example Fire Lily and Edelweiss (i.e., Lilium bulbiliferum subsp. croceum, Edelweiss-Leontopodium alpinum); ‘Hiking’; ‘Local customs’; ‘Watching large mammals’; and the importance of ‘Terraces for traditional Agriculture activities’. Results from the spatial analysis show that identical geographical locations in the Lower Engadine provide multiple CES and bring health benefits to the users. Show less
Archaeology has gone digital for some time now! Topics such as GIS databases, 3D models, drone photography, meta- and para-data, semantic mapping, text mining, simulation, and social network... Show moreArchaeology has gone digital for some time now! Topics such as GIS databases, 3D models, drone photography, meta- and para-data, semantic mapping, text mining, simulation, and social network analysis have become commonplace in archaeological discourse and practice. Digital and technological advancements seemingly offer limitless promises for data recording, analysis and dissemination. Yet, after several decades of innovation, we must ask ourselves which of these promises are actually fulfilled, and which persistent impasses are present. Today, some reflexive questions are more important than ever. In particular, when, how and why do our innovative archaeology tools fail? Do we approach our archaeological projects with a digital wand and (implicitly or explicitly) expect a magical solution? And when there is indeed a digital solution, at what expense does it come?In this volume, scholars and practitioners in the field discuss the state of the art, as well as the promises and impasses that digital approaches to archaeology entail. The authors discuss the current state of teaching digital archaeology, the societal impact of digital innovations, current issues in archaeological data management, promises and limitations of isotopic research and remote sensing techniques, and why subfields such as agent-based modelling and serious gaming struggle to keep momentum. Show less
The National Museum of Raqqa in Syria has suffered immensely from the ongoing violence since 2011. Much of its valuable collection of movable archaeological heritage (ca. 6000 items) is considered... Show moreThe National Museum of Raqqa in Syria has suffered immensely from the ongoing violence since 2011. Much of its valuable collection of movable archaeological heritage (ca. 6000 items) is considered lost. Starting from 500 of the most precious objects of the museum stored in the Raqqa Central Bank and stolen from there in 2013, the pilot project Focus Raqqa created a concrete, workable database to enable identification by Syrian and international police and heritage institutions. The project made a pivotal first step towards potential reconstruction of the Raqqa Museum in the future. The Raqqa museum collection included cuneiform tablets. Some of the tablets were cast before the war to allow detailed study in Europe. Today the tablets have vanished. The pilot project Scanning for Syria safeguarded information from the lost artefacts by making high-resolution three-dimensional scans of the silicone rubber moulds and subsequently physical replicas of the original objects by 3D printing. The short life expectancy (30 years) of the moulds necessitated measures for long-term preservation. The Scanning for Syria team not only succeeded at the preservation and sharing of knowledge in the academic circle. It also told the story of Syrian culture and its people to everyone for raising more voices in the united effort to keep cultural heritage safe in a zone of conflict. Show less
Schneider, A.; Gussone, M.; Müller-Wiener, M.; Lambers, K.; Ullrich, B.; Kniess, R.; ... ; Dorrestein, J.P. 2023
The large-scale magnetometer prospection conducted in 2021 south of the al-Najaf International Airport, Iraq, reveals the complex settlement structure of the late Antique and early Islamic site of... Show moreThe large-scale magnetometer prospection conducted in 2021 south of the al-Najaf International Airport, Iraq, reveals the complex settlement structure of the late Antique and early Islamic site of al-Ḥīra. The manual archaeo-geophysical interpretation resulted in 16 classes and the three most relevant archaeological classes will serve as a baseline for a (semi-) automated classification workflow. Show less
Kaptijn, E.; Verschoof-van der Vaart, W.; Lambers, K.; Bourgeois, Q.; Kramer, R. 2023
Burgerwetenschap of citizen science is een wetenschappelijke onderzoeksmethode die in de afgelopen jaren steeds populairder is geworden, zowel onder burgers als onder wetenschappers. Bekende... Show moreBurgerwetenschap of citizen science is een wetenschappelijke onderzoeksmethode die in de afgelopen jaren steeds populairder is geworden, zowel onder burgers als onder wetenschappers. Bekende voorbeelden zijn vogeltelprojecten en de nationale bijentelling.1 Ook in de archeologie wordt gebruikgemaakt van burgerwetenschap.2 Tegelijkertijd bestaat er veel verwarring over wat nu precies als burgerwetenschapsonderzoek kan worden gezien en wordt de term regelmatig oneigenlijk gebruikt. In dit artikel gaan wij dieper in op de principes en voorwaarden van burgerwetenschap met de archeologie als voorbeeld. Bovendien beschrijven we de verschillen en overeenkomsten met andere veelgebruikte methoden als crowdsourcing, publieksarcheologie, burgerparticipatie en community archaeology. Vervolgens bespreken wij enkele voorbeelden van burgerwetenschap, publieksarcheologie en crowdsourcing in de Gelderse archeologie. Tot slot gaan we dieper in op een voorbeeld van een archeologisch burgerwetenschapsproject, te weten Erfgoed Gezocht, en bespreken aan de hand van dit onderzoek een aantal principes en voorwaarden die van toepassing zijn op alle burgerwetenschapsprojecten. Show less
We present results from a systematic interdisciplinary study on (pre-)historic rural settlement and landscape development in an upland region of northern Bavaria, Germany. The archaeological and... Show moreWe present results from a systematic interdisciplinary study on (pre-)historic rural settlement and landscape development in an upland region of northern Bavaria, Germany. The archaeological and geoarchaeological investigations—supported by radiocarbon dating, optically stimulated luminescence dating, and palaeoecological analysis—were performed to (i) identify so far unknown prehistoric rural settlement sites, (ii) determine site-specific soil erosion from colluvial deposits, and (iii) assess the composition of woodland from on- and offsite charcoal finds. The earliest indicators of human activities from the Younger Neolithic (late 5th to early 4th millennium B.C.E.) come from colluvial deposits. Our investigations, for the first time, show Middle to Late Bronze Age (ca. 1400–800 B.C.E.), permanent rural settlement in a German central upland region, with a peak in the Late Bronze Age. Due to the varying thicknesses of Bronze Age colluvial deposits, we assume land use practices to have triggered soil erosion. From the spectrum of wood species, Maloideae, ash, and birch are regarded as successional indicators after fire clearance in that period. Settlement continued until the 5th century B.C.E. After a hiatus of 500 years, it re-flourished in the Late Roman and Migration periods (mid-3rd–5th century C.E.) and went on in the Medieval period. Show less
Bubenzer, O.; Casselmann, C.; Faßbinder, J.; Fischer, P.; Forbriger, M.; Hecht, S.; ... ; Zielhofer, C. 2022
Das zentrale Kapitel Feldmethoden liefert einen Überblick über das breite Methodenspektrum, das während geoarchäologischer Forschungskampagnen im Gelände zum Einsatz kommt. Beschrieben werden... Show moreDas zentrale Kapitel Feldmethoden liefert einen Überblick über das breite Methodenspektrum, das während geoarchäologischer Forschungskampagnen im Gelände zum Einsatz kommt. Beschrieben werden zunächst klassische Methoden wie Bohrungen, archäologische Grabungen und Baggerschürfe,gefolgt von der damit mittlerweile häufig kombinierten, jungen Methode der Direct-Push-Sondierung, womit gleichzeitige Messungen unterschiedlicher Parameter wie Spitzendruck, Farbe oder elektrischer Leitfähigkeit möglich sind. Dazugehörige Infoboxen befassen sich mit einem Beispiel aus der Feuchtbodenarchäologie und mit dem wichtigen Thema der langfristigen Probenarchivierung. Der Abschnitt Fernerkundung führt in die Geschichte und in die aktuelle Praxis der Methodik ein und befasstsich mit dem Potenzial von Luftbildern und räumlichen Satellitendaten. Das in einem weiteren Abschnitt vorgestellte Konzept der „Digitalen Geoarchäologie“ bewegt sich an der Schnittstelle zwischen Archäologie, Geo- und Computerwissenschaften. Weiterhin werden häufig eingesetzte geophysikalischeMethoden, wie Geoelektrik, Geomagnetik und Georadar vorgestellt. Am Kapitelende geht es um das Potenzial archäologischer Zeigerpflanzen und ihrer Bedeutung für die archäologische Prospektion. Show less
Abderhalden-Raba, A.; Della Casa, P.; Kothieringer, K.; Lambers, K.; Mächtle, B.; Ranzinger, M.; Röpke, A. 2021
Die gut erhaltene Terrassenlandschaft oberhalb von Ramosch hat eine lange Geschichte, deren ackerbauliche Nutzung im Mittelalter durch historische Quellen belegt ist. Doch bereits die... Show moreDie gut erhaltene Terrassenlandschaft oberhalb von Ramosch hat eine lange Geschichte, deren ackerbauliche Nutzung im Mittelalter durch historische Quellen belegt ist. Doch bereits die prähistorische Siedlung auf der Mottata beweist, dass sie in eine stark vom Menschen überprägte Landschaft eingebettet war. Um der Frage nach der Entwicklung der Terrassen nachzugehen, engagiert sich seit einigen Jahren ein interdisziplinäres Forschungsprojekt mit dem Ursprung dieser Anlagen. Show less
From 1999 to 2004, 639 Nasca geoglyphs near Palpa, south Peru, were recorded in the framework of the PhD project of Karsten Lambers. Aided by Martin Sauerbier, he created a database containing... Show moreFrom 1999 to 2004, 639 Nasca geoglyphs near Palpa, south Peru, were recorded in the framework of the PhD project of Karsten Lambers. Aided by Martin Sauerbier, he created a database containing detailed descriptions of all geoglyphs and produced a virtual flight over the geoglyphs.The PhD project was part of the Nasca-Palpa Archaeological Project directed by Markus Reindel (DAI-KAAK, Bonn) and Johny Isla (INDEA, Lima). This project studied the societies of Paracas and Nasca in the northern part of the Nasca basin in south Peru from a variety of perspectives and from the Pacific coast up to the Andean highlands. Apart from a regional settlement survey and excavations at important sites dating from all pre-hispanic periods, the study of the geoglyphs was a key part of the project. In collaboration with Armin Gruen (ETH Zurich), the geoglyphs were photogrammetrically recorded and modelled in 3D, as a basis for their archaeological documentation and analysis. This resulted in the first comprehensive database of geoglyphs of a sub-region of the Nasca basin and shed new light on the origin, development, and social and cultural significance of the geoglyph phenomenon over time. Show less
Within archaeological prospection, Deep Learning algorithms are developed to detect objects within large remotely sensed datasets. These approaches are generally tested in an (ideal) experimental... Show moreWithin archaeological prospection, Deep Learning algorithms are developed to detect objects within large remotely sensed datasets. These approaches are generally tested in an (ideal) experimental setting but have not been applied in different contexts or ‘in the wild’, that is, incorporated in archaeological prospection. This research explores the applicability, knowledge discovery—on both a quantitative and qualitative level—and efficiency gain resulting from employing an automated detection tool called WODAN within (Dutch) archaeological practice. WODAN has been used to detect barrows and Celtic fields in LiDAR data from the Dutch Midden-Limburg area, which differs in archaeology, geo-(morpho)logy and land-use from the Veluwe in which it was developed. The results show that WODAN was able to detect potential barrows and Celtic fields, including previously unknown examples, and provided information about the structuring of the landscape in the past. Based on the results, combined human-computer strategies are argued, in which automated detection has a complementary, rather than a substitute role, to manual analysis. This can offset the inherent biases in manual analysis and deal with the problem that current automated detection methods only detect objects similar to the pre-defined target class(es). The incorporation of automated detection into archaeological prospection, in which the results of automated detection are used to highlight areas of interest and to enhance and add detail to existing archaeological predictive maps, seems logical and feasible. Show less
The Geoglyphs of Palpa, Peru is a revision of the author´s Ph.D. thesis. In this study, the famed geoglyphs of the Paracas and Nasca cultures on the south coast of Peru are investigated in order to... Show moreThe Geoglyphs of Palpa, Peru is a revision of the author´s Ph.D. thesis. In this study, the famed geoglyphs of the Paracas and Nasca cultures on the south coast of Peru are investigated in order to better understand their function and meaning. Combining aerial photogrammetry, archaeological fieldwork, and GIS-based analysis, more than 600 geoglyphs in the vicinity of the modern town of Palpa were recorded and analyzed. This interdisciplinary approach enabled the establishment of the first digital archive of these prehispanic monuments. It also led to important new insights into the origin, development, and spatial context of the geoglyphs. The Palpa dataset was furthermore used to test a recent model that explains the function and meaning of the Nasca geoglyphs in terms of Andean social, cultural, and religious traditions. The results of this study indicate that the ancient activities which took place on the geoglyphs revolved around concepts of water and fertility, and were a means of expressing social status and cultural concepts. The geoglyphs integrated the desert into the cultural landscape of the valley-based Paracas and Nasca societies, and were thus a valuable cultural resource that can still be appreciated today. Show less
Brandsen, A.; Verberne, S.; Lambers, K.; Wansleeben, M. 2021
This paper presents WODAN2.0, a workflow using Deep Learning for the automated detection of multiple archaeological object classes in LiDAR data from the Netherlands. WODAN2.0 is developed to... Show moreThis paper presents WODAN2.0, a workflow using Deep Learning for the automated detection of multiple archaeological object classes in LiDAR data from the Netherlands. WODAN2.0 is developed to rapidly and systematically map archaeology in large and complex datasets. To investigate its practical value, a large, random test dataset—next to a small, non-random dataset—was developed, which better represents the real-world situation of scarce archaeological objects in different types of complex terrain. To reduce the number of false positives caused by specific regions in the research area, a novel approach has been developed and implemented called Location-Based Ranking. Experiments show that WODAN2.0 has a performance of circa 70% for barrows and Celtic fields on the small, non-random testing dataset, while the performance on the large, random testing dataset is lower: circa 50% for barrows, circa 46% for Celtic fields, and circa 18% for charcoal kilns. The results show that the introduction of Location-Based Ranking and bagging leads to an improvement in performance varying between 17% and 35%. However, WODAN2.0 does not reach or exceed general human performance, when compared to the results of a citizen science project conducted in the same research area. Show less
The question of the origin of Alpine farming and pastoral activities associated with seasonal vertical transhumance and dairy production in the Silvretta Alps (Eastern Switzerland) has recently... Show moreThe question of the origin of Alpine farming and pastoral activities associated with seasonal vertical transhumance and dairy production in the Silvretta Alps (Eastern Switzerland) has recently benefitted from renewed interest. There, pastoral practises began during the Late Neolithic (2300 BC), but alpine dairy farming was directly evidenced so far only since the Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age (1300–500 BC). The vegetation development, timberline shifts at 2280 m a.s.l. and environmental conditions of the subalpine Urschai Valley (Canton of Grisons, Switzerland) were reconstructed for the small (8 m2) Plan da Mattun fen based on palynological and geochemical analyses for the last six millennia. The X-ray fluorescence (XRF) analyses are among the first ones performed on a European peatland in such altitudes. A high Rb/Sr ratio in the fen peat sediments revealed an increase in catchment erosion during the time when the forests of the Upper Urschai Valley were steadily diminished probably by fire and livestock impact (2300–1700 BC). These landscape openings were paralleled by increasing micro-charcoal influx values, suggesting that prehistoric people actively set fire on purpose. Simultaneously, palynological evidence for pastoralism was revealed, such as pollen from typical herbs indicating livestock trampling, and abundant spores from coprophilous fungi. Since then, vertical transhumance and pastoral activities remained responsible for the open subalpine landscape above 2000 m a.s.l., most probably also in the context of milk and dairy production since 1300 BC, which is characteristic for the European Alps until today. Show less
Brandsen, A.; Verberne, S.; Lambers, K.; Wansleeben, M. 2020
In this paper, we present the development of a training dataset for Dutch Named Entity Recognition (NER) in the archaeology domain. This dataset was created as there is a dire need for semantic... Show moreIn this paper, we present the development of a training dataset for Dutch Named Entity Recognition (NER) in the archaeology domain. This dataset was created as there is a dire need for semantic search within archaeology, in order to allow archaeologists to find structured information in collections of Dutch excavation reports, currently totalling around 60,000 (658 million words) and growing rapidly. To guide this search task, NER is needed. We created rigorous annotation guidelines in an iterative process, then instructed five archaeology students to annotate a number of documents. The resulting dataset contains ~31k annotations between six entity types (artefact, time period, place, context, species & material). The inter-annotator agreement is 0.95, and when we used this data for machine learning, we observed an increase in F1 score from 0.51 to 0.70 in comparison to a machine learning model trained on a dataset created in prior work. This indicates that the data is of high quality, and can confidently be used to train NER classifiers Show less
With the proliferation of online learning, the future of classroom teaching has been called into question. However, the unfaltering popularity of brick-and-mortar courses indicates that direct... Show moreWith the proliferation of online learning, the future of classroom teaching has been called into question. However, the unfaltering popularity of brick-and-mortar courses indicates that direct access to expert knowledge and face-to-face engagements remain key considerations for students. Here we showcase a combination of these two worlds in a Small Private Online Course (SPOC). Compared to Massive Open Online Courses (MOOCs), SPOCs are developed for smaller and more dedicated target groups and depend on close engagement between teachers and students. This format enables educational providers to involve internal and external students and teachers alike and to make ample use of online resources. This paper is based upon our experiences of running a SPOC on ‘Modelling and Simulation in Archaeology’ at Leiden University. We review the process of developing and running the course aimed at teaching archaeology students computer programming skills, while supporting their development as professional archaeologists and responsible academics. Show less
Lambers, K.; Verschoof-Van der Vaart, W.B.; Bourgeois, Q.P.J. 2019
Although the history of automated archaeological object detection in remotely sensed data is short, progress and emerging trends are evident. Among them, the shift from rule-based approaches... Show moreAlthough the history of automated archaeological object detection in remotely sensed data is short, progress and emerging trends are evident. Among them, the shift from rule-based approaches towards machine learning methods is, at the moment, the cause for high expectations, even though basic problems, such as the lack of suitable archaeological training data are only beginning to be addressed. In a case study in the central Netherlands, we are currently developing novel methods for multi-class archaeological object detection in LiDAR data based on convolutional neural networks (CNNs). This research is embedded in a long-term investigation of the prehistoric landscape of our study region. We here present an innovative integrated workflow that combines machine learning approaches to automated object detection in remotely sensed data with a two-tier citizen science project that allows us to generate and validate detections of hitherto unknown archaeological objects, thereby contributing to the creation of reliable, labeled archaeological training datasets. We motivate our methodological choices in the light of current trends in archaeological prospection, remote sensing, machine learning, and citizen science, and present the first results of the implementation of the workflow in our research area. Show less
