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Journal of Archaeological Science, 2021
This paper proposes a new methodology for modelling chronological data in archaeology. We introduce the concept of "chronological network", a flexible model for representing chronological entities, synchronisms between them, and other chronological constraints such as termini post/ante quem and duration bounds. We propose a procedure for checking the consistency of a chronological network and for refining dating estimates from the available synchronisms and constraints. We introduce ChronoLog, a chronology software application that allows users to build a chronological network interactively. The software automatically checks the consistency of the network and computes the tightest possible chronological range for each entity, within seconds. ChronoLog is freely available online at http://chrono.ulb.be. Free download link at: https://authors.elsevier.com/a/1c5IN15SlTogcL (until January 6, 2021) Permanent link at: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jas.2020.105225
A spatio-temporal framework for managing archeological data
Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence, 2017
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Journal of Archaeological Science: Reports, 2021
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ACTA IMEKO, 2016
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INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND ANALYTICAL REVIEWS , 2019
Archaeology is the scientific study of human past. As the word scientific indicates not only the equipments used in the field of archaeology but also mentions the advancement in the technological development of Computer field. Computers have been used in the field of archaeology for many years and it has now become an essential widespread tool for archaeologists. As the use or operation of computers becomes increasingly necessary to the work of the archaeologist, which they require a clear understanding of the impact of information technology upon their discipline. This paper explains the influence and the development of computers on all aspects of archaeological research and interpretation, from survey, excavation and landscape to museums, education and communicating the past. The instigation of the computers can begin with the appraisal at all stages of archaeological research and data analysis. The main themes to materialize are the potential of computers as active agents for thought rather than as just passive tools, and the symbiotic relationship between the development of digital technologies and archaeological theory. Introduction Archaeology is the scientific study of humans past. As the word scientific indicates not only the equipments used in the field of archaeology but also mentions the advancement in the technological development of Computer field. Computers have been used in the field of archaeology for many years and it has now become an essential widespread tool for archaeologists. As the use or operation of computers becomes increasingly necessary to the work of the archaeologist, which they require a clear understanding of the impact of information technology upon their discipline. This paper explains the influence and the development of computers on all aspects of archaeological research and interpretation, from survey, excavation and landscape to museums, education and communicating the past. The instigation of the computers can begin with the appraisal at all stages of archaeological research and data analysis. The main themes to materialize are the potential of computers as active agents for thought rather than as just passive tools, and the symbiotic relationship between the development of digital technologies and archaeological theory.
Deducing event chronology in a cultural heritage documentation system
edd.uio.no
In historically oriented research like archaeology, the determination of the chronology of events in the past plays an important role. For example, a fire of a house can seal off the layers physically below and give a partial relative dating of these. A well known tool in this area is the Harris' Matrix used to systematize the contexts and layers found in an excavation. In this paper we will discuss a related but more general tool for documenting and analysing temporal entities like events. This tool is developed as a module of a four dimensional event-oriented documentation database based on the conceptual model CIDOC-CRM (ISO21127). The database is developed for an archaeological excavation project in Western Norway. In addition to places, events and actors the database is designed to contain texts, images and maps used to document such entities. In use the system will contain a dataset of events, their time-spans and relations between events. The system can detect conflicting dating, increase precision of starts, ends and durations of events and finally display a spatial and chronological overview. Given a time and a place within the dataset, the system can display all possible chronologies for the events in the set. So far, this tool has shown a great potential being used in projects involving large amounts of archive material as preparation for new excavations. Further development includes the possibility to use other temporal constraints, such as durations and exploring the potential of adding spatial constraints and constraints on actors. .
Tracking Data Provenance of Archaeological Temporal Information in Presence of Uncertainty
Journal on Computing and Cultural Heritage
The interpretation process is one of the main tasks performed by archaeologists who, starting from ground data about evidences and findings, incrementally derive knowledge about ancient objects or events. Very often more than one archaeologist contributes in different time instants to discover details about the same finding and thus, it is important to keep track of history and provenance of the overall knowledge discovery process. To this aim, we propose a model and a set of derivation rules for tracking and refining data provenance during the archaeological interpretation process. In particular, among all the possible interpretation activities, we concentrate on the one concerning the dating that archaeologists perform to assign one or more time intervals to a finding to define its lifespan on the temporal axis. In this context, we propose a framework to represent and derive updated provenance data about temporal information after the mentioned derivation process. Archaeological d...