The White Monastery Federation Project: Survey and Mapping at the Monastery of Apa Shenoute (Dayr al-Anba Shinuda), Sohag, 2005-2007 (original) (raw)

Archaeology - Summary of results

TRANSFORMATION PROCESSES IN OASIS SETTLEMENTS OF OMAN 2002-2008 Final interdisciplinary project report to the DFG , 2008

The overall goal of this research and documentation project, funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) as a ’package application (Paketantrag)’ was to investigate the transformation processes in oasis settlements of Oman. These transformation processes rapidly progressed since the opening of the country in the 1970s. Based on an archaeological, historical, and urban-architectural analysis of selected oasis settlements emphasis was placed on studying the effects of the observed transformation processes on oasis sustainability and their current and future development. To meet these challenges, in 1999 archaeologists, orientalists, urban specialist, architects and agricultural scientists from the German Archaeological Institute (DAI) in Berlin and the universities of Tübingen, Stuttgart and Kassel-Witzenhausen jointly applied for a four-phase project, whereby the first phase was funded by the State of Baden-Wuerttemberg followed by DFG-funding. In order to respond to the mountainous topography of northern Oman, a transect approach was chosen with a first cut through the Hajar mountains following the Wadi Bani Awf–Balad Seet–al-Hamra line (pilot phase of 1999-2001). During this phase intensive inter-disciplinary surveys were conducted in cooperation with Omani partners from the Sultan Qaboos University (Muscat) coupled with the generation of high resolution aerial photographs of different types of oases from a kite, balloons and finally a remotely controlled plane provided the basic data for the development of the methodological approaches by the different groups. This pilot phase also allowed to define the interdisciplinary research framework and the different research questions to be addressed during the subsequently described three DFG-funded phases by the different disciplines collaborating in the project.