Paper long abstract:

The use of GIS models of palaeolandscapes to investigate the relationship between past peoples and environments has been an important are of landscape archaeology in recent years. The requirements of data resolution for such GIS models are in part dictated by the nature of the questions being asked and the themes being investigated, but we propose that certain data have inherent spatial and temporal limits of resolution - uncertainty which introduces a 'fuzziness' that is problematic for the production of robust and useful models. In this paper we investigate how the inherent 'instability' of such data including that relating to chronology, hydrology (sea level) and vegetation (derived from pollen and other palaeoenvironmental proxies) is intimately tied to our ability to produce useful 'fine grained' models of palaeolandscapes. We present a series of case studies to illustrate how these issues become magnified as the scale of investigation becomes smaller. Our focus will move through the landscape scale - the inundation of the North Sea basin and the spread of peatlands in east England - through to the local scale - the nature of change on a site specific scale and the perception of such change by humans. We consider some of the methodological and theoretical issues related to the incorporation of such 'unstable' data in GIS modelling and argue that any multi-scalar approach to archaeological landscapes must be tied to the particular, scale dependent limitations of different datasets.

Paper short abstract:

This paper will address questions of map perspective, and of 'visualism' in GIS-based landscape analysis focusing particularly on issues of scale.

Paper long abstract:

GIS-based landscape analysis has come under sustained critical attention in recent years, often from a phenomenological perspective. Some have argued that GIS fosters an overly objectified approach to landscape analysis and specifically that undue weight has been given to landscape as a kind of map, and to vision as a means of perceiving the world. This paper will draw on perspectives from embodied cognition and proxemics to argue that, although there is merit in some of these critiques, that it can also be argued that 'map like' perspectives and the visual structuring of landscapes are more general characteristics of human societies than these critiques allow. It is concluded that GIS-based and 'map like' understandings of past human landscapes, including visibility analysis, still have much to contribute to the understanding of past landscapes.

Paper short abstract:

A composite picture of the Roman town at Aldborough, obtained from field-walking, geophysical survey and air photographic investigation, provides opportunity to compare and contrast the different techniques employed and make recommendations for future collaborative work using multi-scalar data.

Paper long abstract:

The civitas capital of Isurium Brigantium lies beneath the medieval village of Aldborough, North Yorkshire. The village is small and redevelopment in recent years has been minimal; as a result, much of the former Roman town is preserved under pasture and arable farmland. Protected as a Scheduled Ancient Monument, understanding of the spatial and chronological development of the Roman town is most suitably progressed via non-intrusive survey methods. In recognition of this, a sustained programme of field-walking has been conducted over the past 20 years by members of the Yorkshire Archaeological Society, directed by Colin Dobinson. In 2009, Martin Millett and Rose Ferraby of the University of Cambridge established the Aldborough Roman Town Survey, employing magnetometer survey, resistance survey and Ground Penetrating Radar. As a complement to this, in 2010 an air photographic analysis and mapping project was completed of the town and its immediate hinterland by Tara-Jane Sutcliffe as part of an English Heritage Professional Placement in Conservation in Aerial Survey and Investigation. The composite picture drawn from these multi-scalar surveys not only helps to develop our particular understanding of Isurium Brigantium, but also provides opportunity to compare and contrast the different techniques employed and make recommendations for future collaborative work. In particular, this paper will explore the methods and resolutions of data capture; the means of filtering and calibrating primary data; and the criteria for validating interpretation.

Paper short abstract:

This presentation uses current research to highlight the importance of fully multi-disciplinary and multi-scalar researxh. It focuses on intra-site spatial analysis of an excavation of a neolithic settlement from the 1980s. It demonstrates what a wealth of information remains sealed away in the archvies awaiting discovery

Paper long abstract:

The Late Neolithic settlement of Keinsmerbrug was excavated in 1986, it is located in North Holland, The Netherlands. Post holes and pits were excavated but at the time and in the years since no structures could be distinguished. Due to the high quantities of bird remains and its size (c.300m2) it was labeled a small base camp for duck hunting. In September 2009 an international multi-disciplinary team was assembled to publish and to try to interpret three settlements, the first being Keinsmerbrug. The sites of Kolhorn and Mienakker are planned in the following years.

With the aid of multi-scalar spatial analysis 5 houses were discovered, adding to only two which are known in the area, three appear unique in form to this period. This presentation briefly illustrates the multi-scalar approach which was taken and asks at which scale should we as archaeologists collect information and then which scale is suitable to interpret the site? Artefact categories were collected in different ways during the excavation, some fully, others sampled. The finds range from the macro to the micro, pottery, flint, amber, stone, mammal bones etc.. to seeds, residues and fish bones etc... Can looking at these at the micro scale or the macro scale provide any further information about the lives of the settlements inhabitants?

Paper short abstract:

This paper considers the contribution of palaeoenvironmental analytical techniques to the study of the landscape context of prehistoric rock-carvings in northwest Europe.

Paper long abstract:

Studies of the landscape context of prehistoric monuments, focused largely on megalithic chambered tombs, emphasise the significance of the relationship between archaeological sites and features within the surrounding landscape (such as alignments on mountain peaks, rivers, valleys and views of the sea). It is a potential weakness of these studies that they have largely ignored the probable impact that vegetation (e.g. trees) may have had on the visibility, and thus significance, of specific landscape features around archaeological sites (see Cummings and Whittle 2003, 2004); vegetation can also serve to separate and isolate sites from settled areas of the landscape. These issues can be explored using palaeoenvironmental data, such as pollen, but where cores are located up to several kilometres distance, they provide only generalised 'regional' vegetation data that should not be used to make comment on the environment of specific sites. However, it is possible to test hypotheses regarding the landscape context of specific sites, but this requires a methodology that derives palaeoenvironmental data from meaningful contexts related to the use-history of that site. Here we illustrate this using two examples from rock-carvings in south-west Sweden and Scotland. The two sites are located in radically different environments and are considered to relate to their landscape in different ways. In both cases, targeted palaeoenvironmental analysis has supported and advanced our understanding of the landscape context hypothesised on the basis of the archaeological/phenomenological data.

Reference

Cummings, V. and Whittle, A. 2003. Tombs with a view: landscape, monuments and trees. Antiquity 77, 255-266.

Paper short abstract:

This paper aims to question the scale that climate change is studied at, arguing that that although it occurred at a global and millennial scale, it unfolded at a local and community level.

Paper long abstract:

This paper aims to question the scale that climate change is studied at, arguing that that although it occurred at a global and millennial scale, it unfolded at a local and community level.

Climate change data tends to be large scale in nature and models frequently describe it as a smooth, linear process, with curves worked out as an 'average'. This often leads to little consideration of the human aspect - the way people either perceived or reacted to the way their landscape changed. It also does not deal with dynamism and uncertainty. It is, however, on the local scale that changes would have been observed, and adaptations developed. This paper will refer specifically to early Holocene climate change but will also use modern day examples to show how an understanding of the local perspective can provide insights that large scale models cannot.

Paper short abstract:

This paper examines how archaeological spaces may be interrogated the mathematical transformations based upon principles of relativity in GIS. House floors from a probable longhouse were tested against longhouse expert models and archaeological round house examples to test for group membership.

Paper long abstract:

This paper discusses a new application for old scientific principles based on a philosophical extension of Einstein's theory of relativity for Space-Time. With Einstein's physics, space and time are relative to the observer. Comparisons of house floors by relativity is achieved with a

mathematically based procedure that places a universal point of

observation within all structures based upon the centroid of the structure

itself. The data is transformed so that all structures can be placed upon

the same axial alignment and sampled for spatial correlations by Principal Components Analysis (PCA), relative to each structure's space. A further method Selective Centric Morphology (SCM) created for this study, places the point of observation as that relative for archaeological interpretations. In this study, the centre of the hearth acts as a centre of social activity and all space is transformed around this point of observation. This enables the ability to apply statistical tests that can be linked to spatial distributions, to compare known quantities against archaeological examples, and to directly make intersite comparisons beyond an anecdotal level. A test case, had archaeological distributions of objects related to food storage (pottery) and preparation (flint or unburnt bone) within house floors tested against models of longhouses and round/wheel houses to determine group membership. The study found that with transformations by both relativity and SCM, the

strongest correlations for the test case were with the longhouse

expert models and had a likely group membership with longhouses.

Paper short abstract:

This session considers how and why archaeology continues to struggle to develop multiscalar models of human sociality. It suggests that network-based analytical models may help us to develop more nuanced understandings of how the multiple scales of social life may have integrated.

Paper long abstract:

Social studies across many disciplines have demonstrated that human sociality operates on multiple scales, ranging from the intimate sphere of the person to larger-scaled, more dispersed networks of cooperation and exchange. Whilst archaeology has sought to participate in this discussion, its studies of human sociality have typically focused on single scales of interaction, such as the household, the settlement or the wider exchange network. To date, few (if any) studies have successfully merged these different scales of interaction into a single narrative, exploring in detail how these dimensions interact, influence and sometimes conflict with each other. This session considers how and why archaeology continues to struggle to develop models of human sociality that tackle the issue of how these different scales may have been integrated. In doing so, it explores factors such as the questions we ask, the theoretic models we apply and the diverse classes of archaeological evidence we utilise. Looking forward, the session suggests that a fresh look at network-based analytical models may help us to overcome some of these issues, moving us closer to the construction of more nuanced, multiscalar models of human sociality and social interaction.