Gis (Other Keyword)
151-175 (275 Records)
This resource is a citation record only, the Center for Digital Antiquity does not have a copy of this document. The information in this record has been migrated into tDAR from the EXARC Bibliography, originally compiled by Roeland Paardekooper, and updated. Most of these records consist of a document citation and other metadata but do not have the documents themselves uploaded. If you have a digital copy of the document and would like to have it curated in tDAR, please contact us using the...
Modelling Communities: Social Transformation of Early Kaushi, Taiwan (2017)
This paper presents the modelling of different communities within two sites, Saqacengalj and Aumagan, which exemplifies the early developments of the Kaushi people. In the light of Ingold’s ‘wayfaring theory’ (Ingold, 2012), this research argues that interpersonal relationships are not entirely based on social identities, and social relations should also be investigated, regardless of their hierarchical status, but through intimate human interaction. Therefore, this research models human...
Modern settlement patterns and site preservation in the Middle Moche Valley (2015)
During the July field season of 2014, the authors conducted a survey of sites within the proposed reserves of Ciudad de Dios and Bello Horizonte in the Middle Moche Valley of Peru. GPS data was collected for comparison with previously recorded site boundaries to offer insight into the threat of modern encroachment on archaeological sites. Using GIS and statistical analysis, the authors identified areas of site degradation and loss, categorized each site on a sliding scale of endangerment, and...
"More field than habitation, and far more fallow than field": Settlement Patterns, Farming Practices, and Demographic Change on the Abomey Plateau, Republic of Bénin (2016)
Archaeologies of urbanism in West Africa have long focused on major cities associated with expansive kingdoms and empires of the second millennium AD. In recent decades, however, archaeologists have turned to the countryside for an alternative view on urban dynamics in this period. Yet, for most of the forested region this shift has been hampered by the problem of identifying sites, both large and small. This difficultly arises from the combined effects of dense vegetation, poor site...
A Multiscale landscape Approach to the Production of Polished Stone Tools in Neolithic Shetland (2017)
The Shetland Archipelago at the very north of Scotland contains one of the best preserved Neolithic stone tool quarries in Western Europe. Recent fieldwork by the North Roe Felsite Project (NRFP) has considerably advanced our knowledge of this quarry landscape and the production of polished stone axes and Shetland knives. THe NRFP has explored the landscape dynamics of this activity on a range of scales; from regional geological survey and workshop prediction using multispectral satellite...
Narratives of Quiechapa in light of material evidence from survey (2017)
Our knowledge of the prehispanic past of Quiechapa and the surrounding regions has been largely based on a combination of historic sources, modern day linguistic classification, and previous archaeological work in nearby regions. El Proyecto Arqueológico de Quiechapa (PAQuie) recently completed a 99 sq. km pedestrian survey of the Quiechapa region in the Sierra Sur of Oaxaca, Mexico. In this talk, I discuss major findings from the survey in the Quiechapa region within the context of broader...
A Network Analysis of Embedded Pathways at Mawchu Llacta, Perú (1591 – 1617 C.E.) (2016)
This paper investigates the occupation of a planned 16th century Spanish colonial resettlement named Santa Cruz de Tute, hereafter referred to as Mawchu Llacta. My analysis incorporates data compiled for the Proyecto Arqueológico Tuti Antiguo (PATA), with a particular focus on colonial census records from 1591, 1604, and 1617, which detail land tenure and livestock holdings. I argue that the construction of a computer-based representation of pathways in ArcGIS platform contributes to the...
New Life for Old Fur Trade Data: Asking New Questions of the 1974 Atlas of Canada Posts of the Canadian Fur Trade Map. (2016)
A detailed map entitled "Posts of the Canadian Fur Trade" was included in the fourth edition of the Atlas of Canada. Over 800 fur trade locations spanning the years 1600-1800 were noted on the map along with the company affiliation, and duration of operation. A quick glance at the map shows how this important aspect of the French and British colonial economies spanned the continent’s northern regions and consequently its aboriginal inhabitants. Forty-one years later little is known about the...
Not Just any Stones: Virgin Branch Puebloan Sandstone Artifact Distribution on the Southern Shivwits Plateau (2016)
Throughout the summer of 2015, graduate students at the University of Nevada Las Vegas began the data mining of over 20 years of archaeological site forms pertaining to the prehistoric occupation of the southern portion of the Shivwits Plateau in Northern Arizona. This data, as collected by the National Park Service, was organized and placed into a geodatabase, allowing for the first time a thorough spatial investigation of artifact distributions associated with the upland Virgin Branch...
The Obsidian Trail: A GIS model for obsidian trade routes in the West Mexican Aztatlán Tradition (AD 900-1350) (2017)
The Postclassic Aztatlán Tradition of Western Mexico is well known for its expansive trade networks. Aztatlán merchants traded ceramics, shell, copper, and obsidian across vast distances. Obsidian provides us with a particularly unique opportunity to trace trade networks due to the compositional homogeneity of obsidian sources. Recent studies have identified the source of thousands of obsidian artifacts from numerous Aztatlán centers, allowing for an elaboration on themes such as access to...
Occupation Over Time at the Gault Site (2016)
It is my goal to use Geographic Information Systems (GIS) applications to map and analyze the distribution of material created by the use life of the Gault site, in order to better understand the ways in which the site was re-used. By attempting to understand the scatter of material culture as a site is continually utilized over a period of centuries, I hope to better understand the reasons that the site was being occupied, including what sorts of activities were taking place, and how previous...
On the Back of the Crocodile: Extent, Energetics, and Productivity in Wetland Agricultural Systems, Northern Belize (2016)
Wetland agricultural techniques have been successfully employed in a variety of environmentally and climatically diverse landscapes throughout prehistory. Within the larger Maya region, these features figure prominently in the region comprised of Northern Belize and Southern Quintana Roo. Along the banks of the Hondo and New Rivers, the ancient Maya effectively utilized wetland agricultural practices from the Middle Preclassic to the Terminal Classic periods. A number of past archaeological...
Outliers: Looking at Human Behavior Patterns through Vesselization (Or A Journey Through Legacy Data) (2021)
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Race, Racism, and Montpelier" , at the 2021 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. Vesselization is an essential method for more accurately understanding the number, form, and use of vessels at a site. When paired with new technologies, like GIS, it can be used to understand how people’s behavior and interactions with the landscape affect how vessel sherds are deposited. Working with legacy data, I used GIS to identify vessels...
Paint It Black: A Geospatial Analysis of Chupadero Black-on-white Ceramics (2017)
Chupadero Black-on-white ceramics were produced in the Salinas and Sierra Blanca regions of New Mexico beginning around A.D. 1100. They quickly gained popularity, covering a geographic region that encompassed much of the modern state of New Mexico, west Texas, southeastern Arizona, and northern Chihuahua. Yet, despite their popularity, little is known about the exchange mechanisms that yielded Chupadero Black-on-white’s impressive distribution. ArcGIS contains analytical applications that can be...
A Paleoclimate model of Neanderthal landscape-use during the last interglacial (2016)
Obstacles to our understanding of Neanderthal (Homo neanderthalensis) land-use patterns during the Last Interglacial (130kya-116kya, Marine Isotope Stage 5e) include not only the scarcity of sites in Europe but also a lack of knowing what the landscape may have looked like during this time. This research explores the influence of climate and seasonal variability on Neanderthal land-use. Recently developed global climate models are capable of simulating past climate variables (e.g., precipitation...
Panopticism, Pines and POWS: Applying Conflict Landscape Tools to the Archaeology of Internment (2018)
The military terrain analysis system KOCOA (Key Terrain, Observation,Cover/concealment, Obstacles, and Avenues of approach), or OAKOC, or OCOKA was developed as part of the burgeoning discipline of military science around the start of the American Civil War. It is now part of the NPS’s American Battlefield Protection Program’s survey methodology, was introduced to conflict archaeology by Scott and McFeaters (2011:115-16) and Scott and Bleed (2011:47-49), and has been used as a tool for...
Past Meets Future: Combining GIS, 3D technologies, and legacy data to reanalyze ceramics at Copan, Honduras (2016)
The archaeological site of Copán—a UNESCO World Heritage Site in Honduras—was a primary center for cultural and economic exchange in the Maya world from the fifth to ninth centuries. Our research investigates the sociopolitical climate of the city immediately preceding this collapse. This poster presents the results of a pilot study intended to evaluate the potential of using a combination of digital technologies and legacy data to reanalyze a subset of diagnostic ceramics from select sites...
Pattern recognition and automatic feature extraction in GIS. (2015)
Archaeological applications of geographic information systems and remote sensing technologies are becoming increasingly popular, especially in regard to site prospection and the geospatial analysis of cultural features. Utilizing aerial LiDAR and high-resolution satellite imagery of North Dakota, a training data set was used to define the boundaries and characteristics for certain morphological features of anthropogenic origin, which include mounds, earth lodge depressions, and fortification...
Pigment Identification as a Proxy for Intercultural Interaction in Casma, Ancash during the Initial Period (2100-1000 B.C.E.) (2015)
Differential distribution of mineral resources in the Andean area has necessitated a long history of interaction between coastal and highland peoples. However, when it comes to the Casma Valley, it is not clear when these interactions began. This paper addresses this issue through an examination of the mineralogy of a set of pigment samples collected from tools found at four sites of the Sechin Alto Polity identified by way of X-ray diffraction (XRD). The results of the XRD findings will be...
Placing The Past: Using GIS To Reconstruct The Maritime Landscape Of The Alexandria, Virginia Waterfront (2020)
This is an abstract from the session entitled "Current Research at the Conservation Research Laboratory at Texas A&M University" , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology. The town of Alexandria sits along the Potomac River in northeast Virginia. Established in 1749, Alexandria’s rich history spans over 250 years. During the late 18th and early 19th century, the waterfront underwent a drastic landscape transformation. To reconstruct the maritime landscape...
Politics of Property: A GIS Analysis of the Shifting Value of Agricultural Land in Colonial Cusco (2016)
Recent GIS studies of colonialism combine archival and archaeological data to understand and map changes in political economy, such as settlement patterns, land use, and population aggregations. Such studies often overlook how colonial politics centered on the transformation of value—the social significance of the things and resources that constituted social life. This paper develops a GIS method to document shifts in land value in the Inca imperial capital (Cusco, Peru), during the long process...
Polyvalent Monumentality: Analyzing Geospatially the Interplay of Fortification and Hydrology at the Maya site of Muralla de León (2017)
Dissertation fieldwork since 2014 at Muralla de León has documented, mapped, and partially excavated an integrated system of earthworks that appears to have served both large-scale defensive and hydrological functions. Located on the shores of Lake Macanché, the site sits atop a steep-sided natural rise, artificially augmented in height by an encircling stone rampart wall, or enceinte. A defensive function for the enceinte is hypothesized, though it also appears to serve as a means of water...
The Post-Medieval Settlements and Road Network of the Mani Peninsula, Greece (2016)
In the past 50 years, a great deal of archaeological research in Mani has focused on its Byzantine churches and the enigmatic abandoned settlements that surround them. Far less has been written about the centuries following the collapse of the Byzantine Empire (i.e., the post-Medieval period), when the Ottoman Empire took control. This paper gives a brief overview of the most important sources of historical information about the post-Medieval settlements in Mani. A reassessment of a list dated...
Postindustrial Places and "Big Data": Exploiting the Potential of Historical Spatial Data Infrastructures for Archaeology (2018)
This paper discusses the ways in which emerging "Big Data" approaches to historical research, in the form of GIS-based Historical Spatial Data Infrastructures (HSDIs), represent a powerful way urban and industrial archaeologists may better exploit historical source material. GIS-based research remains an underutilized asset within historical archaeology and its subfields. Drawing examples from HSDIs covering two postindustrial places (the city of London, Ontario and the Keweenaw Peninsula, in...
Potential for Spatial "Big Data" in Historical Archaeology: A Demonstration of Methods and Results (2017)
Historical Archaeology has seen a steadily increasing embrace of Geographic Information Systems (GIS) for the purposes of site recording, preservation and management, but has seen little to no use of the plethora of spatial datasets already publicly available. Such datasets include census, tax, and immigration records, property and housing maps, and archived aerial and satellite imagery, which when properly integrated in a GIS, have great potential for further contextualizing historical...