The Magnetic View of a Princely Landscape

Summary

This is an abstract from the "Monumental Surveys: New Insights from Landscape-Scale Geophysics" session, at the 84th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

The Hallstatt period hilltop settlement at Mont Lassois and its environs have been the focus of archaeological interest ever since the discovery of the famous princely grave of the "Dame de Vix" in 1953. Several excavations as well as aerial and geophysical prospections have since explored the sites on top and around the hill. Starting in 2013, the German Archaeological Institute in cooperation with the multinational Programme Collectif de Recherche "Vix et son environnement" has been conducting large-scale geomagnetic surveys, using a vehicle towed 16-channel magnetometer system. The interpretation of the resulting magnetograms is complemented by the numerous aerial images taken of the area, as well as LiDAR based elevation models. This survey project has now covered more than 700 ha, and the results so far have not only revealed numerous new sites dating to the neolithic to historic periods, but have also enhanced our understanding of the ancient landscape, showing clear patterns of distribution for both burial and settlement sites, embedded in a natural network of waterways and dominated by the prominent hill Mont Lassois.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Monumental Surveys: New Insights from Landscape-Scale Geophysics   •
• Society for American Archaeology 84th Annual Meeting, Albuquerque, NM (2019)

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Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 25513