Articles by Maria da Conceição Monteiro Rodrigues

The aim of this work is to illustrate a database in which we have recorded a great number of archaeological objects. The example is made with 303 figures from Portugal which the archaeologists name “cylindrical idols”. The first step was to choose the vocabulary and organize it in a hierarchical form. Our tree form has three chapters, some sections and subsections that form the base of the system; in the second step, the programme Access was used to describe the cylinders. When the recording was finished, the following questions were posed: a) What is the provenance of the Portuguese cylinders?; b) What is the main raw material?; c) What is their typology?; d) What is their geographical distribution? The answers were reproduced in the form of a graphical picture in which the results can be observed. These results are confronted with M. Gimbutas’ interpretation about these cylinders over Western Europe. Our conclusion disagrees with Gimbutas as in Portugal the figures appear in Copper Age contexts, whereas Gimbutas states that the cylinders were used during the Neolithic. This thesis was linked to the concept of the “Eve Goddess”, although the Kurgans that seem to have introduced the metal in Portugal held the sun as a principal religious symbol.

The authors show here, through an example, how the reasoning procedures in an archaeological construct can be analysed, represented, critically evaluated, and possibly transcribed so as to be used again as part of an expert system. The monograph which has been analysed is an extract from a study on the prehistorical origins of the myth of Classical Greek Demeter. The reasoning steps of the author are first extracted and rewritten in the form of chains of inferences, according to J.-C. Gardin’s logicist approach. These components are then transcribed in terms of a fact base and a rule base according to the SNARK system. The SNARK knowledge base, as well as the results of the computing, are presented as tools for a better understanding of reasoning in the humanities.