Archeologia e Calcolatori 33.2 - 2022

One year after his untimely passing, the Authors remember Giovanni Adamo and his original and impactful scholarly contribution to the field of terminology and lexicology, in the context of the close relationship with Humanities computing.

In a recently published study, a textual dataset encoding a group of scenes depicted on Mesopotamian cylinder seals from the third millennium was submitted to Procrustes Analysis, considering Correspondence Analysis variations due to progressive reductions of the forms involved. The results seemed to indicate that a slight reduction in the number of forms used to describe the raw data would improve the Correspondence Analysis results. Indeed, the actual impact of each reduction on the outcome of the analyses could not be adequately identified if the forms were not considered as elements forming segments, i.e., sub-images of the scenes. In this paper, the results of the same methodology are presented, this time applied to repeated segments within the same dataset, i.e., sequences of textual forms that may describe sub-images of the described scenes. The comparison between the progressive reductions of repeated segments showed relevant differences between small (around 10% of the rarest segments) and large reductions. Indeed, the latter may undermine a consistent interpretation of the different finding sites, yet well represented keeping 90% of segments. Moreover, a reduction performed by hand and not on the frequency of occurrences provided better results.

Size reduction algorithms are essential in the study of multivariate datasets. Many variables make it difficult to visualize data. In Archaeology, this problem often concerns the study of some variables, which can be quantitative or qualitative. In this article, several methods for dimension reduction are applied to a pottery dataset from the protohistoric necropolis Osteria dell’Osa, located 20 km East of Rome. These methods offer the possibility of visualising and analysing large amount of data in a very short time. Our results show that non-linear and non-parametric algorithms such as t-SNE and UMAP are the best choice for visualising and exploring this type of data.

This paper focuses on a multidisciplinary approach used mainly in the post-processing of the data collected in the intensive survey carried out in 2018 in San Basilio di Ariano nel Polesine (RO). At first, the interpretation of aerial photos and the DTM processing for the area of San Basilio have been used to identify features of the ancient landscape before the field survey, in order to better plan the investigations; the results of the analysis on remote sensing and DTM data have been also used during the post-processing phase. Then, the data collected in the field have been digitalized, organized and processed in a database and a GIS, using both cluster analysis and data classification. The research has allowed us not only to confirm and expand the context of the historical and environmental evolution of the area during pre-Roman and Roman period, but also to reflect on the methodology used for the data collection and processing within an intensive field survey. In particular, cluster analysis and numerical classification methods have been compared in order to better understand their potentialities and limits in the data analysis.

This article focuses on a multidisciplinary and experimental approach on the relationships between the Phoenician cities (Lebanon, Syria, Israel) and their hinterlands in the Hellenistic period (4th-1st century BC). The article presents the successive stages of this approach. The first one is the construction of the corpus and the recording of the historical and essentially archaeological data in a relational database. The next step is addressed to spatial modelling. In other words, it means applying a spatial analysis to the data. For this purpose, we select a model, the gravity model, which relates the distance between archaeological sites, their comparative importance, and their capacity to interact between each other. Then we set up the model, thanks to our historical and geographical knowledge of the region. The results are visualisations, i.e., potential maps that include modelled networks extending across the region. They must be commented on in the light of the historical and archaeological knowledge that we have about the area: they confirm or question our reading of the Phoenician territories and get into dialogue with the archaeological and historical data, to improve our understanding of the cities. Then, we carry out a second experimentation, with the addition of six archaeological sites in the corpus, identified by archaeological survey and dated to the Hellenistic period. A new spatial modelling is carried out, with the same model and the same parameters. The partial reconfiguration of the networks is again commented on. The conclusion, finally, deals with the contribution of the approach, as a new tool available to archaeologists and historians in the study of Phoenician territories.

This contribution is the result of experimenting with methodologies linked to the understanding of soundscapes in the context of medieval monasteries. In our specific area, the approach was not focused on the cognitive concept itself so much as the perception of the spirituality of the ringing of bells. The premise was to understand whether, and how, the bells functioned as a soundmark for controlling the territory. The case studies examined are the Abbey of Farneta, the Monastery of Camaldoli and the Abbey of San Fedele, today located in the Province of Arezzo: the three religious structures differ in their historical development, geographical position, and economy. However, what links them (and what links the great majority of medieval monastic complexes) is a tight control of their territory for production purposes, in order to guarantee the profitability of their material heritage. Analyses of the diffusion of the sound of the bells was compared (and integrated) with visibility and catchment analyses. The aim was to understand whether this type of analytical approach could contribute to the definition of a monastery’s ‘catchment area’. The data that emerged describe a complex economic landscape in which identified anomalies at settlement level can be worth analyzing and trying to understand.

The paper discusses new trends in the archaeological documentation practice, heavily conditioned by the capillary diffusion of web-based technologies and cloud-based services. In this context, a close examination of BraDypUS, a libre and open source project both available for download, self-hosting and as a cloud service, is presented. The online availability of archaeological data sets and the possibility of building new original research on them, by adapting original schemas and formats to new requirements, is considered a very promising initial step towards a more collaborative research. Reducing IT barriers and setting the stage for web-based data management and publication to small-scale (single-researcher and/or highly specialized) projects, will lead to a new era for archaeological data analysis and dissemination.

The Authors illustrate the ‘Monte Abatone Project’, focusing on the important necropolis South of the ancient city of Caere. The area in its archaeological and topographical features was not further studied since the geophysical campaigns (1957-1961) by the Lerici Foundation. The main focus is the large area around the Campana Tumulus, previously left unexplored in the large plan by the Lerici Foundation. Excavations in 2018-2021 on the South side of this area led, conversely, to discover a possible ‘family’ cluster of tombs, dating to at least between the early Orientalizing and the early/middle Archaic period: these tombs were of fossa, semi-constructed, single-chamber and C2 types. Also, further unknown sectors of the necropolis were found not far from this cluster, with a concentration of tombs of the early semi-constructed type (first half of VII cent. BCE), provided with small tumuli, ordered in two approximatively parallel rows and all oriented North-West. This suggests the existence of a planning by some form of ‘urban’ authority, at a time – beginning with the Early Orientalizing period − that marked a considerable acceleration in the economic growth of the city and its civil-political structure. The area West and North of the Campana Tumulus was also investigated, including surveying the edges of the plateau that led to the identification of tombs (VI-III cent. BCE) excavated in the past and partially backfilled, and terraces for funerary rites which are oriented, like the Tumulus, toward the city plateau. Extensive use of laser scanning and photogrammetry allowed to produce a model of the Monte Abatone plateau, a 3D model of both the Campana Tumulus, never surveyed since the first half of the nineteenth century, and other excavated tombs.

The lack of surface water and a high potential for evapotranspiration are the climatic and hydrological characteristics of the arid and semi-arid Middle East regions. In foothills regions the groundwater, often supplied by partially buried alluvial fan systems, has been intercepted and conveyed through the creation of a highly efficient supply system known as ‘qanat’, ‘karez’ or ‘foggara’. This ancient hydraulic technology spread on a large scale since the 6th century BCE, during the rise and development of the Persian Empire. It consists in the excavation of a series of vertical tunnels, like large wells, which are connected by a gently sloping underground channel bringing water by gravity. Through the centuries, the qanats have been not only a sustainable system for exploitation of groundwater resources but also an important factor for the socio-economic and cultural development of local communities. In this paper the Authors illustrate the main aspects of qanats under historical, cultural and socio-economic perspective and the recent decline of the qanat system. An original and still updating database of these type of hydraulic operas, implemented through the collection and analysis of documentary sources, cartographic data, and on-site measurements is then presented. The database, including qanats detected on regional to local scales, might be regarded as a valuable support for the recovery of these structures and a more efficient governance of water resources.

This paper presents some results obtained by the application of remote sensing methodologies in the study and monitoring of the Roman city of Falerii Novi and its surrounding area. This landscape changes quickly and for this reason is suitable for non-invasive investigation, which ensure the regular tilling of the land and allow the monitoring of the conservation of the ancient buried structures. Specifically, the research concerns the experimental application of the recent image processing methodologies on five high-resolution satellite images (one QuickBird-2, two GeoEye-1 and two WorldView-2 acquired between 2003 and 2014). The aim of this processing phase is to enhance spectral, spatial and radiometric properties of the images and so, to facilitate the identification of the archaeological marks related to buried structures. The photointerpretation was necessarily supported by the examination of the bibliographic sources, and was validated, where was possible, by field checks. In general, no significant archaeological marks have emerged in the urban area, but the strategic use of the spectral properties of the images has allowed the identification of the areas with the greatest erosion of the surface soil and those of greatest deposition of the colluvial soil. In the extra-urban area, on the other hand, vegetation marks relating to a probable suburban villa in the immediate territory to the South of the city and to the route of the Via Amerina to the North have been identified.

3D recording methodologies have been successfully integrated into the archaeological fieldwork practice, resulting in a widely accepted series of advantages for the documentation of the excavation. However, post-processing analysis is often neglected and recording protocols do not consider possible developments for exploiting the potential of 3D data. At the excavation of Vetricella, in Italy, the ERC nEU-Med project developed a digital documentation protocol aimed at reconstructing the volumetric physical space occupied by each stratigraphic unit, generating more than a thousand contexts over the course of four archaeological seasons. In this contribution we are going to present how the volumetric approach has influenced the whole methodology of documentation since the recording stage, introducing a standardized workflow aimed at reconstructing solid geometries from 3D surfaces. In this protocol a great attention is paid to the strategies, timings and needs of the fieldwork practice, without overlooking important archaeological aspects such as data accuracy and the chance to generate data for more quick on-field interpretation. The final outcome is a new visualization and analysis of the space with the use of volumetric models, which results in greater accuracy in displaying physical and stratigraphic relationships, as well as generating volumetric quantitative data. In the end, some examples drawn from Vetricella will be employed to show how solid 3D geometries and volumetric quantities can be used in support of the archaeological interpretation of the site.

This paper aims to demonstrate how field data collection applications can represent a good resource in archaeological surveys. As an alternative to the classic paper documentation, using a smartphone application saves time both during the survey (automatic geolocation, GPS tracking) and in the post-processing (easier data import in a computer software, reduction of typo-errors and prevention of transcription errors). The focus of this paper is Geopaparazzi, an open source application for Android that allows customized and easy collection of field data by using a smartphone; collected data are ready to be processed by computer software like GIS. Geopaparazzi 6.1.0 was tested in four archaeological survey campaigns, three in Versilia (Italy, Tuscany) and one in Lampedusa (Italy, Sicily). The two environments are profoundly different: Versilia is a mountain landscape, and Lampedusa is a small island. Moreover, the data collected are different but these differences helped to understand how adaptable the application can be.

By retracing the main experiences carried out by digital archaeology on some well-known funerary contexts, the article presents the preliminary results of the ongoing 3D documentation in the necropolis of Corinaldo (Ancona) and on the tomb of a Picenian prince of the 7th century BC. The tomb was discovered thanks to the research carried out by the University of Bologna. The first activities focus on a program of enhancement and fruition of the important context, within an ongoing procedure of preliminary excavations in the vicinity of the site that will lead to a redevelopment of the area.

The Forum built in Rome by Trajan is a match of his political and military virtues: the defeated populations materialize with statues and high-reliefs in precious marble and are therefore an integral part of the marble triumph of the emperor and the Roman army. The statues of the Dacians are distributed on the most visible architectural parts of the complex, and they have different size, as well as different back surface treatment, depending on their location. In order to reconstruct the architectural composition together with the sculptural apparatus, a complete metrological analysis of the sculptures has been undertaken, alongside the examination of the material features of Daci statues (clothing, surface treatment) and of data yielded by archives and excavations that took place in the past centuries and recently in the 21st century. The work has been based on a method measuring bi-dimensional photographic shaped-set of all the Daci dispersed in several art collections, starting from the idea of working with a low-cost method without specific expensive software. The workflow combines bi-dimensional images, scaled to 1:1 reference, imported in AutoCAD in order to produce a single .dwg file, with good resolution but easy-to-manage during the data processing. Some interesting, albeit preliminary, goals have been achieved. In the first place, a measured catalogue of all the Dacian statues dispersed in the world has been quickly built. It was therefore possible to start the reconstruction, at least virtual, of the sculptural context of Trajan’s forum. Regarding the size and archaeological aspect of the sculptures, three dimensional series of Dacians have been grouped, which contributed, on the one hand, to confirm the results of previous studies, and on the other to advance the knowledge with new data.

On July 19, 1992, in the waters of Punta del Serrone (Brindisi, Italy), over 200 fragments of bronze statues of exceptional manufacture were found. This paper traces the history of the exceptional discovery and fate of the finds. The first part deals with the recovery, conservation and exhibition and the main phases of the analytical study that led to their identification and the reconstruction of the events that caused their abandonment on the seabed. The second part is dedicated to the digital acquisition and processing of the statues through laser scanning and to the virtual restoration and creative modeling of some of them, carried out on the occasion of ‘Nel mare dell’intimità/In the sea of intimacy’, an exhibition set up at the Brindisi airport between July 2019 and January 2021. The third and last part discusses the making of the computer animation video ‘Rottami preziosi. Una ballata del mare profondo/Precious scrap. A ballad from the deep sea’, created for the exhibition, and dedicated to telling the story of the bronzes, retracing the different phases of the creative process and the solutions developed to combine all the available data in a functional narrative.

The one-day workshops on ‘The Archaeological Publication in the Digital Environment', organized by Nanterre University in 2021, was the opportunity to discuss the work carried out by the Franco-Egyptian Centre for the Study of the Temples of Karnak in the years 2000. The use of digital photography in an archaeological site has allowed the creation of virtual images that modify our perception of the real world and require a digital publication form. Digital technologies, such as 3D and photogrammetry, generate new scientific imagery. Photomontages and orthomosaic photographs are similar in general appearance to reality but they are completely virtual images. The real object is virtually transformed and, at the same time, the generated virtual object strives to be as close as possible to reality. The digital edition of Paul Barguet’s work on Karnak temple was an example of a paperless approach and an attempt to dematerialize the traditional information media. Nevertheless, virtuality is anchored to the materiality of the computer world to ensure its durability and it is constrained by IT media and software obsolescence. System upgrades and hardware developments may appear the death-knell for these achievements. These images and software are products of a new discipline called ‘virtual archaeology’, ‘digital archaeology’ or ‘cyber-archaeology’, but is that the right terminology? If there is to be a cyber-archaeologist, what should be his function? In the near future, when many machines and software are no longer executable or consigned to the scrapheap, cyber-archaeology will become the science of our digital past and no longer the science of the graphic representation of our past.

Digital technologies are not neutral tools; rather, they mediate our knowledge of material evidence. This contribution stems from the reflections on the sidelines of the ArchAIDE project, which developed AI tools to recognise ceramics and attempts to answer questions, among others, on how technological intervention takes place in archaeology, particularly through AI, and if such effects are disruptive concerning epistemology and hermeneutics. Postphenomenology and material hermeneutics have been considered to describe the relationship between archaeology and digital technology. In the AI age, Archaeology’s challenge is to recognise technology as an actor (or maybe as an agent) on whom we depend on extracting meaning and, at the same time, as something that partially reflects our hermeneutic. The algorithms have digital technological intentionality that creates information, performs hermeneutics in our place, and finally directs archaeologists what to read. This act of knowledge is performed instead of ours. If, in Heidegger’s ontological inversion, science becomes dependent on technology and, in a sense, a tool of technology, in the same way, archaeology has become dependent on technology and entrapped by it.