Abstract
Abstract. Remote sensing has provided a modern wider perspective to approach the earth with its various environments and impact of humans by prospecting previously unknown frontiers of human life. The traces of mobile groups are archaeologically often more difficult to detect than those of the sedentary ones, but new approaches and methods have changed and enhanced the ways to extract archaeological information of hunter-gatherers and pastoral nomads. Remote sensing, for example, provides alternative views from above and better visibility in a larger scale, especially with high resolution solutions, than on the ground to trace sites. Mobile people have become more visible in archaeology, and therefore their importance in the development of human cultures has received more focus and understanding. This paper will focus on the use of remote sensing in the archaeological study of mobile cultures and their environments in the Near East. Various examples of techniques and site types will be discussed, and the suitability of applications will be considered based on the studies by Finnish and Finnish-Swedish projects in the Near East. We will provide examples of applications and emphasize the importance of empirical approaches in studying archaeological evidence by remote sensing. GPS coordinate points have served as the basis of our field survey and mapping. From the image-based data we shall deal with aerial photographs, CORONA satellite photographs, Landsat, SPOT, QuickBird and GeoEye satellite images. From the range-based data we shall discuss X-SAR Shuttle Mission 2000 and ASTER-DEM data, but LiDAR and geophysical devices will only be briefly considered.
Highlights
Archaeology of mobility has particular challenges, because of the ephemeral nature of many types of remains hunter-gatherers andpastoral nomads leave behind. (See, e.g., Wendrich and Barnard, 2008)
The kinds of remains of hunter-gatherers that remote sensing with aerial photographs and satellite imagery can be traced consist of rock shelters, hut bases and kites
The tracks such as hollow ways have been identified in the landscape of Syria, and they have been studied by remote sensing using CORONA satellite photographs
Summary
Archaeology of mobility has particular challenges, because of the ephemeral nature of many types of remains hunter-gatherers andpastoral nomads leave behind. (See, e.g., Wendrich and Barnard, 2008). During the past decades new technologies and methods of inquiries have enhanced prospecting and studying the mobile cultures (see Silver, 2016b). They have provided new ways to extract information of these cultures and make them more visible in the archaeological record. As far as the time scale of the human way of life on earth is concerned, its longest period pertains to mobility, i.e., huntergatherers and later pastoral nomads. They represent cultures that have had an intimate relationship with the environment. The ground survey or an excavation can empirically bring confirmation of the nature and age of the site
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