Going from Analogue to Digital: A Study of Documentation Methods during an Excavation of the Neolithic Flint Mines at Pilbladet, Sweden

Anders Gutehall,Åsa Ottosson Berggren

doi:10.37718/csa.2018.10

Abstract

The ‘digital turn’ in archaeology has resulted in documentation, analysis, visualization and repository requirements becoming increasingly digital in recent years. However, we are only at the beginning of understanding how the shift from analogue to digital affects archaeological interpretation, as attention has mainly been directed towards technological aspects. However, how archaeology is executed influences the production of archaeological knowledge, and additional research into digital practices and their consequences is needed. During the latest excavation in 2014 of the Neolithic flint mines of Södra Sallerup, in Malmö in southern Sweden, several recording methods were used to document the remains in plan, including hand drawing, digital mapping with GPS and digital photography using a camera mounted on a pole. The records were used to create both a digital plan as well as georeferenced orthophotos from a 3D model and from photomosaic. The aim was to produce a record comparable to previous documentation from decades of archaeological excavations of the flint mines in the area, as well as one that is up-to-date with today’s digital standards. The methods are described and their consequences for the archaeological results are discussed.

Highlights

The introduction of digital tools into the archaeological toolkit has transformed, and is still transforming, archaeological practices, as technical development is in a phase of rapid change
The digital turn in archaeology has come to encompass all aspects of archaeological work, including recording, analysis, dissemination and storage of archaeological information, wherever digital tools are used in archaeology
To yet again rephrase the question asked by Huggett (2015): ‘what did we gain from the digital component of our documentation in this case?’ It can be concluded that the digital documentation proved most useful as a combination of digital plans and orthophotos, as it provided a new perspective on the remains that was available after the excavation, which influenced interpretations

Summary

Introduction

The introduction of digital tools into the archaeological toolkit has transformed, and is still transforming, archaeological practices, as technical development is in a phase of rapid change This development and its impact on archaeology has been called a ‘digital turn’ (Costopoulos 2016) and has had a profound impact on archaeological work and archaeological information processes, altering the subject in ways we have hardly begun to imagine (Huvila 2014, 2018). The digital turn in archaeology has come to encompass all aspects of archaeological work, including recording, analysis, dissemination and storage of archaeological information, wherever digital tools are used in archaeology It started with data processing and statistical analyses as computers became common in the 1960s and 1970s (Zubrow 2006), continued with digital mapping with total stations during the 1990s, as well as the use of GIS software for analysis and visualization of the collected data, to the situation of rapid development today, which has been characterized as a ‘digital leap’, rather than a digital turn (Gunnarsson 2018). This is in essence a change of perspective that leads to the possibility of asking new questions and achieving new knowledge

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Conclusion