The Shieling Project: Learning from the past in the Scottish Highlands

Recently, 40 pupils made the journey with me, their teachers and some parents up to the historic shieling site in the hills just above our office. The weather was windy and rainy, for many they had never been out for a day in such conditions, let alone walked such a long way in wild country.  Yet we were re-creating the journey children would have made for centuries every year: up with the cattle to the high ground, to the ‘shieling’ (àirigh in Scottish Gaelic), to milk, explore and live for the summer.

As we walked we discussed the contrast between our modern lives and these traditional ones whose footsteps we were walking in. We all felt that contrast in our bodies – breathing, working hard, carrying our needs with us on our backs. We sung Gaelic songs, and created Gaelic place-names as we went. Finally we got to the shieling – and at first the young people could see nothing – just a grassy area in the hills. But then it turned out they were standing on the ruins of a hut – not used for 250 years, but still visible if you looked. Suddenly the place came alive, as they told shieling stories, drew pictures of what it would have looked like, and we put up our own shelter to stay for the day. And this experience isn’t a one off – the teachers have been working with the Shieling Project for ten months and the pupils were on their second visit, using that ten month interval to develop projects tailored to their interests back in their class. It is this experience that we want to expand and develop. We would like to be able to host groups for whole weeks, where they could really get to grips with the history of the shieling and the implications for the present: landuse, farming, workskills, sustainability, conservation. We have a vision of a modern shieling camp, with micro-dairy and learning centre, leading Scotland in sustainability and heritage education.

Learning from the past

The project is inspired by the heritage, landscapes and traditional culture of Highland Scotland, specifically the shieling.  The shieling was a traditional practice of moving up to the high ground with livestock to live there for the summer. Young people had a fundamental role at the shieling: they took on new responsibilities, learning about themselves and the landscape beyond their homes. The shieling has many resonances today and can help Scotland’s young people face a variety of challenges: increasing levels of unhealthiness; physically, mentally and in their local environments, lack of opportunity to go outdoors, lack of contact with heritage and traditions of their local area, and little understanding of food production or farming.

Learning for sustainability

Our accredited training programmes for teachers in Learning for Sustainability enable them to address the deprivation caused by indoor lives. We combine this training for teachers with experiences for young people exploring the shieling and its impact on health and well-being today. These two services, accessed in combination or separately, support young people to understand and experience the landscape not just during the visit to the project but back home in the school and community life.

Since 2013 we have negotiated and signed a 10 year lease with the Struy Estate for our outstanding project site in Glenstrathfarrar, near Inverness. Working with our landlords, we have renovated the cottage on site for staff accommodation and office space. All project activities are now delivered from this site. We became the first organisation to be accredited by the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS) to deliver professional learning programme for teachers in Learning for Sustainability, and are currently recruiting our third cohort for this programme.

Our first cohort on the professional recognition programme involved mostly primary teachers and 137 young people, and has already received positive feedback from Education Scotland and the Scottish Government Learning Directorate. Our second programme (May 2015 – May 2016) is focused on secondary teachers, and our third will run from September 2015.

Transformative learning experiences

Young people and teachers report transformative learning experiences – with teachers having changed their approach, found new focus or inspiration, and young people reporting that coming to the Shieling Project was the “best day at school ever.”

Back in school after visiting the project, young people have been reflecting on what makes a community work; the values and skills needed, they have been designing small huts, creating artwork and videos, researching Gaelic work songs, and working together across classes and schools to continue these projects. They are captivated by the story of what young people did in the past, and excited to have so many opportunities to get outdoors. From a baseline at the start of their programme, they are expected to document and critique their learning journey. These journals also inform our understanding of the project’s impact.

Teachers are already reporting changes in their educational practice, the benefits of sustained reflection and discussion of outdoor learning, the opportunities to run new projects with their classes.  For example, Aboyne Academy teacher Jane Summers explained:

“I am taking part in the Shieling Project’s Professional Recognition Programme in Learning for Sustainability recognised by the General Teaching Council (Scotland). Learning for Sustainability means loads of different things to different people. To me, it’s about two things, building personal capacity in pupils and adults through engagement with their past and their environment and it’s about learning to live in and contribute effectively to their community.  The Shieling Project challenges us to do this through looking at how communities lived and worked in the past and how that can inform the way that we teach and live in our communities today. “

“I have completed my first weekend at the site in Glen Strathfarrar focusing on what I wanted to achieve in my year working with Sam and sharing experiences and insights with other colleagues. Sam works brilliantly to facilitate creative and strategic thinking, coaxing the most interesting ideas out of us through immersion in the landscape. The project is about the archaeology but it is about so much more than that too. To me, it’s about what the archaeology can inspire when used in different ways to connect young people with their landscape, culture and community today. I have had my own experiences using archaeology to develop inter-disciplinary learning in schools, and working with Sam I hope to take this further over the next 2 or 3 years, gathering valuable evidence of the importance of place-based learning to the development of young people and gaining professional recognition for my work in this area.”

A week of shieling Life

Arriving on the Monday the class will orientate itself around the shieling, learning the basics about the site, settling themselves in at the camp, looking at how water, waste and energy are managed here and how this contrasts with their everyday lives.

Camping in the comfort of simple wooden cabins, the days will follow a routine: starting in the morning with some of the class milking the cow, while the others prepare breakfast. The children will be responsible for cleaning up and making their lunches, then we will start an activity which will keep us outside for most of the day: going to the peat moss to cut and collect peats, going to the historic shieling site, mapping the area, surveying the wildlife, learning about useful plants, going to the dairy to help make and package cheese and butter. The choice of activities will be determined by the time of year, weather, and interests of the class, as well as the questions they have been working on through the project prior to the residential. The afternoon will contain some free time inside the project site and recording their experiences. The evenings will involve craft activities such as dying, weaving, felting, basketry, rope-making, story telling as well as making an evening meal. On the Friday after reviewing the week, packing and tidying, the class will depart in time to return to the school by the end of the school day.

Archaeology and experimental reconstructions

This autumn we will do an initial investigation of our historic shieling site which will involve local community, schools and university students. From this initial study we will create a fuller programme of digs in 2016 and 2017. We hope that some of the information we gather can lead to some experimental reconstructions of the shieling huts in situ.
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Reference:

Past Horizons. 2015. “The Shieling Project: Learning from the past in the Scottish Highlands”. Past Horizons. Posted: June 13, 2015. Available online: http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/06/2015/the-shieling-project-learning-from-the-past-in-the-scottish-highlands

Saving Chilean mummies from climate change

At least two thousand years before the ancient Egyptians began mummifying their pharaohs, a hunter-gatherer people called the Chinchorro living along the coast of modern-day Chile and Peru developed elaborate methods to mummify not just elites but all types of community members -- men, women, children, and even unborn fetuses. Radiocarbon dating as far back as 5050 BC makes them the world's oldest human-made mummies.

But after staying remarkably well preserved for millennia, during the past decade many of the Chinchorro mummies have begun to rapidly degrade. To discover the cause, and a way to stop the deterioration, Chilean preservationists turned to a Harvard scientist with a record of solving mysteries around threatened cultural heritage artifacts.

Nearly 120 Chinchorro mummies are housed in the collection of the University of Tarapacá's archeological museum in Arica, Chile. That's where scientists noticed that the mummies were starting to visibly degrade at an alarming rate. In some cases, specimens were literally turning into a black ooze.

"In the last ten years, the process has accelerated," said Marcela Sepulveda, professor of archaeology in the anthropology department and Archeometric Analysis and Research Laboratories at the University of Tarapacá who specializes in materials characterization, during a recent visit to Cambridge. "It is very important to get more information about what's causing this and to get the university and national government to do what's necessary to preserve the Chinchorro mummies for the future."

What was eating the mummies? To help solve that riddle Sepulveda called on experts in Europe and North America, including Ralph Mitchell, Gordon McKay Professor of Applied Biology, Emeritus at Harvard School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS). Mitchell has used his knowledge of environmental microbiology to pinpoint the causes of decay in everything from historic manuscripts to the walls of King Tutankhamen's tomb to the Apollo space suits.

"We knew the mummies were degrading but nobody understood why," Mitchell said. "This kind of degradation has never been studied before. We wanted to answer two questions: what was causing it and what could we do to prevent further degradation?"

Preparing the mummies "was a complicated process that took time -- and amazing knowledge," Sepulveda said. The Chinchorro would first extract the brains and organs, then reconstruct the body with fiber, fill the skull cavity with straw or ash, and use reeds to sew it back together, connecting jaw to cranium. A stick kept the spine straight and tethered to the skull. The embalmer restored the skin in place -- sometimes patching the corpse together using the skin of sea lions or other animals. Finally, the mummy was covered with a paste, the color of which archeologists assign to different epochs in the more than 3,000 years of Chinchorro mummy-making -- black made from manganese was used in the oldest ones, red made from ocher in later examples, and brown mud had been applied to the most recent finds.

The first thing that Mitchell and his team needed was physical evidence, something Sepulveda supplied in the form of samples -- both degrading skin and undamaged skin -- taken from mummies in the museum's collection. The task of receiving the unusual shipment fell to Alice DeAraujo, a research fellow in Mitchell's lab who also played a lead role in analyzing the samples as part of her thesis for a master's degree in biology at Harvard Extension School.

It became apparent to DeAraujo and Mitchell that the degradation was microbial. Now they needed to determine if there was a microbiome on the mummy skin that was responsible.

"The key word that we use a lot in microbiology is opportunism," Mitchell said. "With many diseases we encounter, the microbe is in our body to begin with, but when the environment changes it becomes an opportunist."

Mitchell had a series of questions: "Is the skin microbiome from these mummies different from normal human skin? Is there a different population of microbes? Does it behave differently? The whole microbiology of these things is unknown."

The pair isolated microbes present in the samples of both the degrading skin and uncompromised skin. But since there was only a limited amount of mummy skin, they needed a surrogate for the next step: culturing the organisms in the lab and testing them to see what happened when the samples were exposed to different humidity levels. Using pig skin acquired from colleagues at Harvard Medical School, DeAraujo began a series of tests. After determining that the pig skin samples began to degrade after 21 days at high humidity, she repeated the results using mummy skin, confirming that elevated moisture in the air triggers damage to the skin. This finding was consistent with something that Sepulveda reported: humidity levels in Arica where the archeological museum is located have been on the rise.

DeAraujo's analysis suggested that the ideal humidity range for mummies kept in the museum was between 40 percent and 60 percent. Any higher and degradation could occur; any lower and equally damaging acidification was likely. Further testing is needed to assess the impact of temperature and light.

The results will help museum staff fine-tune temperature, humidity, and light levels to preserve the mummies in their extensive collection, Mitchell said. But he is keen to solve an even larger challenge.

According to Sepulveda and others there are large numbers -- perhaps hundreds -- of Chinchorro mummies buried just beneath the sandy surface in the valleys throughout the region. They are often uncovered during new construction and public works projects. Rising humidity levels may make the unrecovered mummies susceptible to damage as well. While the degradation process is relatively controlled at the museum, it is worse in sites exposed to the natural environment.

"What about all of the artifacts out in the field?" Mitchell asks. "How do you preserve them outside the museum? Is there a scientific answer to protect these important historic objects from the devastating effects of climate change?"

The solution to the challenge of preserving the 7,000-year-old Chinchorro mummies, Mitchell believes, may draw from 21st-century science. "You have these bodies out there and you're asking the question: How do I stop them from decomposing? It's almost a forensic problem."

Others who contributed to the research include Vivien Standen, Bernardo Arriaza, and Mariela Santos of the University of Tarapacá, and Philippe Walter from the Laboratoire d'Archéologie Moléculaire et Structurale in Paris.

The work was supported by Harvard SEAS, Consejo Nacional de Investigación Científica y Tecnológica in Chile and the Universidad de Tarapacá.
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Reference:

Science Daily. 2015. “Saving Chilean mummies from climate change”. Science Daily. Posted: March 9, 2015. Available online: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2015/03/150309093212.htm

VIMS to help protect key Native-American site

Grant will help defend Werowocomoco shoreline from erosion

A $199,000 grant from the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation will allow researchers at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science to help protect Werowocomoco—one of the most important Native American sites in the eastern U.S.—from shoreline erosion and sea-level rise.

Occupied for the last 10,000 years, Werowocomoco was the seat of power for Algonquian Chief Powhatan when English colonists arrived at Jamestowne in 1607. The site—where Captain John Smith was purportedly saved by Powhatan's daughter Pocahontas—occupies an eroding headland on the north side of the York River about half way between Yorktown and West Point. Bob and Lynn Ripley, the current landowners, have graciously allowed a conservation easement and archeological excavations on the 57 acres of their property that form the core of the historic village.

VIMS researcher Donna Milligan, who leads the project in collaboration with colleagues at the National Park Service (NPS) and the Virginia Department of Historical Resources (VDHR), says "This project is about protecting a one-of-a-kind archeological site. Every day, erosion is removing artifacts from the bank, and we can fix that. We can build a living shoreline that somewhat mimics what the Native Americans would have hunted and fished, the marshy area that would have fringed the whole shoreline in their time."

The main feature of the restoration project will be two or more sills—long piles of rock placed just offshore and parallel to the low, sandy cliff that forms the existing shoreline. Between sill and shore, sand and marsh grasses will be added for additional habitat and protection. Bringing an educational component to the project, the marsh grasses will be planted and monitored by students from Ware Academy in Gloucester. All told, the project will create about 15,000 square feet of marsh while keeping more than 900,000 pounds of sediment and nearly 500 pounds of phosphorus and nitrogen out of the York River each year.

Milligan says VIMS' role in the project is to create the conceptual plan for managing the shoreline—figuring out where to place the sills, how long and high they should be, and the distance between them. That requires careful analysis of a host of site-specific factors, including tidal range, water depth, prevailing wave direction and height, frequency of storm surge, the prevalence of boat wakes, geometry and orientation of the shoreline, height and composition of the bank, and any existing shoreline-defense structures. Scott Hardaway, Director of VIMS' Shoreline Studies program, says the ultimate goal of the restoration is "a diverse coastal habitat that supports marine life, land animals, and birds, while protecting the shoreline and archaeological resources from storms and sea-level rise."

The effects of sea-level rise at the site are clear. Analysis of aerial imagery by VIMS researchers shows that the most exposed stretches of the Werowocomoco shoreline are eroding at a rate of more than 1.5 feet annually, with nearly 100 feet of retreat since the 1930s. Remnant marsh outcrops, widening marsh creeks, and "ghost" trees provide further evidence of rising waters. William & Mary Professor Martin Gallivan, head of archeology at Werowocomoco, says "This area has seen considerable erosion since the site represented a Native town, with recent hurricanes producing visible damage to the bluff."

The area of greatest concern along the 1,300-foot Werowocomoco shoreline is a 300-foot stretch bisected by an existing pier. "Erosion in this section threatens the connection between the pier and the bank," says Milligan. "We've identified this as a critical area and will address it in Phase 1 of the overall shore-protection system." Protection will likely come via construction of two sills, each about 125 feet long and separated by a 50-foot gap for the pier.

Hardaway adds "We'll prepare a Joint Permit Application for the entire site, then put construction of the Phase 1 sills out to bid as a design/build project to local marine contractors." Construction costs are by far the largest part of the project budget. Protection of the remaining Werowocomoco shoreline awaits additional funding.

Preserving the pier is a key part of the long-term plan for the site. The plan—prepared by the Ripleys, NPS, and VDHR—ultimately sees public ownership and permanent protection of the entire 250-acre property, with land access from the Gloucester County road system and water access by boat from another existing pier at York River State Park—directly across the river and within easy driving distance of Jamestown, Colonial Williamsburg, and other hubs of historical tourism. Werowocomoco is also part of the Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail. This water trail—the first of its kind in the U.S.—follows the historic routes of Smith's travels based on his maps and journals.

"With docks on both sides of the river, water access to Werowocomoco is easily carried out and will provide an exciting and historic visit," says Milligan. Indeed, the National Park Service believes that visitation to Werowocomoco could ultimately rival that of Jamestown.

Says NPS Superintendent Chuck Hunt, "Werowocomoco could certainly become one of the major heritage tourism sites in the region. It would not only be a major factor in the local economy but also play an important role in helping people to understand the life of American Indians at the time of European contact."

Adds Gallivan, "The archaeological research at Werowocomoco has been conducted in partnership with Virginia Indian tribes who have expressed a special connection to the site and its long history as a landscape of Native power. This shoreline project will provide critical protection for Werowocomoco's richest archaeological deposits. The shoreline was the residential core of the town, and the archaeology in this area includes artifacts, food remains, and the footprints of Powhatan houses. My colleagues and I in the Werowocomoco Research Group agree that this project will provide immeasurable benefits for the site. The stabilization plan is carefully considered and will not harm the archaeological record."
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EurekAlert. 2014. “VIMS to help protect key Native-American site”. EurekAlert. Posted: October 15, 2014. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-10/viom-vth101514.php

Digitising cave art will prevent it being lost forever

Virtual records of fragile archaeological sites will preserve them for future generations when it's not possible to defend them from the elements

A RESCUE mission is underway on the Scottish coast north of Edinburgh. Jonathan's Cave, with its rare trove of 1500-year-old rock art, risks being flooded by the sea or buried in a landslide. But rather than fight the elements researchers have opted to save the cave by putting the whole thing on the internet.

A team led by Joanna Hambly, an archaeologist at the University of St Andrews, UK, is using a series of laser and visual scanning techniques to recreate a virtual cave in minute detail.

Starting last year, the team brought in a low-flying drone to shoot aerial footage of the outside of the cave and the surrounding land. Lasers then scanned the cave, both inside and out, to build a 3D model of the site on a millimetre-scale.

The team also scanned the carvings several times using a variety of techniques. In one, a camera snapped images of the walls as they were lit from many different angles. And another approach, called structured light scanning, projected different patterns onto the walls and then read distortions in the patterns caused by the rock surface. This method provides detail down to the level of 100 micrometres – fine enough resolution to examine each individual hammer blow that made up the carvings.

"We're throwing everything at it. There is a danger that we may lose these caves," says team member Tom Dawson of the non-profit trust Scottish Coastal Archaeology and the Problem of Erosion.

An online walk-through of Jonathan's Cave will go live later this month. As well as clicking to move through the cave, you will be able to use the mouse cursor like a torch to illuminate more than 30 different carvings left by the Picts, who lived in Scotland during the Iron Age. These include images of men and animals, Christian symbols and the earliest known depiction of a Scottish boat. If all goes well, the team hopes to recreate the process for other nearby caves that are also in danger of disappearing.

"One of the objectives is to see which technique is most effective at recording heritage like this," says Hambly.

The project is not the first to create a virtual record of fragile archaeological sites.

"This scarce resource is being lost forever," says Frank Weaver, a documentary filmmaker who has been using Microsoft's Kinect depth-sensing cameras to record rock art in Paraguay. "What better way to save it for future studies and appreciation than online?"

Katherine Tsiang, an art historian at the University of Chicago, has used similar methods to digitally record historic caves in China. But she cautions that even high-tech archives are vulnerable to becoming outdated, or simply forgotten about. "All of this digital stuff isn't permanent unless it's carefully maintained," she says.
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References:

Rutkin, Aviva. 2014. “Digitising cave art will prevent it being lost forever”. New Scientist. Posted: Available online: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg22229644.500-digitising-cave-art-will-prevent-it-being-lost-forever.html#.U2wCL8ejfmk

Save ancient Chinese scrolls with anti-curl weapons

Ancient Chinese scrolls may solve a dilemma for futuristic electronics: how to avoid curling. Hanging scrolls traditionally used in Chinese paintings are normally stored rolled up to protect their delicate artwork. But when unrolled, the long sides will curl, potentially causing damage.

Tzay-Ming Hong at the National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan and his colleagues decided to investigate curling scrolls after a trip to the National Palace Museum in Taipei, where they talked to art conservationists about ways to use physics to protect hanging scrolls. "Like the mounting masters before them, over the span of more than 2000 years, they did not think this problem was at all solvable," says Hong.

The team modelled the problem on computers and with real paper and plastic films. They found that rolling causes the back layer of a scroll to stretch along its length. This means the paper shrinks back when the scroll is laid out flat, causing it to expand along its width and curl.

Stiffer back

The paper backing used to mount scrolls is often replaced as part of normal restoration. So Hong's team says one solution is to replace the backing on scrolls with paper that has fibres aligned with the long edges, increasing stiffness in that direction. Adding extra layers of paper to the sides has a similar effect.

Alternatively, making tiny perforations along the entire backing sheet with a stiff brush will reduce the amount of stretch that converts into curling. The team saw similar results for plastic films, which suggests that these techniques could be useful for designing flexible electronic displays, which also curl after rolling.

"No one would have guessed that studying ancient Chinese paintings would lend a lesson to modern technologies such as flexible electronic paper," says Hong.
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References:

Aron, Jacob. 2014. “Save ancient Chinese scrolls with anti-curl weapons”. New Scientist. Posted: January 28, 2014. Available online: http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn24959-save-ancient-chinese-scrolls-with-anticurl-weapons.html

Seashells inspire new way to preserve bones for archeologists, paleontologists

Recreating the story of humanity's past by studying ancient bones can hit a snag when they deteriorate, but scientists are now reporting an advance inspired by seashells that can better preserve valuable remains. Their findings, which appear in the ACS journal Langmuir, could have wide-ranging implications for both archeology and paleontology.

Luigi Dei and colleagues explain that a process similar to osteoporosis causes bones discovered at historically significant sites to become brittle and fragile — and in the process, lose clues to the culture they were once part of. Preserving them has proved challenging. Current techniques to harden and strengthen bones use vinyl and acrylic polymers. They act as a sort of glue, filling in cracks and holding fragments together, but they are not ideal. In an effort to stanch the loss of information due to damage, Dei's team set out to find a better way to preserve old bones.

The researchers turned to seashells for inspiration. Using skeletal fragments from the Late Middle Ages, they grew aragonite, a kind of lime that some sea animals produce to shore up their shells, on the bones in a controlled way. The treatment hardened the surfaces of the bones, as well as the pores inside them, making the ancient remains 50 to 70 percent sturdier. "These results could have immediate impact for preserving archeological and paleontological bone remains," the scientists conclude.
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References:

EurekAlert. 2014. “Seashells inspire new way to preserve bones for archeologists, paleontologists”. EurekAlert. Posted: January 22, 2014. Available online: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2014-01/acs-sin012214.php

Lego helps save ancient Egyptian mummy case

Thanks to an ambitious conservation project, the ancient Egyptian cartonnage mummy case of Hor, a little-known treasure of the Fitzwilliam Museum, is now on display after years in obscurity.

The conservation of the mummy case was undertaken with the assistance of the University’s Department of Engineering, who helped construct clever frames to support the delicate case during conservation and a new display mount with internal supports using LEGO®.

The mummy case was found in the Ramesseum at Thebes by Quibell in the Ramesseum in 1896. The gilded wooden face had been torn out by robbers and the mummy removed.

Cartonnage is a uniquely Egyptian material, often only a few millimetres thick, consisting of layers of plaster, linen and glue. It is remarkably rigid but also very sensitive to humidity. At some point the Hor cartonnage had been exposed to damp conditions and had sagged dramatically around the chest and face. This caused structural problems and serious cracking and instability in the painted decoration. There had been some attempts at repair and restoration, most probably in the cartonnage’s early years in the Museum with some of the gaps  filled in with a blue-green paint.

The cartonnage is decorated with scenes from the underworld books, which can be seen on the walls of the royal tombs in the Valley of the Kings at Luxor; the colour scheme is also unusual.

In the recent project, the conservators wanted to reshape the cartonnage by using humidity to soften it and allow it to be manipulated. But introducing water into this material was risky because the painted surface is very easily damaged by moisture, and furthermore, if the whole cartonnage were softened at once there was a real danger it would collapse. Introducing water in a controlled way to the distorted area could only really be done if the cartonnage was face-down – but the fragile state of the chest and face made this almost impossible.

Luckily, help was available from the University’s Department of Engineering. In the latest of a series of collaborations with the Museum’s conservators, the Department offered the problem as a project for a final year student. The challenge was taken up by David Knowles. In close consultation with the Fitzwilliam, David devised and made a frame to suspend Hor face-down while the reshaping was carried out. Using a combination of traditional wooden frames and mouldable materials designed for medical use, Hor could be completely supported for weeks at a time, allowing conservator Sophie Rowe to reshape the cartonnage very gradually.

Once Sophie had successfully reshaped the chest and face and stabilised the surface, David designed and built a display mount for the mummy case. An essential part of this is the internal support which ensures that the structure cannot collapse again in the future. Six light, ingenious little structures made from LEGO® have been placed inside the chest cavity. They are adjustable using screw threads, and are padded with archival foam where they are in contact with the ancient surface.

A great result for Hor, who can now be displayed safely and for David, who was awarded a prize by the Department of Engineering for his final presentation on the project! See the video here: Video
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References:

Past Horizons. 2012. “Lego helps save ancient Egyptian mummy case”. Past Horizons. Posted: September 15, 2012. Available online: http://www.pasthorizonspr.com/index.php/archives/09/2012/lego-helps-save-ancient-egyptian-mummy-case

Campaign to save Australia's rock art

A national campaign to protect Australia’s rock art led by Griffith University’s Professor Paul Tacon was recently launched in Sydney. Professor Tacon, who is Australia’s first Chair in Rock Art, warned in less than 50 years, half of Australia’s valuable rock art sites could vanish.

He said without a national heritage register of rock art, Australia’s estimated 100,000 sites were in danger of being destroyed by vandalism or industrial and urban development.

“We need a fully-resourced research institute and national register-archive to bring together diverse forms of information about rock art sites and to plan for the future management and conservation of sites.”

“Australian rock art is priceless and older than the majority of priceless artworks in galleries around the world. It offers a unique visual archive of Australia’s history going back at least 15,000 years and it tells us about our recent and ancient pasts.”

Rock art consists of paintings, drawings, engravings, stencils and figures made of native beeswax in rock shelters and caves, on boulders and platforms.

He said South Africa led the world in national rock art archives with a major repository at the Rock Art Research Institute in Johannesburg.

“Many other nations have smaller scale national registers and archives but Australia has never had one. We are way behind other countries like China, South Africa, France, India and Spain in managing rock art heritage.”

The register and digital archive will be a joint initiative between Griffith University’s Place, Evolution and Rock Art Heritage Unit and the Australian National University’s Rock Art Research Centre.

It will have strong links with Indigenous communities, museums, and other universities. Collaborative fieldwork between Aboriginal Australians, archaeologists and other scientists will take place across Australia.

For more information visit the Protect Australia’s Spirit website

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References:

2011. "Campaign to save Australia's rock art". Past Horizons. Posted: June 1, 2011. Available online: http://www.pasthorizons.com/index.php/archives/06/2011/campaign-to-save-australias-rock-art

Smugglers discovered and plundered a Parthian Dynastic site in Masjed-Soleiman

Smugglers in search of treasures in an area known as Shanzdah-Maylee (Šānzdah-Māylē / sixteen-mile) have discovered and plundered an ancient tappeh (archaeological mound) in a depth of four meters, according to a recent report by the Persian service of Mehr News Agency.

The site is located between Batvand and Karāee villages, near the city of Masjed-Soleiman in the south-western Iranian province of Khuzestan.

According to the report, 75 year old farmer Farhad Pur-Rezaee alerted volunteers at Khuzestan's Friends of the Cultural Heritage Association (TARIANA), regarding the illegal excavation in his 56 hectares farmland.

Nine years ago the same farmer reported illegal excavation in his land to Islamic Republic officials who ignored the complaint, as a result he reported this particular incident to TARIANA. The TARIANA volunteers attended the site and inspected the damages and subsequently reported to Khuzestan Cultural Heritage and Tourism Organisation (KCHTO) to take appropriate action.

Volunteer archaeologists working with TARIANA dated the site to the third Iranian dynasty, the Parthians (Arsacids) 248 BCE-224CE, due to the type of stone-work and style of construction which is similar to nearby ancient sites from that period. The volunteers also discovered a large number of openings in the farmland, which points to an ongoing operation by the smugglers. It is suspected that the holes are kind of test-trenches to ascertain the location of ancient structures buried beneath the farmland. It is expected to be looted soon if it has not been done so already.

The farmer also told TARAINA that he has obtained planning permission from KCHTO to build a factory-farm only 300 meters away from the plundered tappeh. This demonstrates that the permit was issued without any survey on the site; otherwise the results would have revealed the presence of an ancient structure and consequently would have stopped the plundering.

Locals believe that smugglers have people in KCHTO working with them, since this is beyond KCHTO’s norm of incompetency.

After informing the KCHTO, it came to light that the authority was aware of the existence of Parthian constructions in the farmland and promised an investigation. Three days later, KCHTO to everyone’s surprise claimed the discovery and plunder was a rumour. ICHTHO also backed KCHTO and issued a statement calling the news fictitious and asked news-agencies not to concern the public with the plundering of sites in Iran. Both KCHTO and ICHTO refused to explain the farmer's statement as well as the picures that were taken from the site as evidence.

ICHTO in March 2009 banned Iranian archaeologists from giving interviews, and anyone in breach of the imposed law will lose their job and will face draconian punishments.

The volunteers at TARIANA since its foundation in 2006 have single-handedly done the jobs of the government run KCHTO as well as the provincial police in safeguarding the Iranian heritage in Khuzestan Province. KCHTO management has constantly penalised and attacked TARIANA for being a ‘Wikileak’-like cultural body, but despite this they are still fighting for their noble cause. The majority in the province consider TARIANA as the main cultural body rather than KCHTO – with many sharing the view of a Khuzestani archaeologist who said, “it is better to dismantle KCHTO and let TARIANA do the job of safeguarding the Iranian heritage of the province in a real term, at no cost.”
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References:

CAIS. 2010. "Smugglers discovered and plundered a Parthian Dynastic site in Masjed-Soleiman". Circle of Ancient Iranian Studies. Posted: December 3, 2010. Available online: http://www.cais-soas.com/news/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=158:smugglers-discovered-and-plundered-a-parthian-dynastic-site-in-masjed-soleiman-&catid=47

Disaster Archaeology: The socio-cultural profile of hazards. Disaster Archaeology and the risk assessment of past catastrophic events

ABSTRACT
Natural and man-induced hazards play an active role in the morphology and evolution of past, present and.. future ecosystems, both natural and human. They happen in periodical or chaotic patterns, varying in frequency, magnitude and functional structure. They may have also several impacts on the evolution of human civilization (biological, ecological, environmental, socio-economic, political, technological, geographical, ideological and cultural results) that are not always clearly defined, even by the victims or the generations following the event. These effects could be hidden in the 'archaeological landscapes', due to diverse parameters. Furthermore, many 'entities', for example the vulnerability of ancient societies to environmental or human-made risks, and their adaptation process to the 'unfamiliar landscapes' formed after natural disasters are not measurable as other proxy data can be be (e.g. palaeoclimatic, hydrogeological, palaeoanthropological) .

Considering the above-mentioned parameters, this paper deals with : a) the definition of a methodological framework consistent with the needs and scope of Disaster Archaeology, b) the application of risk analysis on hazardous phenomena and case studies from Pleistocene to 19th cent. A.C.E, c) the adoption of pivotal axes by contemporary mitigation plans and risk management policies (e.g. landscape evolution, human behavioral patterns, investment choices and proactive planning of past societies) and d) the deep understanding of collective shock response, its mechanism and dynamics via Psychopathology.

This attempt could result in various methodological tools and analytical parameters. The formation of disaster sequences can highlight the temporal and spatial distribution of past hazards, the elaboration of a d-base with this kind of information can enrich the flexibility of adopted scenarios and the categorization of affected targets (e.g. human lives, ecosystems' equilibrium, economic losses, products and services, artifacts, cultural identity, demographical stability, aesthetic values) can differentiate the risk assessment efforts. Finally, the analysis of the socio-cultural profile of hazardous phenomena can increase the potential power of human collaboration and good will towards serving common goals.

1. THE METHODOLOGICAL FRAMEWORK OF DISASTER ARCHAEOLOGY

1.1 General approach
Disaster Archaeology, an upcoming interdisciplinary science, emerges and establishes itself as a uniquely significant part of the fields that deal with hazards, risk management, prevention policies and mitigation plans all over the world. Increasing possibilities of multifarious and costly natural and human-induced disasters force both civil and private sectors to move deeply and heavily into broader approaches of such events.

Considering that the functions and the results of disasters, the human response to hazards and the carrying capacity of natural and human ecosystems do not vary considerably in space and time, as several constants exist in Nature and Society, modern scientists can detect the spatial and temporal distribution of hazards. But firstly, we must define clearly the aims, the scope, the methodology and the applications of this discipline, which can provide modern researchers with a huge spectrum of information concerning hazards and disasters of the past.

Generally speaking, Archaeology of Natural Disasters (Torrence & Grattan, 2002 ; World, 2002; Byrne, 1997; Blaikie et al., 1994): a) defines the identity, the impact and the dynamics of natural hazards into the evolution of human civilization, b) tries to find and analyze the kinds, frequency and magnitude of natural hazards that are hidden in the 'archaeological landscapes', c) searches for the adaptation process in past human societies and the 'unfamiliar landscapes' formed after natural disasters.

The 'reconstruction' of the natural and cultural landscapes of the past that were 'used' and modified by humans, is a vital priority. By studying the natural, built and socio-economic environments of the past within the integrated approach of human ecosystems, we can distinguish three main categories (resources, processes , effects), three pivotal axes (A: flora, fauna, human beings, minerals, water, land, air, etc.; B: buildings, housing, communication system, water supply, etc.; C: human activities, education, health, arts and culture, economic activities, heritage, lifestyles in general) and three groups of archaeological information (ecofacts, artefacts, mentifacts).

Nevertheless, the natural hazards could happen in chaotic patterns, varying in frequency, magnitude or functional structure. They may also have several impacts on the evolution of human civilization (biological, ecological, environmental, socio-economic, political, technological, geographical and cultural results) that are not always clearly defined, even by the victims or the generations following the event. Moreover, these effects could be hidden in the 'archaeological landscapes', due to diverse parameters (e.g. natural phenomena that constantly change the landscape and falsify the evidence, applied techniques and methods concerning the retrieval of information). Finally, many 'entities', for example the vulnerability of ancient societies to environmental or human-made risks, and their adaptation process to the 'unfamiliar landscapes' formed after natural disasters are not measurable as other proxy data can be (paleoclimatic, hydrogeological, paleoantrhopological e.t.c.) ..

On the other hand, when archaeologists strike a destruction level during their excavational work, they may be dealing with global environmental events and cultural fractures, economic instabilities and movement of peoples, religious revival and suppression or revolutionary regimes, despair and major death (de Grazia 1984). But this is a rather rare coincidence. What about local events or other forms of information, such as the artistic representations, written sources of past events, indirect testimonies derived from different communicative subsystems (e.g. language, technology, warfare, conflicts) and the huge pool of beliefs (oral traditions, religious rituals, mystical knowledge, ceremonies and daily practices)?

Continue reading at: http://www.drgeorgepc.com/DisasterArchSocCultLaoupi.html
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References:

Laoupi, Amanda. 2010. "The socio-cultural profile of hazards. Disaster Archaeology
and the risk assessment of past catastrophic events". Disaster Archaeology. Posted: Available online: http://www.drgeorgepc.com/DisasterArchSocCultLaoupi.html