Funerary Landscapes and GIS Applications: A Review
(2012) 3rd Symposium Archaeological Research and New Technologies ARCH_RNT — Location: Kalamata (Greece) (3.October.2012)
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- Abstract
- Thanks to the theoretical developments of funerary and landscape studies, it is now widely acknowledged that the location of tombs is not a chance outcome. On the contrary, it is the result of choices dictated by the socio-political, economical, cultural and ideological characteristics of a society. The implications are significant for archaeologists, as a careful examination of the spatial arrangement of tombs can give a chance to shed new light on the mortuary behaviors of ancient societies. In this context, this paper aims at providing a critical review of how GIS have been implemented for the study of funerary landscapes. Since the 90s, archaeological GIS applications have of-ten dealt with burials sites, with a particular emphasis on the prehistoric megaliths, cairns and barrows of Western Europe (e.g. De Reu et al. 2011; Fisher et al. 1997). The monumentality of these buildings suggests indeed that they had a strong impact on the landscape of past societies, which makes them suitable to reconcile cognitive archaeology and GIS analyses. However, most of these early projects are better described as GIS studies using burial sites to test new methodologies, rather than as funerary studies calling on GIS’ services. GIS practitioners were primarily concerned with the improvement of the procedures, focusing on a single type of analysis (usually viewscapes), and their results were rarely contextualized. As a consequence, while these studies constitute important landmarks in the field of archaeological GIS, their impact on funerary studies has been quite limited. Conversely, ar-chaeologists have shown a growing interest in the multiple dimensions involved in the establishment of burial places, while neglecting the potential of GIS to shed light on the spatial criteria that might have influenced the location of tombs (e.g. Blake 2001; Vavouranakis 2007). It is argued here that GIS have a much more central role to play in the study of funerary landscapes. They can help highlighting the creation (or the careful avoidance) of spatial and visual relations between tombs, settlements, to-pography, striking natural features, arable land, rivers and sea, pathways, celestial phenomena, etc., all of which can in turn shed new light on the living’s attitude towards death and the dead. However, two precautions have to be considered. First of all, it is simplistic to limit the investi-gation to a single component of the landscape, forasmuch as the location of tombs appears rather as a compromise between a set of criteria deemed important for various rea-sons that are proper to a particular human group. Second, and independently of the results of the GIS-based analyses, it is only their incorporation within a contextual framework that can provide them with an archaeological meaning. Fortunately, some recent studies seem to move towards this direction, ready to bridge the gap between GIS and funerary studies (e.g. Lopez-Romero 2008; Wheatley et al. 2010).
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Déderix, S. (2012). Funerary Landscapes and GIS Applications: A Review. 3rd Symposium Archaeological Research and New Technologies ARCH_RNT, Kalamata (Greece). https://hdl.handle.net/2078.5/51238