ARENA
Archaeological Records of Europe - Network Access. Extending Online Access and Digital Preservation of European Archaeological Archives
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ARENA Archaeological Records of Europe - Network Access. Extending Online Access and Digital Preservation of European Archaeological Archives |
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Ref. No. 430 CLT2001/ action: 2 Period: 3 years (Dec. 2001 - Nov. 2004) |
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Participanti:
Description of aims and activities:
Description of the activity: It is intended to develop a programme of European seminars and workshops on the preservation and promotion of digital cultural heritage data. At the workshop on "New Information Technologies for Managing the European Archaeological Heritage" held under the Raphael Programme in Sevilla in June 2000 participants from 16 European countries called upon the European Commission to provide financial support for "the establishment and maintenance of multilingual information resources and electronic communications networks to disseminate information such as: guides to good practice, existing national and regional practices for heritage information management..., metadata approaches and standards for the interoperability of archaeological geographic information systems." The current bid unites some of the key European stakeholders in implementing this proposal. Objectives:
Target Group: There is an urgent need to raise awareness
of the fragility of digital data and to promote actions which secure its
long term future amongst all European countries. This action will be aimed
at the partners themselves and at other European bodies with a responsibility
for the preservation of archaeological archives.
Expected Results: It is hoped that this
action will raise awareness of digital archiving, will promote standards
and interoperability at a European level and will provide a prototype
framework for a European archaeological archiving network.
Description of the activity: Each of the partners is responsible for the protection and promotion of significant archaeological archives of national and international importance; several are also responsible for the maintenance of national computerised registers of sites and monuments. The ADS Digital Archiving Pilot Project for Excavation Records (DAPPER) project, funded by English Heritage, demonstrated that by making archives available online and providing appropriate documentation it was possible to enhance accessibility and ensure the long term preservation of the data. Whereas a recent survey published in the European Journal of Archaeology (Hedley and Swain 1999) found that, on average, traditional museum archives received less than 20 visits per year, the DAPPER online archive for the Eynsham Abbey excavations has already received more than 6000 visits. As part of the cooperation agreement the partners will identify and make a number of key archaeological archives and cultural heritage data sets available to the profession and the general public. These will be selected for international significance and wide European public interest. Particular emphasis will be given to themes where the partners have a critical mass of archives relating to a particular period or European culture, such as Viking expansion and colonisation. Objectives:
Target Group: The first two objectives are aimed at archiving professionals but in the long term they will benefit the scholarly community and general public by allowing archives to gain experience in the management, preservation, and dissemination of digital data. The third objective will have the direct and immediate result of promoting scholarly and public to some key cultural heritage data archives. The project will be developed so as to ensure that standards and methods are extensible to other cultural disciplines. The ADS works closely with its sister archiving services in Performing Arts and Visual Arts, and CIMEC also works with other categories of data. A specific role of the Visual Arts and Performing Arts Data Services will be to provide advice on how far technologies may be transferable to related sub-disciplines. Indicative Timetable:
This
action will provide direct experience of the preparation and documentation
of digital archives for each of the project partners. It will also promote
the use of digital data amongst the scholarly community and will enable
public access to the results of archaeological fieldwork of international
significance.
Description of the activity: Archaeological data always has a geospatial component in that the location and various attributes of sites, monuments or finds can be mapped according to their geospatial coordinates. Many of the partners already have some experience in the use of map-based searching and web-delivered clickable maps. At the National Museum of Denmark the DKC has provided an interactive map-based web site since 1997; the ADS has also provided map-based searching of its web-based catalogue. This provides an intuitive interface to cultural data, for academic, professional and public audiences. The interest of the general public in cultural information is promoted by allowing them to ask questions of the type "What was found in this location?… in my village?… in my town?… in my region?". Such spatial interfaces are particularly important at European level, where a true understanding and appreciation of past cultures and societies (such as Celts, Romans, Slavs, Vikings etc) depends upon map-based searches which transcend modern political boundaries. In addition there is a need for the emerging European digital archives to develop interoperability (see (4)) so that collections relating to single themes or specific areas held in more than one physical location can be searched simultaneously. For example, the ADS curates digital archives relating to fieldwork conducted by UK-based archaeologists in several other European countries. The project will investigate mechanisms for archival transfers between partners, but will also seek to develop interoperability such that, for example, the distributed archives relating to the archaeology of any regions or countries can be located by cross-searching several catalogues. Objectives:
Target Group: The common map-based interface will be aimed at the general user without the detailed for specialist archaeological knowledge, and will provide a key means of promoting the use of online archival material within and also beyond the scholarly community. Indicative Timetable:
Expected Results: The partners
will develop existing expertise for map-based searching for archaeological
information, and will open this out for public use. They will investigate
and implement technologies for interoperable map-based searching.
Description of the activity:
Over recent years there have been several standards initiatives (the Dublin core standard, XML, and Z39.50 communications protocols) which together will allow better integration and interoperability of European digital archives. The EC Aquarelle Project helped develop Z39.50 systems and proved the concept, but did not lead to the implementation of any working systems. Dublin Core metadata has been recommended by several Governments; the AHDS and ADS have been key players in promoting it amongst the arts and humanities communities. There has also much interest in the use of XML (an SGML derived mark-up language) for tagging digital archive objects and using it for web delivery, and the Norwegian Museum Project has extensive experience in the application of SGML/XML to archaeological archives. To achieve full interoperability there is also a need to apply multilingual thesauri. The National Museum of Denmark was a lead partner in the Council of Europe project to develop a Bronze Age thesaurus; this has been published, but has not yet been implemented. Under this action the partners will build on each of these initiatives and will work together using the online archives created under Action 2 to develop interoperability. This is in turn a necessary stage to achieving the spatial interoperability for public access to be developed under Action 3. Objectives:
Target Group: Common access to distributed European archives will be of benefit both to the scholarly community, and the wider general public with an interest in their shared European archaeological heritage. Indicative Timetable:
This action will enable interoperable access
to distributed archives from the ARENA: European heritage web portal.
It is important to stress that this is not another gateway to web-sites,
such as ARGE (the Archaeological Resource Guide to Europe). Gateways such
as ARGE rely on a centrally held database of web sites, which must be
continually updated to maintain currency. The Z39.50 portal will link
to distributed target databases which can be updated by their host institutions.
Thus the project is both sustainable beyond its funded life span, and
extensible, as there is no technical limit on the number of targets that
can be linked.
Romanian translation: Vlad Oberländer-Târnoveanu
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United
Kingdom - Archaeology Data Service (ADS), York Universitity (Jon
Kenny, ARENA European Project Officer; contact: 
Denmark
- National Agency for Cultural Heritage, Copenhagen (contact:
Henrik Jarl Hansen) (
Islands
- The Institute of Archaeology [Fornleifastofnun lslands], Reykavik
(contact: Orri Vésteinsson) (
Norway
- The Museum Project, Oslo University (contact: Jon Holman)
(
Poland
- Poznan Archaeological Museum (contact: Andrzej Prinke) (
Romania
- cIMeC - Institute for Cultural Memory, Bucharest (contact:
Irina Oberländer-Târnoveanu) (
To
allow the partners to share and extend their existing expertise and experience
