Institute of Heritage Sciences (Incipit)

In this paper we examine the possible application of a statistical test from astronomy and astro-physics to the analysis of ancient astronomical alignments. We compare the test the Nearest-Neighbour Test which has been previously used for this purpose. We then compare the outcomes of both tests when applied to alignments of sites in northwest Scotland. This revealed that this newer test, Z-test, has far greater adaptability and power in the detection of clusters in orientation, especially where there was background 'noise'. Importantly, we discovered that the clustering in orientation of megaliths in western Scotland was stronger and far more geographically wide-spread than previously reported.

""The "Big Dig" is designed to encourage and allow students to develop an understanding of philosophical notions and their place in the past, present and future in an engaging and amusing way.

This is about teaching theoretical concepts in their historical contexts. "

See Chapter 6 at
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=M-TCs3_TIvwC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=The+big+dig:+theoretically+speaking&source=bl&ots=oJu1URee9L&sig=EIldMiTlnpICIJB-KuipEzJknHA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VcQhU9jsGM7YkQXrqoH4DQ&ved=0CD4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=The%20big%20dig%3A%20theoretically%20speaking&f=false"

"The aim of this work is to contribute to the quantitative analysis and development of testable hypotheses concerning archaeological sites in the landscape.  The initial intention was to ensure that valid and reliable outcomes regarding the original use of the freestanding megalithic monuments of western Scotland were possible through its use of appropriate spatial and statistical analyses.  Whilst this objective remains, it is no longer the sole objective.  Rather, more complex theories regarding the nature of the cosmology of those who built the monuments and the possible cosmological connections between them, other monuments and the environment are considered.  Based upon the methodologies and outcomes of the initial investigations, further development of sound hypotheses and robust experimental designs that could be used in conjunction with GIS data and applications was then possible for those more complex considerations.

This project attempts to incorporate systematic project design and quantitative analysis in archaeological investigations.

Conferred 2003

Keywords: landscape archaeology, archaeoastronomy, cosmology, methodology, GIS, viewshed, orientation, spatial analysis, visibility, directionality, Scotland, megaliths, Bronze Age, Neolithic Age.
"

Grasp is a strategy card game that involves logic, memory and visualisation and encourages students to pull together people, notions, contexts used in Archaeological theory.

See Chapter 4 at
http://books.google.com.au/books?id=M-TCs3_TIvwC&pg=PA103&lpg=PA103&dq=The+big+dig:+theoretically+speaking&source=bl&ots=oJu1URee9L&sig=EIldMiTlnpICIJB-KuipEzJknHA&hl=en&sa=X&ei=VcQhU9jsGM7YkQXrqoH4DQ&ved=0CD4Q6AEwAg#v=onepage&q=The%20big%20dig%3A%20theoretically%20speaking&f=false

""RESEARCH OUTCOME:
It was discovered that, regardless of monument form, free-standing stones on Coll and Tiree shared specific intimate landscape variables, depositional characteristics and astronomical foci. With this knowledge we propose the cosmological connections made by past peoples in prehistoric Scotland.

ABSTRACT
This paper reviews something of the state of research on standing stone monuments in Scotland. It also offers a précis of the methodology and results of the first stage of a research project on standing stones in western Scotland. This stage sought to establish, more empirically than the majority of studies done to date, the nature of standing stone sites’ connection to specific astronomical phenomena and to establish a firmer understanding of standing stones as a group phenomenon across the region. This is followed by a focused case-study of six standing stone monuments of the inner Hebridean islands of Coll and Tiree to uncover the relationships between themselves, the landscape and astronomical bodies.

Two significant accomplishments of this landscape project are: (i) the use of statistical applications to ensure plausible conclusions and (ii) the development and use of accurate three dimensional landscape and astronomical reconstructions as seen by the naked eye.  Using statistics, the study analyses 125 sites across western Scotland. The 3-D modelling focuses upon the application of visual engagement. This development considers the creation of the visual experience of made and non-made objects in the landscape by past people, and through this method we observe their constructional choices (Higginbottom, 2003: passism, especially Chapter 12; Higginbottom 2005; Barrett and Ko, 2009, p287). 
""

"""RESEARCH OUTCOME
Focusing on the standing stones of Mull, we reveal an incredible construction process by which the builders chose to organise their monuments in specific groups and in deliberate consideration of eachother, their individual properties and the visual scape. The unfolding of the visual dynamics at these sites is far more complex and intense than any other study has shown to date.
 
ABSTRACT
This paper considers the philosophy of Martin Heidegger in terms of its application to contemporary debates in archaeology, particularly with regards to material production and its relationship to archaeological interpretation.  We shall argue that material production amounts to the appropriation of the material in the service of the communal and, through appropriation, involves the accomplishing of a world.  As such, megalithic monuments emerge as cultural paradigms and windows into this world.  These paradigms co-perform the appropriation of the material and the communal essential to the determination of a community as a community: as a group with shared values. This work uses these theoretical considerations as a framework to inform the empirically-based research method leading to an archaeological-phenomenological description in terms of contextual relatedness or a holistic context of significance.  Through methods examining the experiential context of monuments of past peoples, primarily innovative 3D GIS, statistics and phenomenology, we demonstrate how an artefact can indeed indicate or reveal something of their meaningful presence for the people who created them and, indeed, their shared world. 

"""

"Entry for Cultural Heritage Management section. 1 of 3 sections that form the introduction to the CHM section covering both the history of the origins of the philosophy behind Intangible Heritage  as well as the role it played in the international arena throughout the 20th –21st centuries.
"

Humanity and Creation:
This volume intends to involve open debate around the possibilities of archaeological interpretation at the fundamental level – that of the theory(ies) of existence and materiality. We discuss philosophical notions in a challenging and thought-provoking way. We show how these notions can be used in interpreting life and ideas in the past. The individual works offer conceptual depth where the core concept, and the application thereof, can tell us something about what it is to be human generally as well as to create a defensible contribution to the period it endevours to understand.

Importantly the volume investigates why humans create, how they create and the impact this has on those around them and in the future, all from an archaeological interpretive viewpoint. Predominately we tackle the issues of making material objects. Relevently, the subfields these works come from include the human and social evolution, cosmological systems, oral history, phenomenology,  osteoarchaeology, ontology and epistemology. The papers range in time from the Lower Palaeolithic to the Age of the Anthropocene.

If you wish to participate contact me at gail.higginbottom@anu.edu.au. I am especially looking for people working in evolution right now, but welcome all enquiries"

In 2005, Higginbottom and Cobb ran an EAA session called “Time and time again: notions of time in prehistory”, which highlighted how phenomenologists demonstrated that time involved Being and vice versa and how geographers argued that activities created time and space and that time is multidimensional. This paper partially presented to CAA 2013, Perth, extends the theoretical discussion begun here regarding the assumptions and theories that are required when we apply 3D visual modelling of places in the past. This paper will again concentrate on Husserl’s vision of human experience where Husserl is influenced by Heidegger’s ideas on contextualising experience where the physical place of the individual affects what they experience. Here materiality and place conjoin to create known worlds and understandings. NOW COMPLETED AND SUBMITTED - SEE ABOVE IN PAPERS.

This paper reviews something of the state of research on standing stone monuments in Scotland. It also offers a précis of the methodology and results of the first stage of a research project on standing stones in western Scotland. This stage sought to establish, more empirically than the majority of studies done to date, the nature of standing stone sites’ connection to specific astronomical phenomena and to establish a firmer understanding of standing stones as a group phenomenon across the region. This is followed by a focused case-study of six standing stone monuments of the inner Hebridean islands of Coll and Tiree to uncover the relationships between themselves, the landscape and astronomical bodies.

Two significant accomplishments of this landscape project are: (i) the use of statistical applications to ensure plausible conclusions and (ii) the development and use of accurate three dimensional landscape and astronomical reconstructions as seen by the naked eye.  Using statistics, the study analyses 125 sites across western Scotland. The 3-D modelling focuses upon the application of visual engagement. This development considers the creation of the visual experience of made and non-made objects in the landscape by past people, and through this method we observe their constructional choices (Higginbottom, 2003: passism, especially Chapter 12; Higginbottom 2005; Barrett and Ko, 2009, p287).

"See attached files for (i) Book Outline and (ii) Chapter Abstracts and People to date . See sub-section below this for the book abstract.

If you wish to participate, contact me at gail.higginbottom@anu.edu.au or message me here, at academia.edu. "