Making Better Use of Monitoring Data

• Published in: Conservation and Management of Archaeological Sites
• Main Authors: Hollesen, Jørgen, Matthiesen, Henning, Møller, Anders Bjørn, Martens, Vibeke Vandrup
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: 2016
• Subjects: Bergen; Norway; Voldstad; Northern Norway
• Online Access: https://pure.au.dk/portal/da/publications/making-better-use-of-monitoring-data(5ec151e5-cd2e-4a45-89b4-a5485283b55f).html; https://doi.org/10.1080/13505033.2016.1182750

Large amounts of environmental monitoring data have been collected at Europe’s archaeological sites over the last decades. Nevertheless, very few examples exist where the collected data have been used directly to document the effects of environmental change on preservation conditions and the speed at which the archaeological record is lost. As a consequence, heritage managers are starting to question the use of environmental monitoring — why monitor if the efforts do not provide a proper basis for decisions on protection and mitigation strategies? At the same time, urban development and climate change are increasingly threatening the continued preservation of archaeological sites. This leaves us with a great challenge in how to secure a balance between developing new and more reasonable monitoring strategies without overlooking sites that are suddenly undergoing rapid decay. In recent years we have focussed on developing methods to combine on-site monitoring data with decay rates measured in the laboratory in order to predict ongoing decay in organic archaeological deposits (Matthiesen, et al., 2014; Hollesen & Matthiesen, 2015; Hollesen, et al., 2015). In this paper we describe the basic methodology used until now and present two different case studies in which the methods have been used. The first site is the archaeological deposits at the World Heritage Site Bryggen in Bergen representing an urban site that is highly influenced by both drainage and reduced infiltration. The second case study is the farm mound Voldstad, in northern Norway representing rural medieval archaeological deposits that are threatened by increasing air temperatures and changes in the water balance.