national heritage regime which aims to give Australians a list of natural, Indigenous and historic places with ‘outstanding heritage value to the nation.’ However, Australians need to know a lot more facts about their past and about historical impacts on our society before there is widespread support for new approaches to heritage conservation. As most heritage practitioners know, heritage is a social and political process, at times uncomfortable, but the results create a cultural legacy in which we all share. This book offers lots of ideas about the nature of heritage, has good case studies and an academic approach to the issues based on many years experience. It does not offer any case studies based on the archaeological analysis familiar to readers of Australian Archaeology. The author is critical of the current structures of heritage assessment and management but does not clearly spell out new directions which she considers heritage should take to resolve the criticisms.
This article frames the virtual museum as a meaning-modeling system within digital heritage and proposes an operational semiotic method for analysis. Grounded in Modeling Systems Theory and informed by Adorno’s non-identity, we construct a twelve-category coding matrix that combines three modeling levels with four organizational forms. Applying this matrix to five heterogeneous cases (web, VR, and 3D environments), we derive three quantitative ratios that summarize each system’s profile: the Abstraction Ratio (degree of conceptual mediation), the Connectivity Ratio (degree of interlinking and systematic organization), and the Object Primacy Score (degree of object-centered representation). Exploratory clustering on these ratios reveals three recurrent patterns of virtual-heritage mediation: Network-Symbolic, Concept-Dominant, and Object-Preserving. The results articulate how different curatorial and technical choices redistribute attention between objects, contexts, and concepts, and how these redistributions affect the subject–object balance in digital settings. The contribution is twofold: a transparent, reproducible coding protocol that enables cross-case comparison, and an interpretive lens that relates quantitative patterns to critical concerns in heritage, including authenticity, legibility, and over-standardization. We conclude with implications for curators and designers seeking to align immersive interfaces with heritage values while preserving the irreducible remainder of the object.
تعتبر الدولة الساسانية (226-651م) من اهم واكبر الدول التي حكمت في الشرق الادنى القديم، اذ امتدت من حدود الهند والصين شرقاً الى نهر الفرات وبلاد الشام غرباً ومن اسيا الصغرى شمالاً الى شبه الجزيرة العربية واليمن جنوباً. وشملت دويلات واسعة وشعوب واعراق مختلفة فضلاً عن التنوع الديني من عبده الاصنام الى الديانات السماوية القديمة اليهودية والمسيحية ، لذا كان موضوع البحث الاقليات الدينية في الدولة الساسانية اليهود نموذجاً وقسم موضوع البحث بعد المقدمة الى مدينتين استعرض المبحث الاول اليهود ماقبل قيام الدولة الساسانية في عصر الدولة السلوقية (313-126ق.م) وعصر الدولة الفرثية(126ق.م-226م) وما قام به اليهود وما واجهوه من مواقف صعبة واضطهاد وماسببوه من مشاكل لهذه الدولتين وموقف كل منهما ضد او مع اليهود . اما المبحث الثاني احوال اليهود في الدولة الساسانية (226-651م) اذ ركز على توزع اليهود واهم جالياتهم داخل اطار الامبراطورية الساسانية وموقف رجال الدين والملوك الساسانيين من هذه الاقلية داخل دولة لها سياسة دينية ومركزية حكم وعلاقتهم بالملوك الساسانيين ، وابرز المشاكل والاحداث التي قاموا بها داخل الدولة وتم الاعتماد على مجموعة مصادر كتاب العهد القديم وكتاب يوسيفوس اليهودي ، وتاريخ اليهود فضلاً عن المصادر التاريخية والاثارية الانجليزية والعربية.
Andrei Crisan, Massimiliano Pepe, Domenica Costantino
et al.
Cultural heritage conservation demands interdisciplinary and complex documentation and analysis while facing increasing pressure to adopt sustainable and productive practices. This paper bridges these gaps by proposing a methodology and a set of requirements for Building Information Modeling (BIM) models aligned with European directives for sustainability and productivity in the Architecture, Engineering, and Construction (AEC) sector. Leveraging 3D scanning and intelligent models, we establish information needs specific to conservation, encompassing material properties, historical data, and decay analysis. Interoperability, compatibility with advanced analytical tools, and open-source formats are emphasized for seamless data integration and accessibility. We further introduce two use cases for BIM-enabled heritage conservation, illustrating the application of our proposed methodology in real-world scenarios. These cases exemplify how BIM models cater to the specific needs of cultural heritage sites, from their initial condition assessment to ongoing preservation efforts. Through these examples, we demonstrate the adaptability of BIM technology in capturing and managing the complex information associated with heritage conservation, including structural details, material characteristics, and historical significance. Our work highlights the potential of BIM to revolutionize heritage conservation practices, offering a digital backbone for documentation, analysis, and management that aligns with sustainability and productivity goals.
The paper addresses the issues of the operation of urban settlements in the territory of the Volga Bolgaria in the second half of the 13th – early 15th centuries. Attention is drawn to their distribution and arrangement in the Middle Volga region after the Mongol conquest, as well as to the specifics of these settlements of this time period. The author makes a conclusion about the different distribution of settlement monuments in the area, as well as the quantitative ratio during the 10th–15th centuries. Based on a complex of archaeological information obtained in the course of their study, a conclusion is made about the continued development of urban planning in the territory of the Bolgar ulus of the Golden Horde and its long-term continuity. One of the examples was the continuity of pre-Mongol traditions in the construction and use of fortifications in individual settlements located in the region, as well as the preservation of technological methods in the construction of fortifications. In this regard, the paper addresses the differences from the cities of the central part of the Golden Horde state. The development of the city of Bolgar and its planning features are given as an example.
Julian Susat, Harald Lübke, Alexander Immel
et al.
Summary: A 5,000-year-old Yersinia pestis genome (RV 2039) is reconstructed from a hunter-fisher-gatherer (5300–5050 cal BP) buried at Riņņukalns, Latvia. RV 2039 is the first in a series of ancient strains that evolved shortly after the split of Y. pestis from its antecessor Y. pseudotuberculosis ∼7,000 years ago. The genomic and phylogenetic characteristics of RV 2039 are consistent with the hypothesis that this very early Y. pestis form was most likely less transmissible and maybe even less virulent than later strains. Our data do not support the scenario of a prehistoric pneumonic plague pandemic, as suggested previously for the Neolithic decline. The geographical and temporal distribution of the few prehistoric Y. pestis cases reported so far is more in agreement with single zoonotic events.
Edición y comentario de un epígrafe latino procedente de Paramio, provincia de Zamora, y que por su situación geográfica, perteneció al conventus Asturum. La inscripción es interesante por su onomática y formulario y porque no es evidente su funcionalidad.
The present article deals with the mosaic pavements of one of most significant residential complexes in Late Antique Philippopolis – the Domus Eirene. The name of the complex refers to the personification that is the main element in the decoration not only of the reception hall, but the entire building. An analysis of two main aspects is made: one concerning the transformation of the image of the personification into a Christian saint, and another which concerns the transformation of the complex itself into a domus episcopalis and how that is reflected in the mosaic pavements. In the case of Eirene the image may have well been connected with historical events, contemporary or nearly contemporary with the time when the mosaic was produced, and also with political and religious propaganda.
The article presents a reconstruction of “archaeological” costume restored by the Ostrov Krym Scientific Restoration Laboratory (Almaty, Republic of Kazakhstan) by the finds uncovered from Early Iron Age graves. The authors examined organic remains of clothes from barrow no. 11 of Berel burial ground (4th – 3rd centuries BC) located on the territory of the Kazakhstan Altai and undertook a partial reconstruction of several items: a fur coat, a headdress and two felt stockings. The accuracy of this reconstruction is confirmed by well-preserved analogues of synchronous Altai barrows on the territory of Russia and Mongolia, belonging to the Pazyryk culture. The article also describes a method by which undisturbed graves can be extracted as one (monolithic) block and contains techniques for formation of such blocks in the dig and lab studies of “archaeological” costumes in such blocks, applied by the Ostrov Krym Laboratory.
Mª Luisa Vázquez de Ágredos Pascual, Patricia Horcajada Campos
Maya architecture was one of the most widely employed backdrops for the colour, and this application extended over a continuous period from the Mid-Preclassic period to the end of the Late Postclassic. The principal buildings of the Maya Lowlands were covered with stucco layers and painted with a rich colour palette that included pigments and colorants, and its archaeometric study offers important information on lime technology and colour technology between ancient Maya. On the other hand, these studies are necessaries for the conservation and restoration of Maya architecture and its polychrome decoration. Some of the analytical techniques more employed in these studies are Optical Microscopy (LM), Scanning Electronic Microscopy combined with energy dispersive X-ray (SEM/EDX), X-Ray Diffraction (XRD), Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FT-IR) or Chromatographic Techniques (GC/MS; Pyr-GC/MS; HLPC).
Genuine community participation in research and conservation projects is crucial for sustainable protection, management and development of archaeological sites, especially in sub-Saharan Africa where the scientific value of such resources is less appreciated. Local people often become suspicious of and discontented with field researchers who do not inform them of what they are doing around their courtyard, just as they are displeased with government officials who impose conservation projects upon them. Their discontent often comes for good reasons: either the given research or project is not a priority to them or its objectives differ from theirs. As a result, a conflict of expectations emerges, often leading local communities into disliking the project and hence investing little or just superficial commitment to it. Such feelings may be expressed verbally in formal or informal gatherings or through indifference, resentment, or vandalism, all of which are detrimental to the proper management of the heritage resource in question. Using specific cases of researchers/administrators-villagers differences and conflicts of expectations experienced in various places in Tanzania, the paper discusses causes of such differences, critically examines the Community Participatory technique exposing its strengths and weaknesses, as well as suggests solutions and outlining potential benefits should villagers be genuinely incorporated in such undertakings.
At the present, in trend of shifting the old 2D-output oriented survey to a new 3D-output oriented survey based on BIM technology,
the corresponding working methods and workflow for data capture, process, representation, etc. have to be changed.Based on case
study of two buildings in the Summer Palace of Beijing, and Jiayuguan Pass at the west end of the Great Wall (both World Heritage
sites), this paper puts forward a “structure-and-type method” by means of typological method used in archaeology, Revit family
system, and the tectonic logic of building to realize a good coordination between understanding of historic buildings and BIM
modelling.