Sensing Archaeology in the North: The Use of Non-Destructive Sensing Methods in Archaeology in Scandinavian and North Atlantic Territories

Dear Colleagues,

This Special Issue of Remote Sensing aims to gather original articles and reviews showing the practical application of ground-based, marine and remote sensing methods to investigate archaeological sites in Scandinavia and the North Atlantic.

LiDAR, satellite imagery, ground-based geophysical prospection, or marine geophysics, inter alia, currently stand as powerful methods in archaeology to study sites remotely (i.e., from the ground surface, from the sea, or from the air) in a non-destructive and minimally invasive manner. In the last decade, major technological developments have introduced reduced and more compact sensors; sensor arrays; as well as motorised or robotised ground, aerial, or marine platforms that have, and are still, revolutionising archaeological research. This technological breakthrough has allowed the implementation of extremely fast and high-resolution surveys to discover, explore, and record archaeological sites located either in terrestrial or marine environments.

Many of these sensing technologies have been tested, and some have even been developed in Nordic countries and employed in archaeological research projects. Whilst the status of their adoption as established and routine methods for cultural heritage management-led projects varies from country to country, their use, at least in archaeological research projects, seems to be steadily increasing.

Scandinavian and North Atlantic survey environments can be quite particular (e.g., sites buried under tephra layers in Iceland), but, beyond the similar archaeological legacy, they conceal a number of other characterizing factors, such as the effects of glacially-shaped geologies and landforms, climate, snow cover, permafrost, waterlogged/organic soils, and coastal erosion issues. The particular challenges posed by survey environments in the North and the type of archaeological targets appear to point toward survey strategies based on the integration of a diversity of sensing methods and particular techniques to maximise the information extracted from the sensed data and ensure the success of these studies.

This Special Issue will integrate some of the research presented in the ‘SENSING ARCHAEOLOGY IN THE NORTH’ workshop organised by the ‘TErrestrial, Marine, and Aerial Remote sensing for archaeology’ research group and the Department of Archaeology and cultural History (NTNU). The workshop brought together, for the first time, researchers with interests in applying ground-based, marine, and remote sensing methods to investigate archaeological sites in Scandinavia and the North Atlantic in order to exchange experiences, discuss common and/or specific challenges and solutions, consider opportunities and future directions to further develop sensing methods and strategies to survey archaeological sites in ‘Nordic’ areas, and promote cooperation and future research collaborations.

The Special Issue is also open for contributions from researchers interested in applying sensing methods to explore the archaeology and manage cultural heritage of the North. The goal of the Special Issue is to present research that showcases innovative methodological approaches to prospect and characterise Nordic/North Atlantic archaeological sites. Also, critical approaches assessing the state-of the art on the use of these tools in research and cultural heritage management in different Nordic/North Atlantic countries are highly encouraged to better guide opportunities for integrating remote sensing into future projects.

We invite all prospective authors to share their work.

Dr. Carmen Cuenca-Garcia
Dr. Richard Bates
Assoc. Prof. Ole Risbøl
Mr. Raymond Sauvage
Mr. Fredrik Skoglund
Dr. Arne Stamnes
Dr. Øyvind Ødegård
Guest Editors

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