Egyptian Archaeology in the Digital Age: Recording, Mapping & Imaging

Graduate / Professional

Over the past decade the field of archaeology and the methodology in recording practices have seen major transformations with the development of new digital resources for mapping, recording spatial data, and modeling features with user-friendly, affordable digital tools, often available as open-source software, to produce rapid and extremely accurate results. Egyptian archaeology became relatively early a leading field in the use of such equipment and software for recording archaeological and architectural remains, epigraphic data, and cultural heritage. The aim of this course is to provide students a comprehensive understanding and training of these digital recording systems and methods in archaeology taking advantage of the most recent technologies. This course includes theoretical overviews of those highly multidisciplinary activities as well as practical training in the use of modern mapping tools for topography, photography, photogrammetry, digital drawing and RTI, post-processing and immersive virtual reality. This course includes lectures and seminars by guest speakers with extensive experience and practice of several techniques in Egypt, workshop sessions, and some lab activities. Students are engaged in the use of real archaeological data coming from excavation sites in Egypt and are able to practice in person some of the methods seen in class on physical structures on Yale campus. Permission from the instructor to confirm that the student has a general background in Archeology or Ancient Near East or Egyptology is required. Th 1:30pm-3:25pm