Abstract: Constructing the sacred, visibility and ritual landscape at the Egyptian necropolis of Saqqara (Stanford University Press), a born-digital monograph utilizing a 3D GIS model of the ancient site of Saqqara, was published in 2020. One of the goals of this fully online work was to make transparent all the data visualization decisions necessary for creating this type of ‘reconstruction’ model. In this presentation, the author will discuss some of the challenges inherent in representing long-occupied archaeological sites like Saqqara as a data visualization and the decisions made to try and represent an ancient site in a new way.

Elaine Sullivan (M.A. and Ph.D. in Egyptian Art and Archaeology, Johns Hopkins University) is an Associate Professor of History at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Sullivan is an Egyptologist and a Digital Humanist whose work focuses on applying new technologies to ancient cultural materials. Her born-digital publication, Constructing the Sacred (Stanford University Press), utilizes a geo-temporal 3D model of the necropolis of Saqqara (near modern Cairo) to investigate questions of ritual landscape at the site. She served as the project coordinator of the Digital Karnak Project, a multi-phased 3D virtual reality model of the famous ancient Egyptian temple complex of Karnak. Her archaeological work in Egypt includes five seasons of excavation with Johns Hopkins University at the temple of the goddess Mut (Luxor), as well as four seasons in the field with a joint UCLA-Rijksuniversiteit Groningen project in the Egyptian Fayum at the Greco-Roman town of Karanis. She has also excavated at sites in Syria, Italy, and Israel.

A version with closed captions is available on YouTube.

Kontaktperson för denna film
Isto Huvila, Institutionen för ABM