The Avebury Papers: digitisation, exploration and creative re-use of a uniquely important archaeological archive.

埃夫伯里文件：对独特重要的考古档案的数字化、探索和创造性再利用。

• 批准号: AH/W003619/2
• 负责人: Mark Gillings
• 金额: --
• 依托单位: University of Bristol
• 依托单位国家: 英国
• 项目类别: Research Grant
• 财政年份: 2024
• 资助国家: 英国
• 起止时间: 2024 至 无数据
• 项目状态: 未结题
• 来源: https://gtr.ukri.org/projects?ref=AH%2FW003619%2F2
• 关键词: Avebury; Papers; digitisation; exploration; creative

Context: The proposed research focuses upon the dramatic phase of monument construction that characterises the later Neolithic of the British Isles. This is a period that saw the creation of a wide and varied range of megalithic, timber and earth structures, alongside the development of extensive landscapes of linked and interwoven monuments. Nowhere is this more apparent than Avebury, north Wiltshire. A key component of the UNESCO Stonehenge and Avebury World Heritage Site, the Avebury henge is one of the pre-eminent megalithic monuments of the European Neolithic, sitting alongside Stonehenge, the Boyne Valley passage graves and Carnac alignments. Its 420m diameter earthwork encloses the world's largest stone circle, which in turn encloses two smaller (yet still colossal) megalithic circles of c.100m diameter - the northern and southern inner circles. Within each of the latter are further complex stone settings. From two of its four entrances lead avenues of paired standing stones that together extend for c.3.5km linking with other monumental constructions. It sits at the heart of a landscape rich in later Neolithic monuments, among them Silbury Hill and the West Kennet palisade enclosures. Avebury has stood at the heart of developing narratives of the Neolithic period in the British Isles - a period of remarkable transformation in the ways in which people understood and engaged with the world. Avebury's history has a resonance that extends far beyond the British Isles, informing research on a range of fundamental questions concerning the European Neolithic such as: what sparked this remarkable period of monument construction? What was the inspiration for the monumental forms we observe? Why were specific locations chosen to monumentalise? Aims & Objectives: Despite its international importance, detailed knowledge of Avebury is sorely lacking. The only large-scale excavations to take place at Avebury were carried out in the first half of the 20th Century, with an ambitious programme of open area excavation brought to an abrupt end by the outbreak of WWII. As a result, we have only a partial understanding of the range, character and relationships between the features present at Avebury. This lack of understanding is due to a failure to synthesise, integrate and make available the full detail encoded in the archives resulting from this extensive early 20th century work - much of which was methodologically exemplary - as well as much smaller ad-hoc investigations that took place after. This has lead to only partial understandings of this pivotal site, circular arguments, repeated rediscoveries and a serial forgetting of the results of previous work. To rectify this we will complete the work that ended so abruptly in 1939: carrying out unfinished programmes of detailed post-excavation analysis and synthesising the mass of unpublished detail that survives only in archive form. Most critically, we will make the full set of data available and accessible through the design and implementation of an ambitious, open access digital archive, that will provide a baseline from which all future engagements with Avebury can proceed. This will not only support future archaeological and Heritage studies, but is expressly designed to stimulate, foster and nurture innovative public and creative engagement. Applications & Benefits: The results will have enormous significance for the general public, creative industries and all academic students of prehistory, revealing in detail the origins and subsequent life-history of one of Europe's most important prehistoric sites. They will also allow for effective heritage management (through a fuller understanding of the WHS and its history) as well as enhanced education and tourism potential. Avebury has always been an object of fascination, and as international media interest in recent discoveries has demonstrated, public interest in Avebury is global.

背景：拟议的研究集中在纪念碑建造的戏剧性阶段，这是不列颠群岛新石器时代晚期的特征。这是一个时期，见证了创造了广泛和不同的巨石，木材和土壤结构，同时发展了广泛的景观的相互联系和交织的纪念碑。这一点在威尔特郡北部的艾夫伯里最为明显。作为联合国教科文组织巨石阵和埃夫伯里世界遗产的重要组成部分，埃夫伯里巨石阵是欧洲新石器时代最著名的巨石纪念碑之一，与巨石阵、博伊恩山谷通道坟墓和Carnac路线并驾齐驱。其直径420米的土方围绕着世界上最大的石圈，而石圈又包围着两个直径约100米的较小(但仍然巨大)的巨石圆圈--北部和南部的内圈。在后者的每一个里面都有更复杂的石头背景。从它的四个入口中的两个通往由成对的直立石块组成的大道，这些石块总共延伸约3.5公里，与其他纪念性建筑相连。它位于新石器时代晚期遗迹丰富的景观的中心，其中包括锡尔伯里山和西肯内特栅栏围栏。埃夫伯里一直是不列颠群岛新石器时代叙事发展的核心--这是一个人们理解和接触世界的方式发生了显著变化的时期。埃夫伯里的历史产生了远远超出不列颠群岛的共鸣，为关于欧洲新石器时代的一系列基本问题的研究提供了信息，例如：是什么引发了这一非凡的纪念碑建造时期？我们观察到的不朽形状的灵感是什么？为什么要选择特定的地点作为纪念碑？目的和目的：尽管埃夫伯里在国际上很重要，但对它的详细了解非常缺乏。埃夫伯里唯一的大规模挖掘是在20世纪上半叶进行的，一项雄心勃勃的开阔区域挖掘计划因第二次世界大战的爆发而戛然而止。因此，我们对埃夫伯里现有功能的范围、特征和之间的关系只有部分了解。这种缺乏理解的原因是未能综合、整合和提供档案中编码的全部细节，这些细节来自20世纪初的这项广泛的工作--其中许多工作在方法论上堪称典范--以及之后进行的规模小得多的特别调查。这导致了对这一关键遗址的部分了解，循环论证，反复的重新发现，以及对以前工作结果的一系列忘记。为了纠正这一点，我们将完成1939年突然结束的工作：进行详细的挖掘后分析的未完成计划，并综合大量仅以档案形式保存下来的未公布的细节。最重要的是，我们将通过设计和实施一个雄心勃勃的、开放访问的数字档案，使全套数据可供使用和访问，这将提供一个基线，使未来与Avebury的所有合作都可以进行。这不仅将支持未来的考古和遗产研究，而且明确旨在激发、促进和培育创新的公众和创造性参与。应用和好处：研究结果将对普通公众、创意产业和史前研究的所有学术学生具有巨大的意义，详细揭示欧洲最重要的史前遗址之一的起源和随后的生活史。它们还将有助于有效的遗产管理(通过更全面地了解世界遗产及其历史)，以及增强教育和旅游潜力。埃夫伯里一直是一个令人着迷的对象，正如国际媒体对最近发现的兴趣所表明的那样，公众对埃夫伯里的兴趣是全球性的。