A Space for Predictive Modelling In
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
A Space for Predictive Modelling in England’s Archaeological Heritage Management System: A case study of modelling site patterns in Roman Hertfordshire, England Jennifer Stacey Figure 1: A collaboration of different data layers that were used to influence and create the Roman Hertfordshire predictive model. From left to right: land-use, modern roads, Roman roads, bedrock geology, digital elevation model, modern rivers, superficial bedrock, archaeological sites (Stacey 2020). E-mail: [email protected] 1 A Space for Predictive Modelling in England’s Archaeological Heritage Management System: A case study of modelling site patterns in Roman Hertfordshire, England Jennifer Stacey S1829424 MSc Thesis Archaeology (4ARX-0910ARCH) Supervisor: Dr. K. Lambers Specialisation: Archaeological Science University of Leiden, Faculty of Archaeology Leiden, 21/08/20 Final draft 2 Contents 1. Introduction .......................................................................................................... 7 1.1. Brief Introduction to Archaeological Predictive Modelling .......................... 7 1.2. The Motive for the Research ......................................................................... 8 1.3. Aims and Research Questions ....................................................................... 9 1.4. Thesis Outline .............................................................................................. 10 2. Hertfordshire and Archaeological Heritage Management (AHM) .......... 13 2.1. Characteristics of Hertfordshire .................................................................. 13 2.2. Roman Occupation of Hertfordshire ........................................................... 16 2.2.1. The developing Roman landscape ....................................................... 16 2.2.2. Roman sites .......................................................................................... 17 2.3. Archaeological Heritage Management (AHM) Practices ............................ 20 2.3.1. The Valletta Treaty effect .................................................................... 20 2.3.2. Planning permissions and the assessment process ............................. 22 2.3.3. Predictive modelling and the English AHM system ............................. 23 3. Materials .............................................................................................................. 27 3.1. Elevation and Derived Layers ...................................................................... 29 3.1.1. Hillshade............................................................................................... 30 3.1.2. Slope .................................................................................................... 31 3.1.3. Aspect .................................................................................................. 32 3.2. Environmental Layers .................................................................................. 33 3.2.1. Soil textures ......................................................................................... 33 3 3.2.2. Geology ................................................................................................ 36 3.2.3. Hydrogeology ....................................................................................... 38 3.2.4. River system ......................................................................................... 40 3.3. Roman Roads............................................................................................... 42 3.4. Modern Layers ............................................................................................ 44 3.4.1. County and district boundaries ........................................................... 44 3.4.2. Modern land-use and roads ................................................................ 45 3.4.3. Protected areas and scheduled monuments ....................................... 48 3.5. Archaeological Data .................................................................................... 49 3.5.1. Data cleansing ...................................................................................... 50 3.5.2. Split sampling data ............................................................................... 53 3.5.3. Categorising subjects ........................................................................... 56 4. Methodology ....................................................................................................... 61 4.1. Predictive Factors ........................................................................................ 61 4.2. Modelling Methods ..................................................................................... 62 4.2.1. Deductive methods .............................................................................. 62 4.2.2. Inductive methods ............................................................................... 63 4.3. Environmental Data Assessment ................................................................ 64 4.3.1. Future suggestions ............................................................................... 65 4.4. Archaeological Data Assessment ................................................................ 65 4.4.1. Soil types .............................................................................................. 66 4.4.2. Groundwater ........................................................................................ 67 4.4.3. Modern land-use ................................................................................. 69 4.4.4. Future suggestions ............................................................................... 70 4 5. Results .................................................................................................................. 71 5.1. Application of the Methodology ................................................................. 71 5.1.1. Evaluating the proximities of rivers and roads .................................... 71 5.1.2. Weighted proximity to roads and water sources ................................ 76 5.1.3. Weighted aspect and slope ................................................................. 82 5.1.4. Site densities and Roman towns .......................................................... 91 5.2. Evaluating the Predictive Model ................................................................. 95 5.2.1. Split sampling ....................................................................................... 96 5.2.2. Kvamme’s Gain .................................................................................... 97 5.3. Applications of the Roman Hertfordshire Predictive Model .................... 100 5.3.1. Proximity-based analysis ................................................................... 101 6. Discussion ......................................................................................................... 108 6.1. Guidance for the Roman Hertfordshire Model ......................................... 108 6.2. Funding for Predictive Modelling .............................................................. 111 6.3. Reproducibility and ‘Open Science’ .......................................................... 114 6.4. Standards for Predictive Modelling .......................................................... 116 6.4.1. General standards .............................................................................. 117 6.4.2. Standards for predictive modelling for AHM ..................................... 118 7. Conclusion ........................................................................................................ 120 8. Abstract ............................................................................................................. 123 5 Acknowledgements I would like to express my warmest gratitude to all those who helped this research come to fruition. To my supervisor, Dr. Karsten Lambers, for his continued guidance and feedback throughout the writing of my Master’s thesis. To the Archaeological Data Service, Historic England, the Ordnance Survey, British Geological Survey, the European Copernicus Land Monitoring Service, the Office for National Statistics, the North Hertfordshire District Council and Harvard University for providing the data that was used within this research. To Dr. Milco Wansleeben, for his help and effort in focusing my research ideas. To the Archaeology Faculty at Leiden University, for the invaluable experiences and the many inspiring people there. To my family and my friends, for their unending support and encouragement. Lastly, to Christodoulos Makris, for his love and patience. 6 1. Introduction This thesis aims to apply and test the method of archaeological predictive modelling in the context of Roman Hertfordshire, England by using open-access data and applications. Through this application, the potential of integrating predictive models within the current English Archaeological Heritage Management (AHM) system will be discussed. By doing so, the benefits and drawbacks of archaeological predictive modelling can be identified through an applied case-study. 1.1. Brief Introduction to Archaeological Predictive Modelling The act of archaeological predictive modelling has generally been defined as a set of techniques which are employed to predict “the location of archaeological sites or materials in a region” (Kohler & Parker 1986, 400). This can be done either inductively from “a sample of that region”, or