Satellite Remote Sensing for Archaeological Applications
Stewart, Christopher
Tor Vergata University, ITALY
Remote sensing techniques for archaeological analyses using satellite data from primarily ESA and Third Party Mission sensors are presented. The applied techniques take advantage of the different characteristics of the various sensors that can be exploited for the purpose of detecting archaeological features of interest concealed in a range of land cover types in Europe and North Africa.
Features buried beneath the ground can affect the characteristics of the overlying soil, including its composition and ability to retain moisture. This in turn can alter the properties of vegetation that may grow on the surface. If the differences in the soil and vegetation over buried features compared to where there are no buried features are sufficient to render them visible to the human eye, they are termed soil and crop marks respectively. This study aims to identify soil and crop mark signatures in remotely sensed data that may be due to the presence of buried archaeological features. Results are presented of a number of cases where soil and crop marks are identified through the analysis of their spectral signature in optical multispectral and panchromatic imagery (Kompsat-2 and ALOS PRISM) and other cases where their identification is attempted through the analysis of their backscatter signature in polarimetric SAR imagery (ALOS PALSAR). [see example fig. 1.]