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VI/2/2015
INTERDISCIPLINARIA ARCHAEOLOGICA
NATURAL SCIENCES IN ARCHAEOLOGY
homepage: http://www.iansa.eu
A look at the region
Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology:
National Chapter Czech Republic/Slovakia
Ladislav Šmejda
a,b*
a
Department of Archaeology, Faculty of Arts, University of West Bohemia, Univerzitní 8, 30614 Pilsen, Czech Republic
b
Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Kamýcká 129, 165 21 Prague, Czech Republic
1. Introduction
This article provides a concise report on the history of the joint
Czech and Slovak Chapter of the Computer Applications and
Quantitative Methods in Archaeology organization (CAA).
It presents an overview of how this national section of CAA
came into existence and where it might be heading in the
future.
It will be useful to start with some historical background.
The CAA conference began as a small meeting of
archaeologists, mathematicians and computer scientists at
the University of Birmingham (UK) in 1973. Subsequent
conferences were organized annually at various other British
universities for nearly 20 years. The number of presenters
and general popularity of the conferences steadily increased
– with a growing number of delegates from many countries
of Europe, North and South America, Japan, Australia and
New Zealand. At the frst meeting held outside the United
Kingdom, at Aarhus University in Denmark in 1992
(Andersen
et al.
1993), an agreement was passed that the
conference should be held annually in different countries,
thus literally travelling around the world. At around the
same time, some national chapters (country sections) were
offcially established: CAA-UK became the frst local
organization in 1995, followed by the Netherlands, Spain,
Italy, Portugal, India, Germany, North America, Norway,
Sweden and others later on. In 2006, the international CAA
conference was organized outside of Europe for the frst time:
in Fargo, North Dakota in the USA (http://caa-international.
org/about/history/).
In the Czech Republic, where the interest of archaeologists
in the mathematical treatment of archaeological data and
application of computer methods had started early on (Soudský
1967; Bouzek, Buchvaldek 1971; Malina 1977; Podborský
et al.
1977; Neustupný 1978), an annual meeting of a similar
kind has been running since 2002, quite independently of
the international CAA meetings. From the beginning, these
nationally-organised meetings took their name after the
edited volume “Počítačová podpora v archeologii” (Computer
support for archaeology), which had been put together and
published by Jiří Macháček fve years earlier (Macháček
1997). The very frst Czech meeting, designated at that time as
a workshop, was held on the grounds of the well-known Early
Volume VI ● Issue 2/2015 ● Pages 243–249
*Corresponding author. E-mail: smejda@kar.zcu.cz
ARTICLE HISTORY
Received: 22
nd
December 2015
Accepted: 28
th
December 2015
Keywords:
digital archaeology
Central Europe
archaeological method and theory
conferences
history of archaeology
ABSTRACT
Computers and information technologies play a very important role in modern archaeology. This article
describes the history of group of scholars interested in the use of digital technologies for the study of
human past and a later establishment of the “Czech Republic & Slovakia national chapter” affliated
to the “Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology” international organization.
The author summarizes the main research directions explored so far in this Central European region
and considers the potential for further progress. It is concluded that “digital archaeology” is a dynamic
research feld here, matching in most aspects the latest developments in the international context. A
future more pronounced tendency toward theoretical refexivity in various computer applications and
a wider recognition of certain yet under-represented topics as valuable contributions to the general
archaeological discourse is foreseen by the author.
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Mediaeval archaeological site of Pohansko (near Břeclav)
in South Moravia (Šmejda 2002; Švecová 2003–2004). The
next year, a follow-up meeting was organized in the chateau
of Nečtiny in West Bohemia (Figure 1) and here it took the
form of a conference considerably increased in size, with the
attendance of some 100 participants. In subsequent years, the
size and format has varied but normally between 15 and 30
papers are being presented at each meeting. Oral presentations
have been regularly complemented by posters – as well as by
stands of commercial companies, advertising their products,
where pertinent to the discussed topics (typically surveying
instruments and software for handling spatial data). In most
aspects these Czech conferences have resembled similar
foreign events elsewhere, for example, the CAA meetings
or conference series held annually in Vienna under the title
“Archäologie und Computer: Kulturelles Erbe und Neue
Technologien”.
2. National Chapter Czech Republic/Slovakia
From time to time questions have been raised as to
whether it will continue to be possible to bring new
themes, methods and results if the annual frequency of the
conference was maintained, and whether at some point all
possible IT applications would appear to be exhausted.
Nonetheless, every individual year yet another conference
has materialized and the “annual tradition” has lived on even
more vigorously than before (Table 1). The idea of joining
the international CAA organization has gradually grown
Figure 1.
The national 2003 meeting in
Nečtiny, Czech Republic. Presentations by
M. Kuna (above) and E. Neustupný (below).
Photo L. Šmejda.
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245
since the CAA meetings held in Berlin (2007), Budapest
(2008), Williamsburg (2009) and Beijing (2011), as it has
become obvious that the very modest representation of Czech
archaeology at these truly global events does not do justice
to the real progress of the discipline in this central European
territory. The possibility of the formal establishment of a
local chapter in the Czech Republic was probably suggested
and discussed for the frst time during the 10
th
anniversary
conference of the Czech group, at that time (2011) held in
the Dalešice brewery. Furthermore, it was concluded that
merging forces with our colleagues from Slovakia, who
regularly attended the Czech conferences, would seem quite
reasonable. The plan was than discussed with the CAA
steering committee at the international CAA conference in
Southampton, which marked the 40
th
anniversary of this
organization (Figure 2). Finally, the joint chapter for the
Czech Republic & Slovakia was formally established in
May 2012 at the next Czech conference held in Loket nad
Ohří. After a decade of “isolated” development, our group
of specialists has become a part of the global CAA family.
Immediately, in the following year, we eagerly took the
opportunity to meet in Slovakia for the frst time (Figure 3)
and, after returning to the Czech Republic in 2014, we have
stood up to the new challenge. Thanks to the members of the
Polish CAA chapter, established at about the same time as
ourselves, the frst central European meeting of the Visegrad
countries’ national chapters (Poland, Czech Republic,
Slovakia, and Hungary) took place in Cieszyn (2015). This
look across national borders was certainly useful in many
ways – it created new, or strengthened already-established,
professional contacts, contributed to the exchange of
ideas, and hopefully will continue to stimulate new fruitful
research. Last, but by no means least, we can see this growing
cooperation as a sign of maturity – of what existed once as
small, relatively marginalised and internationally-divided
groups of computer enthusiasts within several separate
central European archaeological communities. These
communities have now grown into fully-fedged professional
groups with common interests that seek to critically discuss
the latest developments in the feld of digital technologies
and the impact they may have on archaeological theory
and practice. In my view this development gives a positive
answer to the main question inherited from the frst decade
of our conference series – can digital archaeology prosper as
a specifc area of research?
Table 1.
A list of annual meetings titled “Počítačová podpora v archeologii”
(Computer support for archaeology) and most recently “Computer
Applications in Archaeology”.
Meeting No.YearLocation
12002Pohansko (CZ)
22003
Hrad Nečtiny (CZ)
32004Kravsko (CZ)
42005Roztoky(CZ)
52006
Brněnská přehrada (CZ)
62007
Chodová Planá (CZ)
72008
Zvíkovské Podhradí (CZ)
82009
Hradec Králové (CZ)
92010Litomyšl (CZ)
102011Dalešice (CZ)
112012
Loket nad Ohří (CZ)
122013
Kočovce (SK)
132014Svratka (CZ)
142015Cieszyn (PL)
Figure 2.
The CAA International annual
meeting in Southampton (2012), a session
dedicated to the history of this conference (see
also the related flm at http://www.sms.cam.
ac.uk/media/1357554). Photo L. Šmejda.
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3. Directions and achievements
The early thematic interests of this group are well documented
in several edited volumes and conference proceedings. The
frst two books published in print are inseparably linked
to the long-term effort of Professor Jiří Macháček from
Masaryk University in Brno. The frst volume (Macháček
1997), being intended primarily as a textbook for students
of archaeology, focused mainly on databases, geographic
information systems, and statistics. The second book, edited
by the same editor and published a decade later (Macháček
2008), included chapters based on conference presentations
or on student’s dissertations (Figure 4). Thematically they
followed the topics covered by the previous publication from
1997, but also expanded to the new territories of digital 3D
recording and visualization techniques, and specialized web
services. Over the years these books have proved useful and
found a much wider audience than was perhaps originally
envisaged, and they are still regularly sought after by students
and researchers alike. Another edited volume associated with
these conferences, the latest one so far, appeared in digital
form as the proceedings of the 2010 conference held in
Litomyšl (Kuchařík
et al.
2010). Other books were published
as collections of works written by university students, edited
and complemented by their supervisors (Neustupný 2003;
Neustupný, John 2005).
It is interesting to observe which themes are recurring at
the conferences of the Czech and Slovak group and which
are more popular than others. Only a very limited selection
of relevant references can be cited in this short overview, for
which reason I refer here only to publications not included in
the above-mentioned collective tomes, which also cover much
Figure 3.
The CAA-CS national 2013
meeting in Kočovce, Slovakia. The
participants gathered in front of the
conference venue (above); and an excursion
to archaeological sites (below). Photo
K. Hladíková and L. Šmejda.
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of what follows. Judging from rough fgures, it seems that by
far the most popular topic concerns the landscape-oriented
applications of geographical information systems (Dresler,
Macháček 2013; Lieskovský
et al.
2013; Kuna, Danielisová
2009), including the integration of survey data and remote
sensing into GIS (Šmejda 2009; Gojda 2010; Gojda, John
2013). Intra-site spatial datasets and their analyses in GIS
closely follow (Macháček 2002; Šmejda 2014), underscoring
the massive impact of spatial technologies on present-day
archaeological practice. Contributions on archaeological
databases, data warehouses and information management
systems also belong to some of the most frequented topics
(Kuna 2015).
Archaeological (non-spatial) statistics is another
mainstream topic with a wide range of specifc applications,
although purely numerical methods and statistical tests used
alone are seemingly a less inspiring source of knowledge
compared to the more eye-catching studies presenting plans
and maps. Of course, statistical analysis coupled with spatial
visualization provides a revealing and attractive combination
in many cases (Smrž
et al.
2011; Demján 2015; John 2011).
More recently, the dramatic increase of 3D recording and
modelling techniques can be observed (Preusz
et al.
2014;
Květina
et al.
2015). The potential of the Internet for
archaeological research and presentation is obvious and
multifaceted, and aspects of this increasingly prominent
phenomenon of our present-day world are included in many
of the above-mentioned publications, as well as in more
specifcally-focused articles (
e.g.
Šmejda 2007a; Šmejda
2007b). This overview, however, would remain incomplete
without a note regarding those papers that present new
advances in geodesy, photogrammetry, CAD, computer
graphics, and other related technical disciplines applied to
archaeology, although they are usually inseparably connected
to the various thematic categories and references already
mentioned above (Bárta
et al.
2003). Among the topics with
a relatively minor occurrence are the applications of agent-
based simulations (Danielisová, Štekerová 2015), network
analysis (Sosna
et al.
2013), use of IT in public archaeology
(http://www.archeologickyatlas.cz), and contributions to the
debate on general methodological issues, critical approaches
to the role of modern technologies in contemporary science
and society.
4. Conclusion: CAA-CS national chapter in a wider context
From a rough comparison of the papers featuring at CAA
international meetings with those at our own local group, we
can see that the themes most popular in our country have
also been repeatedly discussed at the international CAA
conferences, where we can fnd them among well-established
session themes. But is it really the same agenda everywhere
or can we spot any differences? In the Czech Republic and
Slovakia, internationally recognized themes mostly appear
with some delay, but this is surely becoming shorter than
used to be the case: before computers became widely
available in post-socialist countries. Some differences still
remain apparent in the themes requiring large investment
into infrastructure and human resources; for example, we
are not particularly strong in large projects based on virtual
reality, 3D computer reconstruction, and the dissemination
of knowledge using augmented reality, for instance. These
are gaining more and more attention internationally – but
perhaps we do not regard them yet as “serious science”.
Of course, 3D modelling is also on the rise in our territory,
but on a noticeably smaller scale and with less variety of
sub-themes. A similar bias can be recognized in other
research too: the semantic web, information retrieval or
digital publishing to name but a few, which are only slowly
establishing themselves as scientifc problems inherent
to archaeology in our community, even though they have
already been recognized as such in other national chapters,
as well as at CAA international meetings. However, even
in these emerging themes we can fnd some outstanding
projects that are based on complex, well-thought approach
and original technological solutions (Kuna 2015).
We have a very strong and active group of Czechs and
Slovaks interested in computer applications in archaeology
and a fantastic track record of national meetings. The fact
that this group currently has a somewhat dual identity
(stemming from its traditional designation of “Computer
support for archaeology” and the more recent affliation to
CAA) is, in my view, not a serious matter. After all, both
Figure 4.
The national 2008 meeting in Zvíkovské Podhradí. Evžen
Neustupný is commenting on the new book edited by Jiří Macháček. Photo
Č. Čišecký.
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248
titles carry some historical baggage and should be taken as
“brands”, rather than as a semantically-precise defnition of
the community’s interests and activities. They represent solid
scholarly traditions and stand as trademarks, so to speak.
We can legitimately use both, depending on the context;
“Computer support” makes sense for the domestic agenda
and CAA affliation for the cross-border communication in
English. The more important issue is whether we can move
our debate towards a more pronounced refexivity in our
work with advanced technologies. Being members of a large
global organization can certainly help this trend. Undeniably,
paying more attention to the theoretical background – and to
the critical evaluation of our motivations and expectations,
which lead to our engagement with computers – would be a
good thing.
In the past decade we have witnessed new technologies
becoming for the most part widespread, which has to some
degree contributed to a perceived loss of their novelty appeal.
However, there may permanently appear new and original
ways of how these technologies should be approached,
utilized and implemented in meaningful projects. I can see
a continuous improvement in these matters over the last
two decades, and I am convinced that there will always be
a horizon of unexplored space where technologies may be
innovatively embodied into areas of research. Of course,
many of us can perceive a certain danger in what has
emerged as a methodology – a tool – but which could begin
to control implicitly the way we do archaeology; those very
same technologies may have an agency of sorts, dictating
our research preferences. On the other hand, if we choose
to be critical and self-refective about it, which is where we
would like to aim in our future CAA-CS meetings, we can
learn more about the past – and also about the present-day
lens through which we view the past. This new “technology
awareness” has the potential to direct the future development
of research more responsibly. While it would be foolish to
take computer and information technologies as theory-free
and purely objective tools, we cannot go to the other extreme
and discard them as potentially distorting and dangerous
agents. Present-day society is already so entangled with
the many “gadgets” of modern technology that these have,
without too much exaggeration, become part of our self-
same personalities and infuence how we structure our
thinking about our research and about our world. This is not
necessarily a bad thing, provided we are able to acknowledge
this aspect of our cognition. It will certainly not disappear in
the immediate future and, with new advances in the felds
of artifcial intelligence and human-machine coupling, we
may yet witness further highly-interesting new turns in our
discipline.
Acknowledgements
This article draws on the results of the grant project titled
“The strategy of archaeological research in Europe”
(CZ.1.07/2.3.00/20.0036), which was fnanced between
the years 2011 and 2014 by the European Social Fund and
state budget of the Czech Republic under the Operational
Programme Education for Competitiveness.
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