Towards computerized typology and classification of ceramics [An article from: Journal of Archaeological Science]

This digital document is a journal article from Journal of Archaeological Science, published by Elsevier in 2004. The article is delivered in HTML format and is available in your Amazon.com Media Library immediately after purchase. You can view it with any web browser.

Description:
We report on newly developed mathematical and computational tools for morphological description, classification and analysis of archaeological artifacts. The need for such tools is most acutely felt, due to two main factors: (1) The lack of objective, quantitative criteria for shape analysis, classification and comparanda; (2) The overwhelming abundance of data, which renders impossible any extensive comparative typological analysis using traditional methods. We shall describe the main ideas which distinguish our method, and demonstrate its applicability by presenting the analysis of two assemblages of Iron Age ceramics from sites in Israel.