GETTING information on Cyprus’ antiquities used to be a chore discouraging potential hobbyists and frustrating specialists who were forced to do a lot of running around but this will hopefully change with the imminent completion of a digitisation programme.
The Cyprus Archaeological Digitisation Programme (CADiP) started in mid-October 2009 in order to manage thousands antiquities scattered all over Cyprus “and serve the needs of the Antiquities department as well as those of researchers and the public,” Curator of Antiquities Despo Pilides yesterday said at a news conference.
Roughly 1,300 monuments have been catalogued under the project. Also catalogued are Paphos Museum’s 5,000-odd artefacts found up until 1975.
The project “will significantly help to overcome the problem of the dispersal of individual pieces of information,” Pilides said.
In order to get a complete picture on antiquities a lot of diverse information has to come together, she said. This would include photo archives, technical details including the excavation process, current location and preservation history.
Some monuments and artefacts are on private land under the auspices of the Cyprus Museum and many others are in storage.
A Geographic Information System, in essence a digital map of antiquities, will interface with all existing information on the catalogued antiquities making access and research much easier.
In the future this will allow researchers to locate possible excavation sites by analysing existing data in order to predict the likelihood of the existence of an unknown archaeological site.
It will also mean that the infrastructure is set up to “create a fully digital archive, which will include antiquities in storage and also on display,” Pilides said.
The creation of the digital archive was made possible partly by external funding from Norway.
A private company, HS Data Ltd, along with the Institute of Mediterranean studies in Crete jointly worked on the creation of the IT system.
A website should be operational by the end of next month at: http://gis.da.mcw.gov.cy/cadip.
Members of the public can apply for permission for full access to the data which has to be granted in writing by the Director of the Department of Antiquities, Marina Hadjicosti.
Author: Poly Pantelides | Source: Cyprus Mail [April 28, 2011]
The Cyprus Archaeological Digitisation Programme (CADiP) started in mid-October 2009 in order to manage thousands antiquities scattered all over Cyprus “and serve the needs of the Antiquities department as well as those of researchers and the public,” Curator of Antiquities Despo Pilides yesterday said at a news conference.
Roughly 1,300 monuments have been catalogued under the project. Also catalogued are Paphos Museum’s 5,000-odd artefacts found up until 1975.
The project “will significantly help to overcome the problem of the dispersal of individual pieces of information,” Pilides said.
In order to get a complete picture on antiquities a lot of diverse information has to come together, she said. This would include photo archives, technical details including the excavation process, current location and preservation history.
Some monuments and artefacts are on private land under the auspices of the Cyprus Museum and many others are in storage.
A Geographic Information System, in essence a digital map of antiquities, will interface with all existing information on the catalogued antiquities making access and research much easier.
In the future this will allow researchers to locate possible excavation sites by analysing existing data in order to predict the likelihood of the existence of an unknown archaeological site.
It will also mean that the infrastructure is set up to “create a fully digital archive, which will include antiquities in storage and also on display,” Pilides said.
The creation of the digital archive was made possible partly by external funding from Norway.
A private company, HS Data Ltd, along with the Institute of Mediterranean studies in Crete jointly worked on the creation of the IT system.
A website should be operational by the end of next month at: http://gis.da.mcw.gov.cy/cadip.
Members of the public can apply for permission for full access to the data which has to be granted in writing by the Director of the Department of Antiquities, Marina Hadjicosti.
Author: Poly Pantelides | Source: Cyprus Mail [April 28, 2011]