Archaeological Looting in Egypt: A Geospatial View (Case Studies from Saqqara, Lisht, and el Hibeh)
Sarah Parcak
Near Eastern Archaeology
Vol. 78, No. 3, Special Issue: The Cultural Heritage Crisis in the Middle East (September 2015), pp. 196-203
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Abstract
While many news reports exist about
archaeological site looting in Egypt following its January 2011
Revolution, no one had yet examined the issue of how looting patterns
changed over time across the country or at distinct archaeological
sites. This study uses rapidly tasked high resolution satellite images
from 2009–2013 to assess looting at three important regions: The pyramid
fields (from Abusir to Dashur), el Hibeh, and Lisht. We mapped looting
pits and their areas to assess overall change in looting patterns, and
noted an increase of over 500% over the three year time period. While
open source tools like Google Earth are useful for longer term looting
mapping projects, we suggest that rapidly tasked commercial satellite
imagery can provide near real-time looting evaluation of sites. Ground
truthing visits are described here, as well as potential solutions via
collaborative programs in partnership with Egypt's Ministry of
Antiquities.
Copyright 2015 American Schools of Oriental Research
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