WEBVTT - Look What I Found! 0:00:04.280 --> 0:00:07.240 Get in touch with technology with text Stuff from how 0:00:07.280 --> 0:00:14.600 stuff works dot com. Hey everyone, and welcome to tech Stuff. 0:00:14.600 --> 0:00:19.040 I'm Jonathan Strickland, and we are going to take another 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:22.600 look at archaeology. This is our part two on archaeology 0:00:22.720 --> 0:00:25.119 and the tools used in the trade. Yes, in the 0:00:25.160 --> 0:00:27.880 first episode we talked a lot about the history and 0:00:28.000 --> 0:00:30.760 about carbon dating and some of the other dating methods 0:00:30.800 --> 0:00:33.480 that exist for um, for you know, when you've got 0:00:33.520 --> 0:00:35.600 something that you have dug up from the ground, figuring 0:00:35.600 --> 0:00:37.720 out how old it is, and also some of the 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:41.280 hand tools used for digging stuff up out of the ground. Now, 0:00:41.440 --> 0:00:45.159 that turns out that as technology has advanced, archaeologists have 0:00:45.159 --> 0:00:47.960 figured out ways of applying that technology in their own field. 0:00:48.080 --> 0:00:51.280 And we're starting to see some technologies that are developed 0:00:51.280 --> 0:00:56.080 specifically for archaeological pursuit. There's also a lot of new 0:00:56.160 --> 0:00:58.600 ways of figuring out where in the ground you want 0:00:58.680 --> 0:01:01.360 to dig stuff up. Right, So let's go ahead and 0:01:01.400 --> 0:01:03.960 look at some of the higher text stuff. Now, some 0:01:04.120 --> 0:01:08.560 of it is again basic equipment that has proved itself 0:01:08.600 --> 0:01:11.120 to be really useful in lots of disciplines, so why 0:01:11.120 --> 0:01:14.880 not archaeology. One of those obviously would be cameras. Right, 0:01:15.400 --> 0:01:17.240 as we talked about in the first episode, you do 0:01:17.280 --> 0:01:20.280 a lot of documenting the site when you're doing archaeology 0:01:20.360 --> 0:01:22.840 because it is, by its nature a destructive science. Once 0:01:22.880 --> 0:01:25.000 you have dug up a site and it's never going 0:01:25.040 --> 0:01:27.640 to be the same again, So documenting exactly how you 0:01:27.640 --> 0:01:30.679 found everything is very helpful for the future. Yep, going 0:01:30.720 --> 0:01:33.360 through every single step of the way. Just like as 0:01:33.360 --> 0:01:35.720 you were saying before, Lauren, with a with a crime 0:01:35.800 --> 0:01:39.000 scene where forensics have to come in and document everything. 0:01:39.040 --> 0:01:42.400 It's very much the same sort of principle here, except 0:01:42.400 --> 0:01:44.039 of course we're not looking at a crime. We're looking 0:01:44.080 --> 0:01:47.600 at the evidence of a human settlement at some point 0:01:47.680 --> 0:01:50.440 in the past, and maybe an ancient crime, but not 0:01:50.560 --> 0:01:53.000 really in the same way. Right, it could be some 0:01:53.040 --> 0:01:55.760 fashion crimes. I'm sure there were several of those. It 0:01:55.760 --> 0:01:58.840 would be the ancient version of me pretty much. So. Yeah, 0:01:58.960 --> 0:02:01.720 Cameras would be things like you know, film cameras, digital cameras, 0:02:01.960 --> 0:02:04.680 and not just cameras that take the kind of images 0:02:04.720 --> 0:02:07.840 that we usually take. There's also cameras that might take 0:02:08.000 --> 0:02:12.400 images that are infrared. Now, obviously the version that we 0:02:12.520 --> 0:02:14.760 see would not be an infrared because we wouldn't be 0:02:14.800 --> 0:02:17.040 able to see it, but it would be using infred 0:02:17.080 --> 0:02:21.639 spectrum scaled into into visible spectrum, which that could pick 0:02:21.720 --> 0:02:25.200 up stuff that otherwise we might not see, you know, 0:02:25.320 --> 0:02:27.840 just with the way that our eyes work, you know, 0:02:27.880 --> 0:02:30.280 within the visible spectrum, which is why you would use it. Yeah, 0:02:30.440 --> 0:02:32.440 that's going to be an important part of one of 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:36.079 our later notes. Um. But also in the kind of 0:02:36.160 --> 0:02:40.639 relatively basic technology section, we've got robots. Yeah. In fact, 0:02:40.880 --> 0:02:44.480 the robots thing is really getting exciting because we've got 0:02:44.480 --> 0:02:46.760 a couple of different options here. You know, you've got 0:02:46.760 --> 0:02:49.480 your your robots that obviously you want to send a 0:02:49.560 --> 0:02:51.959 robot in whenever it's going to be really difficult to 0:02:51.960 --> 0:02:54.359 get people there, or really dangerous to get people there 0:02:54.680 --> 0:02:57.280 if you aren't really sure if the environment is a 0:02:57.320 --> 0:03:00.880 safe one. Obviously, losing a hundred thous and dollar robot 0:03:01.040 --> 0:03:03.440 is a small price to pay compared to putting someone's 0:03:03.440 --> 0:03:05.480 life in danger. Oh sure, or in the kind of 0:03:05.520 --> 0:03:09.280 tight spaces that humans literally cannot get into. Yeah, right, 0:03:09.360 --> 0:03:11.840 so if it could, it might be that perhaps there 0:03:11.960 --> 0:03:16.360 was a natural disaster that has uh sealed off something 0:03:16.400 --> 0:03:19.160 that once was open, and then you know, we can't 0:03:19.160 --> 0:03:21.680 get in there easily now, But a robot could also 0:03:21.800 --> 0:03:24.600 if it's in an area that we can't access because 0:03:24.600 --> 0:03:27.200 there are no more roads that lead up there. Perhaps 0:03:27.200 --> 0:03:29.160 there were roads once upon a time, but they have 0:03:29.240 --> 0:03:32.960 been overgrown and they're they're gone now. Other types of 0:03:33.040 --> 0:03:35.600 robots that people might use are are the actual like 0:03:35.680 --> 0:03:39.160 quad copter, six rotor eight rod, you know, things with 0:03:39.440 --> 0:03:41.800 cameras on them. So yeah, and and all of these 0:03:41.840 --> 0:03:43.560 also have the benefit of being i mean, you know, 0:03:43.640 --> 0:03:46.640 humans are you know, a hundred to three hundred pounds 0:03:46.720 --> 0:03:49.160 or so, and robots canna have a much smaller footprint 0:03:49.160 --> 0:03:51.200 and cause a lot less damage to a to a 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:56.840 surrounding area. So both of those devices are used pretty 0:03:56.880 --> 0:04:00.640 pretty extensively. Obviously, one of the most import and pieces 0:04:00.680 --> 0:04:03.720 of equipment in an archaeological dig today would be a 0:04:03.760 --> 0:04:07.440 computer because, as it turns out now that as our 0:04:07.520 --> 0:04:11.640 tools have become more sophisticated, we've been able to extract 0:04:11.720 --> 0:04:15.800 a lot more information about the archaeological digs we do. Right, 0:04:15.840 --> 0:04:19.239 So with that information comes a need to be able 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:22.400 to analyze it and synthesize it and store it and 0:04:22.400 --> 0:04:24.919 and cross reference and i mean, even for the basic 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:27.400 kinds of information that we were coming up with a 0:04:27.400 --> 0:04:30.719 few hundred years ago. A computer in order to crunch 0:04:30.760 --> 0:04:33.719 those numbers and kind of compare things and try to 0:04:33.760 --> 0:04:36.320 pull similarities and patterns out of the data would have 0:04:36.360 --> 0:04:38.920 been very useful. Sure. And if you want to do 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:42.200 something even along the lines of using a computer to 0:04:42.360 --> 0:04:46.440 perhaps construct a virtual representation of the site that you're 0:04:46.440 --> 0:04:48.520 looking at, something so that you can kind of see 0:04:48.880 --> 0:04:51.320 what it may have looked like back when it was, 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:55.599 you know, an actual existing human settlement, obviously a computer 0:04:55.680 --> 0:04:58.160 be really important. So if you if you have you know, 0:04:58.240 --> 0:05:02.080 basic uh information and like the layout of the settlement, 0:05:02.120 --> 0:05:05.359 you know, you've determined where the structures were and what 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:08.120 the perimeter was of this place, you might be able 0:05:08.200 --> 0:05:11.760 to reconstruct that virtually, which would be an invaluable tool, 0:05:11.839 --> 0:05:15.800 and not just for the purposes of that dig but 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:19.480 for scholarship further down the line. And we've already seen 0:05:19.560 --> 0:05:22.679 some people kind of play with this in different ways. 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.200 Some ways it's it's a little bit uh, you know, 0:05:25.320 --> 0:05:27.400 I hesitate to use the word easier, but a little 0:05:27.480 --> 0:05:31.479 less there's less work required on an archaeological side of things. 0:05:31.480 --> 0:05:33.839 For example, there have been people who have created the 0:05:33.880 --> 0:05:39.440 Google Earth models of ancient Rome. So a lot of those, uh, 0:05:39.760 --> 0:05:44.720 those examples of ancient architecture are still in Rome. Uh 0:05:44.760 --> 0:05:48.040 in ruins forms of ruins. But but you can still 0:05:48.080 --> 0:05:49.560 see some of it, and so that makes it a 0:05:49.600 --> 0:05:52.440 little bit easier than say a settlement that is currently 0:05:52.800 --> 0:05:57.800 you know, three ft under sand in Egypt. Yes, yes, 0:05:58.000 --> 0:06:00.560 but um, but with with both of the those examples. 0:06:00.560 --> 0:06:03.600 Aren't there some virtual reality kind of applications that are 0:06:03.640 --> 0:06:06.800 coming into use these Yeah, there actually are. There's a 0:06:06.880 --> 0:06:11.960 project specifically called Virtual Environments for Research in Archaeology. This 0:06:12.040 --> 0:06:15.200 was one that I saw on a British journal website 0:06:15.560 --> 0:06:18.159 which is all about using virtual reality to build on 0:06:18.200 --> 0:06:23.440 our understanding of archaeological finds. So again, uh, it's it's 0:06:23.440 --> 0:06:26.360 really to create that full picture literally in this case, 0:06:26.400 --> 0:06:29.560 a virtual picture of an environment, so that we can 0:06:29.720 --> 0:06:33.640 have a closer connection to our ancestors and really understand 0:06:33.960 --> 0:06:37.719 the progress that that humanity has gone through. To walk 0:06:37.760 --> 0:06:40.320 through one of these towns, yeah, you could, you could 0:06:40.320 --> 0:06:43.320 in theory, assuming that your data is good enough, you 0:06:43.360 --> 0:06:46.160 could in theory have a pretty immersive experience. I mean, 0:06:46.160 --> 0:06:50.760 I can even imagine a world where some educational organization 0:06:50.839 --> 0:06:53.360 takes it upon themselves to make a truly kind of 0:06:53.400 --> 0:06:56.960 immersive experience where it's like a virtual tour of these 0:06:56.960 --> 0:06:59.719 ancient landscapes, and then using something like the Oculus rift 0:07:00.240 --> 0:07:02.320 so that you can get sort of a first person 0:07:02.400 --> 0:07:04.640 perspective of what it would have been like to move 0:07:04.680 --> 0:07:07.240 around in such an environment. Now, if you think of 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:09.760 that as an educational tool that you put in high 0:07:09.760 --> 0:07:13.680 schools where you're no longer just reading about these ancient civilizations, 0:07:13.720 --> 0:07:15.320 but you can actually look around and see what it 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:19.440 would have looked like. Like I remember reading in art 0:07:19.520 --> 0:07:24.640 history and in other history courses about the ancient Roman structures, 0:07:24.880 --> 0:07:28.280 but until I visited Rome, I really had no concept 0:07:28.320 --> 0:07:30.920 of the scale of these sort of things. Sure, and 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:33.840 you know, and I mean even those those little kind 0:07:33.840 --> 0:07:37.040 of kind of probably slightly terrible water color drawings in 0:07:37.080 --> 0:07:39.400 my early history books were always my favorite parts, just 0:07:39.440 --> 0:07:42.280 getting to see like, oh, that's what that was like, 0:07:42.400 --> 0:07:44.120 but of course that's not what that was really like. 0:07:44.400 --> 0:07:48.200 So Yeah, these computers obviously very important, not just I mean, 0:07:48.200 --> 0:07:50.440 the virtual environment stuff is really cool. That's a kind 0:07:50.480 --> 0:07:52.960 of the sexy side of the computers. The ones that 0:07:53.000 --> 0:07:55.120 are actually used in the field might not be nearly 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:58.080 that sophisticated. They're probably a lot more like Excel spreadsheet 0:07:58.120 --> 0:08:01.520 kind of. Yeah, it's about dat collection and storage and 0:08:01.520 --> 0:08:06.120 then eventually analysis. But they are obviously very important tools. 0:08:06.640 --> 0:08:09.840 Some other important tools. Let's get to some surveying equipment. 0:08:09.880 --> 0:08:12.560 And this is probably my favorite device on the whole 0:08:12.600 --> 0:08:15.560 list because it, uh it made me think like it 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:18.960 it slipped out of a Terry Pratchett Discworld novel or something. 0:08:19.920 --> 0:08:22.840 But the audolite, that's how you say it. I was 0:08:22.840 --> 0:08:25.000 going to wait and let you had to watch a 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.600 video first. In fact, here's the secret here. Originally I 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:30.640 watched the video just so I can figure out how 0:08:30.720 --> 0:08:33.120 to say the autolite properly instead of saying it like 0:08:33.160 --> 0:08:36.720 theo delight or something. Uh. So I it was. It 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:40.200 was an English video, as in British English, uh. And 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:42.800 it was actually describing how to set up a theodolite 0:08:42.800 --> 0:08:47.000 for students, so students of archaeology and uh, not just archaeology. 0:08:47.000 --> 0:08:49.840 It's actually used in a few different disciplines, but how 0:08:49.880 --> 0:08:52.240 students could set one up properly so that they could 0:08:52.280 --> 0:08:55.000 learn how to take the right kind of measurements. And 0:08:55.040 --> 0:08:57.200 these measurements, by the way, which we have not said 0:08:57.320 --> 0:09:01.400 yet are our angles in both horizontal in vertical planes 0:09:01.640 --> 0:09:03.679 as I understand it, but I've got a very poor 0:09:03.720 --> 0:09:05.720 concept how this is laid out. What does it do? 0:09:05.800 --> 0:09:09.200 All right? So let's say that you you establish your 0:09:09.320 --> 0:09:11.480 base point. This is the point where you're setting up 0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:14.559 the theodolite. You actually have to be really really precise 0:09:14.640 --> 0:09:16.360 with this. In other words, the best thing to do 0:09:16.480 --> 0:09:19.400 is to set up something directly underneath the theodolite, which 0:09:19.440 --> 0:09:23.280 is on a tripod. Okay, so it's the theodolite itself 0:09:23.360 --> 0:09:25.760 is kind of like a telescope. It's suspended above this 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:28.559 point that you have established. Um. It actually has a 0:09:28.640 --> 0:09:31.680 lens that points straight down so that you can, uh, 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:34.720 you can maneuver it so that it's directly above your 0:09:34.760 --> 0:09:36.599 point of reference. Now, this point of reference is a 0:09:36.840 --> 0:09:39.120 is a a point that you know all the stuff about, 0:09:39.160 --> 0:09:41.960 Like you know exactly where this is in the grand 0:09:42.000 --> 0:09:44.800 scheme of things. Perhaps you have the global positioning units 0:09:44.800 --> 0:09:47.080 for it, so you know exactly where this place is. 0:09:47.880 --> 0:09:50.680 Now you've got at least two other points that you 0:09:50.760 --> 0:09:53.000 want to compare to each other that are off in 0:09:53.040 --> 0:09:56.040 the distance. All right, So the way this would work 0:09:56.120 --> 0:09:58.880 is you would focus in on one of those two points, 0:09:59.280 --> 0:10:01.560 take some measure your mints, focus on the second of 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:04.360 the two points, take some measurements, compare the two and 0:10:04.400 --> 0:10:07.640 then you know more about the relationship of those two 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:10.360 points in the distance to each other as well as 0:10:10.400 --> 0:10:14.160 to you. So theodolite is really important to do things 0:10:14.200 --> 0:10:16.440 like measure. Well, mostly it's the angles, but a lot 0:10:16.480 --> 0:10:19.360 of theodolites now also have range finders on them, which 0:10:19.360 --> 0:10:21.800 we'll talk about in a second. But the idea is 0:10:21.840 --> 0:10:26.199 to really establish where things are in relation to each 0:10:26.240 --> 0:10:29.640 other when you're trying to figure out a full excavation site. 0:10:29.720 --> 0:10:33.560 So you might say, let's say that the main temple 0:10:33.920 --> 0:10:37.880 of an ancient city was in this one part and 0:10:38.320 --> 0:10:42.040 the house of the the ruler is in this other part, 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:46.040 and by that you're starting to establish relationships culturally, not 0:10:46.240 --> 0:10:50.080 just archaeologically, not just you know, architecturally or anything like that, 0:10:50.440 --> 0:10:52.720 but you're you're starting to draw some other social and 0:10:52.760 --> 0:10:57.439 cultural implications from this information. This is what the theodolite 0:10:57.480 --> 0:11:01.040 helps you do. It gets that quantifiable data that you 0:11:01.040 --> 0:11:03.199 can use to start building on this other stuff that 0:11:03.280 --> 0:11:08.000 might be more humanity related as opposed to scientifically related. So, uh, 0:11:08.080 --> 0:11:10.800 it allows you to look at the horizontal or vertical plane, 0:11:10.840 --> 0:11:13.760 meaning that you can tell angles from left to right 0:11:13.880 --> 0:11:17.240 or up and down. So not everything is built on 0:11:17.320 --> 0:11:22.319 a perfectly flat level surface, right, and archaeological digs are 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:25.640 frequently you know, on on various steps and levels down 0:11:25.640 --> 0:11:27.800 into the ground. Yeah, yeah, you might have. You might 0:11:27.840 --> 0:11:30.360 have houses that were on hills that are on the 0:11:30.480 --> 0:11:33.160 sides of areas that you know, or or that the 0:11:33.160 --> 0:11:36.240 ground has shifted in the intervening years. And so the 0:11:36.240 --> 0:11:40.040 theodolite allows you to have very precise measurements of where 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:43.400 these different points of reference are in relation to each other. 0:11:43.880 --> 0:11:47.040 And uh, the I'll try and link. I'll make sure 0:11:47.040 --> 0:11:50.280 I link a video when we maybe a little after 0:11:50.320 --> 0:11:51.880 this podcast goes out, because I think I'm gonna be 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:53.719 gone while it does come out. I'll be at c 0:11:53.840 --> 0:11:58.320 E S. But I'll link some videos that show a 0:11:58.360 --> 0:12:02.280 theodolite being used and explaining why it's being used the 0:12:02.280 --> 0:12:05.160 way it is now. The older theodolites had these glass 0:12:05.200 --> 0:12:07.959 plates on them that actually had the markings on them. 0:12:07.960 --> 0:12:10.960 So one glass plate, for example, would have markings from 0:12:11.080 --> 0:12:14.679 zero to three sixty marking the degrees of the circle right, 0:12:15.240 --> 0:12:17.880 and a second glass plate would essentially just have an 0:12:18.000 --> 0:12:20.520 arrow on it, and since they're both clear, you can 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:22.760 see where the arrow is in relation to the diet. Well. Yeah, 0:12:22.760 --> 0:12:24.960 so you just had to align them and then manually 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:28.000 take down measurements. I assume that the new models are digital, 0:12:28.040 --> 0:12:30.880 and we'll do that for you exactly. So people who 0:12:30.920 --> 0:12:34.000 are using a very modern theodolite might not have to 0:12:34.559 --> 0:12:36.760 be quite as I mean, you still have to be 0:12:36.840 --> 0:12:38.719 very careful the way you set it up, but you 0:12:38.800 --> 0:12:40.960 might not have to be quite as careful in the 0:12:41.080 --> 0:12:43.600 use of it in these older ones. I was watching 0:12:43.640 --> 0:12:45.800 this and it was interesting. It was so intricate. I mean, 0:12:45.800 --> 0:12:48.600 it looks like a telescope that simply can pivot up 0:12:48.640 --> 0:12:51.040 and down and left and right. That's all it looked 0:12:51.080 --> 0:12:53.280 like just at first glance. But then when you see 0:12:53.320 --> 0:12:56.360 all the individual parts that turn relative to each other 0:12:56.679 --> 0:12:59.480 so that you can actually take down these measurements, it's 0:13:00.000 --> 0:13:03.480 pretty phenomenal how complex it is at any rate. And 0:13:03.960 --> 0:13:06.440 eventually it's just so that you can figure out angles, 0:13:06.480 --> 0:13:09.520 Like it's like, wow, this is a really complicated thing 0:13:09.720 --> 0:13:12.640 just to figure out the angles. But it is very 0:13:12.679 --> 0:13:16.640 important to establish the relationship of these different structures within 0:13:16.640 --> 0:13:20.640 an excavation site. Moving on, we I mentioned range finders 0:13:20.640 --> 0:13:24.160 and electronic distance meter as an example, which uses some 0:13:24.320 --> 0:13:29.240 form of electromagnetic signal to establish how far away a 0:13:29.280 --> 0:13:32.280 reference point is from the device itself. So you can 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:35.200 even have handheld versions of this where this is something 0:13:35.200 --> 0:13:38.280 that sends out a signal and then UH counts. It 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:40.360 counts the time that it takes for a signal bounds 0:13:40.400 --> 0:13:43.640 back right, and because we know how fast the signal travels, 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:47.200 that means you can determine how far away that object is. 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:50.760 Another very similar piece of technology of this is the 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:54.560 light are sometimes called a laser range finder YEP. Light 0:13:54.600 --> 0:13:58.760 detection and ranging UH usually is using pulses of laser light. 0:13:58.840 --> 0:14:01.400 It's not always laser, but more frequently than not it is, 0:14:02.120 --> 0:14:05.360 and so it's using these very short pulses of laser 0:14:05.440 --> 0:14:10.480 light to shoot out at whatever the reference area is, 0:14:10.760 --> 0:14:13.800 you know, whatever you're aiming at. It hits, that bounces back, 0:14:13.840 --> 0:14:16.480 comes back. Same sort of thing as the electronic distance meter. 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:19.560 It finds the distance based upon the time it took 0:14:19.600 --> 0:14:22.560 for the light to leave the device and reflect off 0:14:22.600 --> 0:14:26.920 of the object and hit the receiver return senor so 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:29.400 once you've done that, then you can actually say, oh, 0:14:29.480 --> 0:14:33.400 so this is that far away. And obviously again to 0:14:33.600 --> 0:14:37.040 establish what the parameters are for any site, this sort 0:14:37.080 --> 0:14:41.360 of stuff is really important. Yeah, and then those those uh, infrared, 0:14:41.400 --> 0:14:45.040 microwave or or ultrasound devices could possibly be used for 0:14:45.160 --> 0:14:47.880 stuff that's that's underground it's filled in, like in the 0:14:47.920 --> 0:14:51.560 case of vesuvious. Sure, yeah, you can actually have electromagnetic 0:14:51.640 --> 0:14:55.120 radiation that will penetrate the ground and reflect off of stuff, 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:57.720 and it really works well if you have a uniform 0:14:57.840 --> 0:15:00.320 type of soil, like if there's a lot of different 0:15:00.360 --> 0:15:03.320 stuff in the soil, then you can get some corrupted readings. 0:15:03.400 --> 0:15:05.800 You know, you might too much static. Yeah, it's like 0:15:05.880 --> 0:15:09.480 it's like if you went into a um, you know, 0:15:09.600 --> 0:15:11.880 a beach, and you're using a metal detector and you're 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:15.800 looking for some sort of coins there, but someone has 0:15:16.200 --> 0:15:18.600 thoughtfully gone in there and dropped a whole bunch of 0:15:18.640 --> 0:15:23.400 just worthless chunks. Yeah, yeah, something that the mel detector 0:15:23.400 --> 0:15:26.760 would pick up but would be totally worthless. And yeah, 0:15:26.800 --> 0:15:28.680 you'd be detecting lots of stuff, but none of it 0:15:28.680 --> 0:15:31.640 would be valuable. Same sort of thing with this stuff. 0:15:31.680 --> 0:15:36.000 If the ground is not in uniform uh kind of consistency, 0:15:36.080 --> 0:15:38.520 thank you, then you could have some real problems. And 0:15:38.560 --> 0:15:41.520 of course ledar won't penetrate the ground at all. It's 0:15:41.600 --> 0:15:43.800 it's light based, so it'll just reflect right back off. 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:46.200 But these other ones like you mentioned totally would work 0:15:46.200 --> 0:15:48.600 and in fact do work. But still all of these 0:15:48.600 --> 0:15:52.360 are very useful for um, for collecting that precise data 0:15:52.480 --> 0:15:54.760 that is going to help out research down the line. 0:15:54.840 --> 0:15:59.080 As you are systematically destroying your excavation site right now. 0:15:59.120 --> 0:16:03.360 These approaches right here are a little less uh destructive 0:16:03.360 --> 0:16:08.000 than saying too. But obviously it would be really important 0:16:08.000 --> 0:16:10.000 when you want to do something like build that virtual 0:16:10.080 --> 0:16:12.600 environment we talked about earlier. You have to have all 0:16:12.680 --> 0:16:14.760 these facts and figures to do that. Yeah, and and 0:16:14.800 --> 0:16:17.440 before I mean, once you've got this this data set down, 0:16:17.680 --> 0:16:19.680 you can feel a little bit more comfortable going in 0:16:19.800 --> 0:16:22.240 and kind of must mucking stuff up knowing that you've 0:16:22.280 --> 0:16:25.880 already got the original locations of everything laid out. It's 0:16:26.320 --> 0:16:28.720 never gonna be the way it was back in the day, folks, 0:16:28.960 --> 0:16:32.200 we just have to resolve ourselves to that. Um. I think, 0:16:32.320 --> 0:16:35.160 isn't that the good thing about technology? Well, I'm just 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:38.280 saying the archaeological site itself is never going to be perceived. 0:16:39.720 --> 0:16:42.400 So once we've established what what what what it was 0:16:42.480 --> 0:16:45.240 before we started getting really down and dirty, I think 0:16:45.240 --> 0:16:48.880 we're all right. You know, there's there's this one part 0:16:48.920 --> 0:16:52.040 of me who's like, we shouldn't disturb that because that's 0:16:52.040 --> 0:16:54.520 historically important. But I think, well, then if we don't 0:16:54.520 --> 0:16:56.840 disturb it, we don't learn any We don't learn anything. 0:16:58.040 --> 0:16:59.960 And I think as long as you're you're not running 0:17:00.000 --> 0:17:03.600 around chatting it belongs in a museum, then you know, basically, 0:17:03.640 --> 0:17:05.280 I'm gonna have to really think on this, Lauren, I'm 0:17:05.280 --> 0:17:08.679 gonna have to really take this into consideration. So I 0:17:08.720 --> 0:17:11.159 think in order for me to really have the time 0:17:11.200 --> 0:17:13.720 to think about this deeply, we need to take a 0:17:13.800 --> 0:17:17.840 quick break to thank our sponsor. Okay, we're back, and uh, 0:17:18.000 --> 0:17:21.919 for those of you who are wondering what my conclusion was, 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:24.960 uh yeah, let's just rip it all up. Let's just 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:27.720 rip it all up. Okay, So moving on. Now, we've 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:31.520 talked about surveying equipment, Let's talk about geophysical equipment, which 0:17:31.520 --> 0:17:34.959 in some ways is similar, but there are other means 0:17:35.080 --> 0:17:38.840 of making sure that the place that you're you're exploring 0:17:39.000 --> 0:17:43.359 does in fact have some sort of archaeological significance. And 0:17:43.440 --> 0:17:45.720 one of the first things that we can talk about 0:17:45.720 --> 0:17:51.000 our resistivity meters, checking the resistance, the electrical resistance of 0:17:51.040 --> 0:17:52.760 an area, and you might first thing like, wow, that's 0:17:52.800 --> 0:17:54.960 kind of weird. You're checking to see you know, isn't 0:17:54.960 --> 0:17:58.479 the ground ground like, isn't it non conductive? And therefore 0:17:58.520 --> 0:18:01.040 you don't it doesn't help at all. No, Well, I 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:03.760 mean that that sounds kind of like a really fancy 0:18:03.800 --> 0:18:06.320 metal detector. It kind of is, it kind of is. 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:09.000 So the idea is that you're you're measuring for the 0:18:09.040 --> 0:18:13.160 electrical potential between an inner pair and an outer pair 0:18:13.240 --> 0:18:18.359 of electrodes or multiple electrodes that are across a region. Okay, 0:18:18.400 --> 0:18:22.720 so they're all kind of um testing to see what 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:26.640 the conductivity of that particular area happens to be. So, 0:18:26.800 --> 0:18:31.119 if there is conductive material, then by measuring that resistance, 0:18:31.160 --> 0:18:34.520 you can determine, oh, there's something organic here, or perhaps 0:18:34.560 --> 0:18:38.119 there's something metal here that could indicate a human settlement 0:18:38.119 --> 0:18:41.600 was once here. If you start to detect less or 0:18:42.119 --> 0:18:46.160 more resistance and less conductivity, that's an indication that there 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:49.600 could be something that's blocking the signal. That could be 0:18:49.680 --> 0:18:52.880 like a stone wall. So if now, if it's exactly 0:18:52.920 --> 0:18:55.040 what it should be based upon your knowledge of the 0:18:55.080 --> 0:18:57.120 soil in the area, that's an indication that there's nothing 0:18:57.160 --> 0:18:59.000 there and that maybe you don't need to waste your 0:18:59.000 --> 0:19:01.320 time dagging down there, that maybe you need to move 0:19:01.480 --> 0:19:05.160 a hundred feet off to the right or something. So there, 0:19:05.200 --> 0:19:08.080 you know, it's really to kind of establish what is 0:19:08.119 --> 0:19:11.000 a good place to to actually say this is where 0:19:11.000 --> 0:19:16.199 the excavation site is going to be. So uh, it 0:19:16.320 --> 0:19:18.399 is sort of like a male detector. There's another one 0:19:18.440 --> 0:19:22.800 called the electro magnetic conductivity instrument, which is essentially creating 0:19:23.080 --> 0:19:27.280 an electric current in ascending coil. So we've talked about 0:19:27.280 --> 0:19:31.480 this so many times, Lauren. The idea of an electric 0:19:31.520 --> 0:19:35.160 current running through uh, like especially an alternating electric current, 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:38.000 creates a magnetic field, like a fluctuating magnetic field, and 0:19:38.080 --> 0:19:43.440 magnetic fields when uh fluctuating, if they're near a conductor, 0:19:43.720 --> 0:19:47.960 will induce electricity to flow. So that's the general idea. 0:19:48.040 --> 0:19:51.960 You've got this this probe that starts an electric current 0:19:52.080 --> 0:19:56.720 that allows this magnetic field to affect anything that's conductive 0:19:56.720 --> 0:19:59.679 in the area. So if there's something conductive in the soil, 0:20:00.119 --> 0:20:03.000 it'll start to have an electric charge run through it. 0:20:03.119 --> 0:20:06.119 And so by trying to by using an instrument the 0:20:06.160 --> 0:20:09.480 detects an electric charge. You can therefore determine whether or 0:20:09.520 --> 0:20:12.040 not there's something of interest down the soil. Right, So 0:20:12.240 --> 0:20:15.480 that's why this thing is has got a sending coil 0:20:15.560 --> 0:20:18.560 and a receiving coil. The receiving coil is to detect 0:20:18.680 --> 0:20:21.920 any of that other electric charge that might be happening 0:20:21.960 --> 0:20:25.480 in the regions. So it's an interesting approach. It's not 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:30.160 as precise as the resistivity meters, but it is another 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:33.000 kind of approach to similar to that of a metal 0:20:33.040 --> 0:20:35.840 detector um. In fact, I'll go ahead and mention mele detectors. 0:20:35.840 --> 0:20:37.359 We've talked about those before. I think we did a 0:20:37.359 --> 0:20:39.960 full episode of mele detectors, if I'm not mistaken. I 0:20:40.000 --> 0:20:43.880 don't think that we did personally, but perhaps you encristed 0:20:44.000 --> 0:20:47.800 could have been. It might be. It might be you know, 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:50.240 you look like a librarian law and I'm sorry, it's 0:20:50.240 --> 0:20:55.520 just you know. Anyway, So male detectors use electromagnetic induction. 0:20:56.520 --> 0:21:00.640 So that's again a way of detecting con the materials. 0:21:00.640 --> 0:21:03.119 In fact, there are male detectors. They're so sensitive they 0:21:03.160 --> 0:21:07.399 can distinguish between different types of conductive metals. So you 0:21:07.400 --> 0:21:10.640 would be able to tell right away using a male detector, 0:21:10.840 --> 0:21:12.960 assuming it's the right type. I mean, not all male 0:21:13.040 --> 0:21:15.680 detectors are created equally, but assuming it's the right type, 0:21:15.680 --> 0:21:17.440 you would be able to tell very quickly what type 0:21:17.440 --> 0:21:19.440 of metal you are detecting. And if it's a type 0:21:19.440 --> 0:21:23.120