Books by Ralf Vandam
The main goal of my dissertation research was to investigate the diachronic development of the cu... more The main goal of my dissertation research was to investigate the diachronic development of the cultural landscape in the Burdur Plain throughout the Late Prehistory (8000 – 2000 BC). By conducting an intensive survey in the Burdur Plain, which I co-directed, I aimed to contextualize large-sized mound settlements such as Hacılar and Kuruçay Höyük, and to get a more detailed idea of the diverse nature of human activity during the Late Prehistory. The settlement preferences, subsistence, mobility, resource exploitation and interaction networks of these communities were characterized in collaboration with different scholars through GIS-based spatial and statistical analyses, as well as provenance analyses (i.e. petrology and P-XRF) of the newly collected data. Based on these new data I attempted to re-evaluate existing archeological data, and to improve our understanding of the prehistoric societies inhabiting the plain area. Finally, the picture that emerged from the Burdur Plain was situated within a broad archaeological context encompassing Western and Central Turkey and the Aegean.
Journal articles by Ralf Vandam
The Holocene, 2024
Past land-use reconstructions are a key tool for studying long-term human ecodynamics and address... more Past land-use reconstructions are a key tool for studying long-term human ecodynamics and addressing pressing questions about the origins and evolutionary dynamics of the Anthropocene. In particular, agricultural landcover reconstructions are vital for understanding long-term human-environment dynamics. Most past agricultural land-use models, however, rely heavily on modelling assumptions, make limited use of known archaeological site locations to constrain or inform their estimates and tend to be limited to general estimates of percentages of plant types within catchments around pollen trapping lakes. The lack of information outside catchment areas and low spatial resolution even within catchments constrain the utility of these models. To address this problem, we propose a new approach that combines archaeological predictive modelling with pollen-based agricultural landcover reconstructions to produce more accurate, spatially explicit past landcover estimates. Here, we present the results of a case study deploying the new approach to produce improved past landcover maps for a region in the Western Taurus Mountains, southwestern Turkey. The study area surrounds Sagalassos, an antique urban centre with a regional settlement history encompassing nine millennia. We produced five archaeological predictive models for the study region using the ‘Locally Adaptive Models of Archaeological Potential’ (LAMAP) method spanning the Hellenistic through Late Ottoman period. We then combined those predictive surfaces with ‘Regional Estimates of VEgetation Abundance from Large Sites’ (REVEALS) pollen landcover reconstructions for the same periods based on pollen from sediment cores extracted from three catchments within the study area. Lastly, we compared the resulting hybrid landcover models to the archaeological record using data not used to make the predictions. We found that the hybrid landcover model aligned very well with the known extents of agricultural land-use from the study area. These results indicate that the proposed approach is a viable way to combine pollen-based landcover models with archaeological data and produce more accurate, empirically-based landcover reconstructions reflecting real human activity in the past.
The Holocene , 2024
As we stand on the precipice of unprecedented global challenges, understanding the deep-time patt... more As we stand on the precipice of unprecedented global challenges, understanding the deep-time patterns of sustainability and resilience is no longer just a scholarly endeavour but imperative for the future of our planet and its inhabitants. The collection of papers in this special issue brings together archaeologists, historians, and environmental scientists around four main topics: (1) social-ecological modelling, (2) long-term human-environment interactions, (3) modelling diachronic landscapes and (4) sustainability and resilience from past to future. Our aims are to come to a better understanding of socio-economic resilience and sustainability in past, present and future societies. Through interdisciplinary collaboration, we aim to forge new conceptual frameworks for understanding complex, long-term socio-ecological dynamics. Through the case studies, theoretical reflections and methodological innovations presented here, this special issue seeks to advance interdisciplinary scholarship on sustainability and resilience and offer fresh insights into the challenges and opportunities that lie ahead in building a sustainable future.
Near Eastern Archaeology, 2024
The Cypriot Late Bronze Age settlement at DromolaxiaVyzakia, located near the mosque of Hala Sult... more The Cypriot Late Bronze Age settlement at DromolaxiaVyzakia, located near the mosque of Hala Sultan, has been rigorously studied and excavated for more than forty years by the Swedish archaeological expeditions, and since 2001 in cooperation with the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. Excavated contexts and material records suggest the site had its peak during the Late Cypriot IIC up until the Late Cypriot IIIA:2 period (1340–1100 BCE), after which the site went into decline. Systematic excavations revealed a rich and diverse material culture with a multitude of luxurious imported goods from the Eastern Mediterranean region, as well as imported building techniques such as ashlar masonry. During the settlement’s heyday, southeastern Cyprus was dominated by major coastal sites, among which was HST and its fertile and copper-rich hinterland. However, little systematic research has been carried out on this hinterland, hampering broader research on the settlement dynamics, subsistence strategies, and human–environment interactions within southeastern Cyprus. Based on archival sources, site visits, and material studies, it is becoming increasingly clear that the Late Bronze Age settlement systems in southeastern Cyprus were diverse, dynamic, and complex. Furthermore, the HST hinterland possesses great potential to investigate further the human–environment dynamics from a broader, diachronic perspective.
Vergouwen, D., Meganck, M., Degraeve, A., Vandam, R., & Devos, Y. (2024). RETS: een interdisciplinaire studie naar de evolutie van de Zenne in Brussel (Br.). Archaeologia Mediaevalis, 47, 52-54.
While we know that the visualization of quantifiable uncertainty impacts the confidence in insigh... more While we know that the visualization of quantifiable uncertainty impacts the confidence in insights, little is known about whether the same is true for uncertainty that originates from aspects so inherent to the data that they can only be accounted for qualitatively. Being embedded within an archaeological project, we realized how assessing such qualitative uncertainty is crucial in gaining a holistic and accurate understanding of regional spatio-temporal patterns of human settlements over millennia. We therefore investigated the impact of visualizing qualitative implicit errors on the sense-making process via a probe that deliberately represented three distinct implicit errors, i.e. differing collection methods, subjectivity of data interpretations and assumptions on temporal continuity. By analyzing the interactions of 14 archaeologists with different levels of domain expertise, we discovered that novices became more actively aware of typically overlooked data issues and domain experts became more confident of the visualization itself. We observed how participants quoted social factors to alleviate some uncertainty, while in order to minimize it they requested additional contextual breadth or depth of the data. While our visualization did not alleviate all uncertainty, we recognized how it sparked reflective meta-insights regarding methodological directions of the data. We believe our findings inform future visualizations on how to handle the complexity of implicit errors for a range of user typologies and for highly data-critical application domains such as the digital humanities.
Vandam, R., Kaptijn, E. Broothaerts, N., De Cupere, B., Marinova, E., Van Loo, M., Verstraeten, G., Poblome J. 2019. “Marginal” Landscapes: Human Activity, Vulnerability, and Resilience in the Western Taurus Mountains (Southwest Turkey). JEMAHS 7 (4): 432-450. The western Taurus mountains, southwest Turkey, comprise
a diverse set of landscape zones that ar... more The western Taurus mountains, southwest Turkey, comprise
a diverse set of landscape zones that are characterized
by great altitude variations. This article focuses on
the agricultural so-called marginal highlands within this
mountainous region. Large parts of the uplands are labeled
“marginal” nowadays as they are not regarded as highly
productive in terms of agricultural output or permanent
occupation. Three decades of interdisciplinary research
within the Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project (KU
Leuven) have provided an enormous amount of archaeological,
bioarchaeological, and geoarchaeological datasets
that will be brought together in this article to explore diachronic
patterns in human-environmental interactions
within these areas. The study demonstrates not only the
archaeological value of a highland area, but its vulnerability
for human impact as well. The changing environments
both naturally and sociopolitically favored a more resilient
behavior of the human groups within the highlands.
This special issue of JEMAHS originates from a session
at the 2017 European Archaeology Associati... more This special issue of JEMAHS originates from a session
at the 2017 European Archaeology Association (EAA)
conference in Maastricht, the Netherlands, that sought
to reflect critically on the question of marginality across
landscapes and to foster a more explicitly comparative
and empirical approach to using case studies drawn from
the Mediterranean Holocene.
Kuruçay Höyük can be considered a key site for our understanding of Late Prehistory in southwest ... more Kuruçay Höyük can be considered a key site for our understanding of Late Prehistory in southwest Turkey and above all, the poorly known Late Chalcolithic (4200–3100 B.C.). Until now, limited research has been conducted on the relationship between the excavated site and its surrounding. This article discusses the Late Chalcolithic results of an integrated survey in the vicinity of Kuruçay Höyük in the Burdur Plain. Drawing upon these results, this paper illustrates that the site was far from an isolated feature during the 4th millennium B.C. The picture that emerges is one of a differentiated settlement system consisting of both larger höyük/tell settlements (like Kuruçay Höyük) and smaller sized, possibly short-lived, flat settlements. These results are further contextualized within the developments that took place in the region during the Chalcolithic, which seem to have opened the door for communities to become more complex during the Early Bronze Age.
TMA60, 2019
The Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project has a long history of archaeological survey resear... more The Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project has a long history of archaeological survey research that aims to contribute to the project’s mission of documenting the long-term human-environment interactions in its study region (SW Turkey). Over the years, different methodologies, ranging from reconnaissance surveys to intensive tract walking, have been implemented according to the different research questions and scales of examination of our project. In addition, the survey designs had to meet various landscape units of the research area within the Western Taurus Mountains and thus had to deal with different terrain conditions, rates of accessibility and visibility. In this paper we present how we approached the archaeological survey research at Sagalassos and how it developed through time. Via this retrospective view we want to shed light on the merits and shortcomings of our survey research, and what paths we want to set out for our future research.
A short overview (in English/Turkish) of the 2016 Sagalassos Survey Results. For a more comprehen... more A short overview (in English/Turkish) of the 2016 Sagalassos Survey Results. For a more comprehensive overview one is referred to: Vandam, R, Willett, P. and Poblome J. Chapter 15: Living on the margins. First results from the Dereköy Archaeological Survey of the Sagalassos Project in the Western Taurus Mountains. In: Steadman, S.R., McMahon, G. (Eds.), The Archaeology of Anatolia: Recent Discoveries (2014-2016) Vol II, Cambridge Scholar Press, Cambridge. 321-346.
P. Talloen, R. Vandam, M. Broisch, and J. Poblome. 2017. "A Byzantine church discovered in the village of Aǧlasun (Burdur): Some more light on Dark Age Pisidia." Adalya, 20: 375-404, 2017
De Cupere, B., Frémondeau, D., Kaptijn, E., Marinova, E., Poblome, J., Vandam, R., Van Neer, W. (2015). Subsistence economy and land use strategies in the Burdur province (SW Anatolia) from prehistory to the Byzantine period. Quaternary International, art.nr. doi:10.1016/j.quaint.2015.11.097. A reconstruction of the ancient subsistence economy and land use strategies is presented here for... more A reconstruction of the ancient subsistence economy and land use strategies is presented here for the
province of Burdur, more specifically the area south and southeast of Lake Burdur, in southwestern
Turkey. This review is based on the results from archaeozoological (including bone collagen carbon and
nitrogen stable isotope analyses) and archaeobotanical analyses available from seven sites, dated to
distinct time periods ranging from the Neolithic to the Middle Byzantine period. The data (both published
and unpublished) are compiled with information available on settlement development and dynamics,
in the study area. Results show changing agrarian and animal husbandry practices for a period of
more than 8000 years, ranging between self-sustaining economies to specialised husbandry practices
and an intensive agricultural exploitation of the landscape, in relation to human settlement activities.
DE CUPERE, B., FREMONDEAU, D., KAPTIJN, E., MARINOVA, E., POBLOME, J., VANDAM, R., VAN NEER, W. 2015. Subsistence economy and land use strategies in the Burdur province (SW Anatolia) from prehistory to the Byzantine period. Quaternary International 436: 4-17.
The relative importance of deterministic and stochastic processes driving patterns of human settl... more The relative importance of deterministic and stochastic processes driving patterns of human settlement remains controversial. A main reason for this is that disentangling the drivers of distributions and geographic clustering at different spatial scales is not straightforward and powerful analytical toolboxes able to deal with this type of data are largely deficient. Here we use a multivariate statistical framework originally developed in community ecology, to infer the relative importance of spatial and environmental drivers of human settlement. Using Moran’s eigenvector maps and a dataset of spatial variation in a set of relevant environmental variables we applied a variation partitioning procedure based on redundancy analysis models to assess the relative importance of spatial and environmental processes explaining settlement patterns. We applied this method on an archaeological dataset covering a 15 km2 area in SW Turkey spanning a time period of 8000 years from the Late Neolithic/Early Chalcolithic up to the Byzantine period. Variation partitioning revealed both significant unique and commonly explained effects of environmental and spatial variables. Land cover and water availability were the dominant environmental determinants of human settlement throughout the study period, supporting the theory of the presence of farming communities. Spatial clustering was mainly restricted to small spatial scales. Significant spatial clustering independent of environmental gradients was also detected which can be indicative of expansion into unsuitable areas or an unexpected absence in suitable areas which could be caused by dispersal limitation. Integrating historic settlement patterns as additional predictor variables resulted in more explained variation reflecting temporal autocorrelation in settlement locations.
Vandam, R., Kaptijn, E., Poblome, J., Waelkens, M. (2013) The Bronze Age cemetery of Gâvur Evi Tepesi, SW Turkey, Anatolica 39, 241-259 Anatolica no. 39, Aug 2013
During the 2011 Sagalassos project survey, a Bronze Age pithos cemetery was discovered in the vic... more During the 2011 Sagalassos project survey, a Bronze Age pithos cemetery was discovered in the vicinity of the multi-period site of Gâvur Evi Tepesi, in the Burdur Plain, SW Turkey. Despite ongoing quarrying of gravel at the cemetery, several in situ pithoi were found. The following paper is the first report of our work at this cemetery and discusses and contextualizes the findings at Gâvur Evi Tepesi. Furthermore it illustrates how the cemetery belongs to a more widespread tradition attested at similar contemporary cemeteries in Western Anatolia: the deceased were interred in pithoi closed with large stone slabs and oriented to the E/SE. A study of this cemetery suggests that it was used during the Early Bronze Age II (2600-2300 BC) and Middle Bronze Age (2000-1450 BC) since some pithos burials associated with fine ware from both periods were recovered. Six different pithos types were identified ranging from neck pithoi to rib pithoi. In addition, this paper considers the Gâvur Evi Tepesi cemetery and its settlement within the broader Early Bronze Age social landscape of the Burdur Plain. It is clear that in this period this plain witnessed an increase in human settlement density and the development of a distinct settlement pattern: multiple village-type settlements with discrete cemeteries, located close to water and agricultural land. Ultimately, the research in the Burdur Plain faced also problems with regard to the recognition and definition of local EB phases among which the EB III.
Chapters in edited volumes by Ralf Vandam
Bakker, J., Kaptijn, E., Talloen, P., Vandam, R., & Poblome, J. (2024). Sagalassos and Its Environs during Late Roman and Byzantine Times. In A. Izdebski, & J. Preiser-Kapeller (Eds.), A companion to the environmental history of Byzantium (pp. 251-277). (Brill’s Companions to the Byzantine World
Uploads
Books by Ralf Vandam
Journal articles by Ralf Vandam
a diverse set of landscape zones that are characterized
by great altitude variations. This article focuses on
the agricultural so-called marginal highlands within this
mountainous region. Large parts of the uplands are labeled
“marginal” nowadays as they are not regarded as highly
productive in terms of agricultural output or permanent
occupation. Three decades of interdisciplinary research
within the Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project (KU
Leuven) have provided an enormous amount of archaeological,
bioarchaeological, and geoarchaeological datasets
that will be brought together in this article to explore diachronic
patterns in human-environmental interactions
within these areas. The study demonstrates not only the
archaeological value of a highland area, but its vulnerability
for human impact as well. The changing environments
both naturally and sociopolitically favored a more resilient
behavior of the human groups within the highlands.
at the 2017 European Archaeology Association (EAA)
conference in Maastricht, the Netherlands, that sought
to reflect critically on the question of marginality across
landscapes and to foster a more explicitly comparative
and empirical approach to using case studies drawn from
the Mediterranean Holocene.
province of Burdur, more specifically the area south and southeast of Lake Burdur, in southwestern
Turkey. This review is based on the results from archaeozoological (including bone collagen carbon and
nitrogen stable isotope analyses) and archaeobotanical analyses available from seven sites, dated to
distinct time periods ranging from the Neolithic to the Middle Byzantine period. The data (both published
and unpublished) are compiled with information available on settlement development and dynamics,
in the study area. Results show changing agrarian and animal husbandry practices for a period of
more than 8000 years, ranging between self-sustaining economies to specialised husbandry practices
and an intensive agricultural exploitation of the landscape, in relation to human settlement activities.
Chapters in edited volumes by Ralf Vandam
a diverse set of landscape zones that are characterized
by great altitude variations. This article focuses on
the agricultural so-called marginal highlands within this
mountainous region. Large parts of the uplands are labeled
“marginal” nowadays as they are not regarded as highly
productive in terms of agricultural output or permanent
occupation. Three decades of interdisciplinary research
within the Sagalassos Archaeological Research Project (KU
Leuven) have provided an enormous amount of archaeological,
bioarchaeological, and geoarchaeological datasets
that will be brought together in this article to explore diachronic
patterns in human-environmental interactions
within these areas. The study demonstrates not only the
archaeological value of a highland area, but its vulnerability
for human impact as well. The changing environments
both naturally and sociopolitically favored a more resilient
behavior of the human groups within the highlands.
at the 2017 European Archaeology Association (EAA)
conference in Maastricht, the Netherlands, that sought
to reflect critically on the question of marginality across
landscapes and to foster a more explicitly comparative
and empirical approach to using case studies drawn from
the Mediterranean Holocene.
province of Burdur, more specifically the area south and southeast of Lake Burdur, in southwestern
Turkey. This review is based on the results from archaeozoological (including bone collagen carbon and
nitrogen stable isotope analyses) and archaeobotanical analyses available from seven sites, dated to
distinct time periods ranging from the Neolithic to the Middle Byzantine period. The data (both published
and unpublished) are compiled with information available on settlement development and dynamics,
in the study area. Results show changing agrarian and animal husbandry practices for a period of
more than 8000 years, ranging between self-sustaining economies to specialised husbandry practices
and an intensive agricultural exploitation of the landscape, in relation to human settlement activities.
into the way we see the countryside work mainly in
Roman imperial times in the micro-region or study
region of ancient Sagalassos. The archaeological narrative
of our paper is enriched with interdisciplinary
research and insights on different aspects of the
study of this countryside. We would mainly like to
demonstrate that, when it all comes together, reasoning
and results with some historical importance are
within reach.
With ever increasing ubiquity of digital tools and practices, and applications related to data science in archaeology, the organising committee is expecting a prolific event that critically focuses on the theory and practice of digital and quantitative methods in archaeology.
It is with great pleasure that the organising committee can confirm keynote lectures by Prof. Dr. Mark Gillings (University of Leicester) and Prof. Dr. Gary Lock (University of Oxford), two leading scholars in the field of digital archaeology.
The conference will be preceded by a workshop-day on October 28th. Topics for the hands-on workshops are: agent-based modelling in archaeology, spatial databases in archaeology, archaeological linked data and semantic web, and archaeological spatial data visualisations using R.
Registration
The registration form for both the conference and the workshops can be accessed through this link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScZzvYKEnMsMNgjR-UkoTbQRXzVr4lhzUTIdbV_doAFqTSKnA/viewform
Registration for the event is free.
Location
The meeting will take place in the Justus Lipsiuszaal of the Faculty of Arts of the KU Leuven.
Address:
Justus Lipsiuszaal (room: lett. 08.16)
Blijde Inkomststraat 21
3000 Leuven
For further information, see the conference website (http://www.caanlfl.nl/?q=node/69)
We are now accepting paper proposals. More information on www.caanlfl.nl/?q=node/69
This session will bring a critical, comparative, empirical perspective to the question of marginality using case studies from the Mediterranean past. What do we really know about how ‘marginal’ groups lived? Why, and in relation to what, are they considered marginal? If marginality lies at the end of an axis of variation, what defines that axis (e.g. distance, productive output, access to resources etc.). If multiple definitions are possible, do they conflict? Are current definitions or understandings of marginality still relevant or useful? Would they have been recognizable to the people of the past and, if not, is this a problem? What alternatives might be preferable?