Archaeological data. What do we do with it all? In Aotearoa, such data is typically recovered as a result of the archaeological authority process, which is administered by Heritage New Zealand Pouhere Taonga (HNZPT). Archaeological sites are protected by legislation because they’re a public good – a significant and irreplaceable source of information about our past. As such, not only does the legislation protect archaeological sites, it facilitates the recovery of information from archaeological sites that are going to be damaged or modified. It does not, however, protect the data recovered and nor does it fully protect the material recovered. And while the results of archaeological investigations are made available through archaeological reports, these aren’t particularly accessible to the general public and are, necessarily, site specific. They don’t synthesise data, they don’t generally seek to answer big picture questions and the data contained in them is essentially locked in a pdf. Yet such synthesis and analysis are some of what is required to truly realise the public good of archaeological investigations.
Christchurch Archaeology Project was born out of these concerns, specifically as they relate to Ōtautahi Christchurch and the large quantities of archaeological data generated as a result of the Canterbury earthquakes of 2010 and 2011. The volume of archaeological work during this period was unprecedented, with almost 4000 earthquake archaeological authorities issued and close to a million artefact fragments recovered. The resulting archaeological archive (that is, the physical materials recovered from archaeological sites and the associated archaeological and historical data) is a unique window into Canterbury’s past, with the potential to provide significant insights into Christchurch’s story. But the form of the archive, scattered across disparate physical and digital locations, made this nigh on impossible. To solve this problem, to make the data accessible and to enable a whole range of people to explore Ōtautahi’s past, we established the Museum of Archaeology Ōtautahi (MoAŌ).
MoAŌ is an online database of archaeological material, providing access to archaeological data through two interfaces. We think of these as a public interface and a researcher interface, but the reality is that both are freely available to all, although the researcher interface requires users to sign up and have login details. The public interface contains a curated subset of the data, including basic information about archaeological sites (the location, the site type, the period of occupation), archaeological features (again, type and period of use) and artefacts. There’s also historical information about the people and organisations associated with each site and/or feature, and it’s possible to follow the connections between these people, organisations and places. We’ve tried to make this data as user-friendly and image-rich as possible, to ensure that it’s engaging, and to facilitate artefact identification. The public interface is searchable using a range of categories but there is, as yet, no map to facilitate searching.
The researcher interface presents all of the data, essentially in a warts and all fashion. This data is drawn directly from the spreadsheets used to upload the data to MoAŌ. It includes everything from the archaeological authority number, when the archaeological work took place, the dimensions of each feature, the site’s stratigraphy and all of the nitty-gritty details of the artefact analysis. There are no images in the researcher interface. The data is presented in spreadsheet format, and can be filtered and exported. The latter functionality allows the researcher to manipulate and analyse the data for their own purposes.
MoAŌ is still very much a work in progress. To date, we have entered data from 356 projects. This encompasses 470 archaeological sites, 2345 people and over 19,000 artefacts. There’s still a lot more to go. Further, this data only relates to European archaeological sites, and only those sites with below ground archaeology. Consultation with the relevant Ngāi Tahu papatipu rūnanga is required before data from sites of interest to Māori can be entered, and this is about to get underway. Work to enter the first buildings archaeology is also in progress. In addition, the historical data in MoAŌ is in many ways incomplete: all the data currently in MoAŌ was extracted from final reports, with no additional research or analysis undertaken. As such, the information in MoAŌ about any given individual is only that which was in the report. Often, this is little more than a name. Nor are there images for all artefacts or sites. Finally, in terms of data entry, work is underway with Underground Overground Archaeology to establish a process whereby they enter data into MoAŌ as reports and projects are completed. Not only is there more data entry to be done, the website itself requires enhancements and refinements (including the aforementioned map). So, yes, more funding is required…
The initial database build, construction and data entry was funded by a grant from Manatū Taonga Ministry for Culture and Heritage. The database and website were built by local Christchurch firm Intranel and the database was designed by Great Scott, another Christchurch business. The data entry was carried out by our data entry team of Ebony Pike, Madison Gamble, Sam Wallis and Sayali Sangamnerkar. We’re very grateful for the generous support and tireless efforts of these people and organisations, without whom establishing MoAŌ would not have been possible.
