![Sample our Museum and Heritage Studies journals, sign in here to start your FREE access for 14 days]({"type":"image" , "src" : "/sda/5945/TOC-Subject-Sample-2021-Museum-Heritage-Studies.jpg"})
Abstract
This paper will present research on the vulnerability mapping of coastal archaeological sites currently being undertaken in Northern Ireland. The ultimate aim of this research is improve current predictions of where archaeological sites and landscapes will be at risk in the future from coastal erosion. The initial stage of this approach uses a suite of oblique aerial photographs to construct a baseline of eroding locations and coastal geomorphology. The erosion baseline can then be integrated with existing historic environment records to obtain a coarse first-pass archaeological vulnerability assessment. Subsequent stages can then use this assessment to prioritize future mitigation such as field surveys or monitoring exercises, or conduct further refinements of vulnerability classifications by incorporating information on site type and positioning on a local scale.
Acknowledgements
This work was funded by the Northern Ireland Environment Agency, and carried out at the Centre for Maritime Archaeology, Ulster University. We would like to express our thanks to colleagues at both institutions for their advice and support; in particular Rhonda Robinson, John O’Keefe, Colin Breen, Tom McErlean, and Brian Williams. We are also grateful to Prof. Andrew Cooper for his insightful comments on the manuscript. All map data used for this study is from Land & Property Services and was supplied under the Northern Ireland Mapping Agreement. All HER datasets were provided courtesy of NIEA: Historic Environment division.
Notes
1. Numerical predictions, maps and graphs are accessible via the online UKCP09 user interface data portal: <http://ukclimateprojections-ui.defra.gov.uk/ui/start/start.php> [accessed 31 October 2013].
2. See Eurosion website at: <http://www.eurosion.org/> [accessed 31 October 2013].