Introduction#
Informing the Future of the Past: Guidelines for Historic Environment Records (second edition)#
Edited by Paul Gilman and Martin Newman
Published by English Heritage at the National Monuments Record Centre, Kemble, Drive, Swindon, SN2 2GZ.
ISBN forthcoming
©English Heritage 2007
All figures unless specified are © English Heritage. Applications for the Reproduction of images should be made to the National Monuments Record.
We gratefully acknowledge permission from the following organisations to reproduce information and illustrations:
Aberdeenshire Council, figures 57 & 58; Archaeology Data Service, figures 19 & 27; Buckinghamshire County Council, figure 56; Central Counties Air Operations Unit, figure 11; Clwyd-Powys Archaeological Trust, figure 35; Cornwall County Council, figures: 48, 49 & 52; Essex County Council, figures: 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 39, 44, 45 & 55; exeGesIS SDM Ltd. figures: 15, 16, 17, 20, 21, 23, 24, 26 & 53; Hampshire County Council, figurer 42; Hertfordshire County Council, figures: 51 & 55; Historic Scotland, figure 68; Land Management Information System, figure 54; National Trust, figure 26; North Yorkshire County Council, figurers 23 & 24; Peterborough City Council, figure 59; Royal Commission on the Ancient and Historic Monuments of Scotland, figures: 50, 66, 67 & 68; Somerset County Council, figures: 60, 61, 62, 63, 64, 65 & 69; University of St Andrews, figures: 36, 37 & 38; West of Scotland Archaeology Service, figures 28 & 29; Worcestershire County Council, figures: 11, 12, 13, 30, 31, 32, 33 & 34.
Figures 11, 12, 13, 28, 29, 30, 32, 33, 34, 42, 44, 45, 48, 49 , 50 , 51, 52, 55, 56, 57,58, 59 62, 66, 67, 68 & 69 are based on OS maps with the permission of Ordnance Survey on behalf of Her Majesty’s Stationary Office ©Crown copyright. All Rights reserved. Figures 32, 33 & 34 are based on British Geological Survey (BGS) data by Worcestershire County Council, BGS Digital License 2001/125. 2007. Unauthorised reproduction infringes Crown copyright and may lead to prosecution or civil proceedings. OS licence numbers for each organisation basing a figure on an OS map are given in the caption for the image.
English Heritage is the Government’s Statutory adviser on all aspects of the historic environment. The National Monuments Record is the public archive of English Heritage.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
A CIP catalogue record for this book will be available from the British Library
All rights Reserved
No part of this publication may be reproduced or translated in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording or any information storage and retrieval system without permission in writing from the publisher. HER Managers may photocopy this document or store an electronic copy for use within the HER.
Front cover designed by Agnes Bell. Website designed by Bruce Howard.
Cover: Moel Arthur Iron Age hillfort, Flintshire, ©Clywd Powys Archaeological Trust 84-c-0274; Fire in Park Quadrant, Glasgow in 2006, ©Crown Copyright: RCAHMS DP 009620; Shipwreck on coastline, Saltwick Bay, North Yorkshire, ©English Heritage Photo Library K020590; Archaeology, Ashby De La Zouch Castle, Leicestershire, © English Heritage Photo Library N060476.
List of Figures
Figure no. Caption
A
1
The HER 'wheel' drives and is powered by an integrated approach to conservation and understanding of the historic environment
2
Designated wreck sites (February 2005)
3
HERs and other records
B
4
Information management cycle
5
The logo for the Forum on Information Standards in Heritage
6
The logo of MIDAS, the national data standard for the content of historic environment records.
7
The logo for the INSCRIPTION terminology standard web pages
8
A sample screenshot from the INSCRIPTION web page
9
The FISH web site www.fish-forum.info is the starting point for finding out about data standards for the historic environment
C
10
The event-monument-source data model
11
Throckmorton known archaeological sites prior to the 2001 Foot and Mouth epidemic
12
Placename evidence from 1774 Throckmorton Enclosure map
13
Throckmorton events undertaken as part of Foot and Mouth mitigation
14
Relationships between monument records.
15
The monument record for the chapter house at Waltham Abbey displayed in exeGesIS SDM Ltd's SMR software.
16
Indexing monument records using the Thesaurus of Monument Types and other terminology lists in exeGesiS SDM Ltd's SMR software.
17
Creating links between a monument record and associated people and events in exeGesIS SDM Ltd's SMR software.
18
A report showing a monument record in the Essex Heritage Conservation Record.
19
Example of a project summary page from the OASIS form
20
How an event may be recorded in an HER database
21
A typical source recorded in exeGesIS SDM Ltd’s HBSMR software
22
Consultation and conservation advice
23
A typical consultation record from the North Yorkshire County Council HER showing the details tab.
24
A typical consultation record from the North Yorkshire County Council HER showing the consultation Stages tab and the link to the related event record.
25
Monument management process
26
Successive monument monitoring reports as recorded in the National Trust SMR
D
27
ADS web page – Excavation Index
28
WoSAS Events 1: An example of an archaeological evaluation specified to trench level, derived from contractor supplied data.
29
WoSAS Events 2: The event record for the heart of medieval Glasgow showing numerous events as points and polygons.
30
Elmley Castle Tithe map displaying apportionment details for land use
31
3D historic reconstruction of Elmley Castle using the digital tithe map
32
Date ranges of Worcestershire's Quaternary geology
33
Type sites selected for the Worcestershire Palaeolithic HER
34
HER data overlain on terrace deposits displayed by period
35
Maes Mochnant Standing Stone, Powys.
36 NoSAS members surveying at Loch Hourn
37
Clyne Heritage Society members working at an eroding structure on the
beach at Brora, Sutherland
38
Unst Heritage Society surveying an eroding prehistoric mound in Shetland
E
39
Using three dimensional modelling in GIS to examine sites in their landscape setting
40
Representing the location of a heritage object within a 'virtual space'.
41
Representing the approximate location of a heritage object as a fuzzy boundary.
42
A GIS generated map showing Bronze Age barrows over Landscape Types and rivers in Hampshire
43
Relationships between HER text databases and GIS in text
44
A GIS layer showing the use of polygons to show the extent of the early 19th-century defences at Chelmsford.
45
Great Chesterford scheduled area
46
Examples of layers in a GIS
47
A new GIS layer: archaeological sites on arable land
48
The first HLC in England – carried out in Cornwall
49
A selected area of the HLC for Cornwall
50
HLAMAP – HLA as applied in Scotland (from the RCAHMS website).
51
A screen capture from GIS - Illustrating the more detailed HLC study of field boundaries in an area just north of Harlow, which is one of the mineral study areas in Hertfordshire. The thick grey lines represent modern OS mapping of surviving boundaries, whereas the various superimposed coloured lines reflect different periods of historic mapping, such as Estate, Tithe and Enclosure maps. This illustrates the degree of boundary loss and change through the past two centuries. This will enable dating of surviving field boundaries or sections thereof for future land management.
52
Urban HLC as applied in St Austell Cornwall
53
A screen capture of the HBSMR Help manual – this approach embeds the HLC within the HER.
54
Entry Level Scheme for CAP reforms
55
HLC Sensitivity Zones Map from the LCS-M11 Study
56
Illustrating some of the outputs from the MKSM study
57
HLA overlay showing a Designed Landscape.
58
SMR overlay showing same Designed Landscape as an archaeological site.
F
59
The distribution of certain categories of HER information is often more readily understood when seen in the context of ancient topography, such as this interpretative map of part of the Neolithic fenland environment.
60
Some of the publicity material produced for the HER outreach Programme.
61
Professor Mick Aston, Somerset’s first County Archaeologist, launching the website at the County Museum, Taunton Castle on 30th September 2003.
62
An example of the map page of the website, showing Bronze Age barrows in the parish of Priddy, Somerset.
63
One of the one day drop in exhibition/demonstrations of the online Historic Environment Record
64
Rachel Shaw, Education Consultant giving a talk on using the HER website to local school children, many of whom were far more adept at picking it up than most of the adults.
65
Taking a local school on an historic walk around their village based on HER information. This is the starting point of a planned local studies project for next term.
66
Sample NMRS record viewed through CANMORE
67
Site selection using a web-GIS browser: the RCAHMS CANMAP
68
Completed search on PASTMAP with map report on selected records.
69
Example Record Page from Somerset HER.
