Archaeological Prospecting Using High-Resolution Digital Satellite Imagery: Recent Advances and Future Prospects - A Session Held at the Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology

Introduction Over the last few years, a new generation of satellite sensors has provided an unprecedented variety of remotely sensed imagery with a spatial resolution of 1 m and better. These images allow for the first time even small archaeological sites and features to be detected, which is a huge step forward for archaeological prospection: “For three decades archaeologists have waited for a high-resolution satellite capability and the arrival of satellites such as Ikonos and QuickBird signals a new era in research.“ (Hung 2006: 680). Since about 2004, when the 1 International Conference on Remote Sensing Archaeology was organised by the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing, specific conferences have helped to promote research in this new scientific domain. These include the 2 and 3 International Conferences on Remote Sensing Archaeology in Rome (2006) and Tiruchirappalli (2009), the 1 International Workshop on Advances in Remote Sensing for Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Management in Rome (October 2008), the DECARS meeting in Amsterdam in April 2009, as well as special sessions at AARG, CAA, ISPRS, CIPA, SPIE and other conferences.