Design and Implementation of a GIS for Archaeological Legacy Data: the Monastery of San Severo in Classe

The digital component is acquiring an increasingly prominent role in the archaeological framework. In this context, the operation of standardisation of heterogeneous legacy data - collected in several years and using different tolls and techniques – constitutes a crucial step in the preservation of archaeological datasets that would be, otherwise, progressively lost. The thesis aims to critically discuss the series of workflows developed for the implementation of a GIS with the excavation datasets related to the archaeological site of the Monastery of San Severo in Classe (Ravenna, Italy). The heterogeneous dataset has been collected in several campaigns, spanning from 2007 to 2015. The main purpose of the project is to obtain a GIS conceived as a supporting tool for archaeological research, in which fieldwork activities continue to play a central role. The digitisation work involved the integration of stratigraphic units (SU) plans, topographic datums, excavation annual reports and SU records. Approximately 2,000 cartographic acquisitions have been entered within the GIS and divided into different layers, according to their typology – positive SU, negative SU, characterization markers. The spatial information has been integrated, within the different attribute tables, with descriptive information from excavation records and post-excavation phases and chronological interpretations. The GIS developed allows to cross-reference spatial data with descriptive and interpretative attributes, providing a valuable tool for exploring diachronic interpretations and further archaeological analyses. Therefore, SV_GIS_2024 project can be conceived as a dynamic and open-ended research tool, a “critical lens” through which the history of the excavation itself, and not only of the archaeological context, can be examined and furtherly implemented. The system has been designed to accommodate future developments, like 2.5 approaches and fully three-dimensional GIS environments.