Rescue archaeology in the sultanate of Oman: methods and solution strategies

This paper aims at presenting the results of the topographic fieldwork of a team of professional archaeologists invited by the Ministry of Heritage and Culture of the Sultanate of Oman to excavate and survey three graveyards in the area of Sohar (Falaji as Souq, Wadi al Arad and Liwa) in 2014 and 2015. The construction of the Batinah Express Highway would have led to the destruction of hundreds of burial mounds, therefore the team developed a quick and accurate surveying strategy to document them properly: after a first “test” campaign using monoscopic photogrammetry, the team opted for 3D SfM photogrammetry using a completely open source workflow. This workflow required two surveyors on the field and in the IT lab to ensure the archaeologists updated orthophotos and to update the 2D and 3D vector plans. To manage the huge mass of data coming from the field the team opted for QGIS and the plugin PyArchInit. The mix of surveying methodology and managing system developed on site allowed the team to document the numerous Stratigraphic Units produced during the excavation of hundreds of graves, and also proved to be very helpful as hermeneutic tool as shown in the case of the excavation of Grave 21.