Participants:

Joan Damkjar , Provincial Museum of Alberta, Canada
Bernice Field, Ontario Ministry Culture & Communications, Canada
Jack Foster, British Columbia Ministry of Tourism, Canada
Dominique Guillot, Ministère de la Culture, France
Henrik Jarl Hansen, National Museum of Denmark,
Roger Leech, Royal Commission on Historical Monuments, England
Judith Marsh, Department of Communications, Canada
Irina Oberlander-Tarnoveanu, Informatics Center for Cultural Memory, Romania
Pat Young, Canadian Heritage Information Network, Canada

The CIDOC Archaeological Sites Working Group met for the first time on September 22, 1992 in Québec City, Québec, Canada.

The group elected a smaller executive board to consist of Roger Leech (chairman), Judy Marsh (secretary), Irina Oberlander-Tarnoveanu, Henrik Hansen and Dominique Guillot (who agreed to prepare the French language version of the group’s papers). Roger Leech reported on the documentation work being undertaken through the Council of Europe. It was agreed that the group’s work should be undertaken where possible in collaboration or liaison with other interested international bodies, including ICOMOS, the Council of Europe, the Getty Trust and the EURARCH project. (The CIDOC board subsequently agreed to this, on September 27, 1992).

It was agreed that the documentation work of the Archaeological Sites Working Group would be directed at the following objectives:

To facilitate communications between national and international bodies responsible for the recording and protection of the archaeological heritage.

To assist countries at an early stage in developing record systems for the recording and protection of the archaeological heritage.

To facilitate research using archaeological site data where there is an international dimension.

The planning of the programme for the group formed the major topic for the meeting. From a lengthy round table discussion, there emerged the following draft programme:

The preparation of a directory of national archaeological records (regional ones to be included where no national record exists), to be undertaken first for Europe and North America. To be completed before September 1993.

The identification of a basic international standard for archaeological site records. To be completed before September 1994.

The commencement of a multilingual glossary for selected key areas of controlled vocabulary within the core or basic data standards. To be completed before the ICOM meeting in July 1995 (the first stage in this project will be the collection of information on existing glossaries and thesauri).

To ensure the completion of these projects, the following actions were agreed upon:

Roger Leech will circulate, before the end of October 1992, details of the questionnaire used by the Council of Europe for the architectural documentation work. The questionnaire to be used by the archaeology working group will then be agreed upon by the executive and circulated to Europe by Roger Leech and to North America and by Judy Marsh and Pat Young. As a secondary stage, the questionnaire will be circulated to Africa, Asia, South America and Australia.

For the preparation of the core data standard, Jack Foster will complete a preliminary draft by February 1993. Roger Leech will provide Jack Foster with information on European core data work, including that on bibliographic standards, by end of October 1992. For the work on controlled vocabulary, Irina Oberlander-Tarnoveanu will prepare a paper for our April meeting in Stoke on Trent, summarizing further thoughts based on discussions and on the results of the directory questionnaire.

The group agreed to plan for two meetings in addition to those of CIDOC. The first will coincide with the Computer Applications in Archaeology meetings in Stoke on Trent, England, from April 5- 8, 1993. The second will coincide with the CIDOC meeting in Washington in the spring of 1994.

Names and addresses of all people who indicated an interest in the group, in addition to those who attended the meeting, were circulated and a mailing list will be generated by Judy Marsh. The minutes will be circulated by end of October 1993.