New guidance has just been launched – Identifying and Recording Scotland’s Prehistoric Rock Art by Tertia Barnett is a legacy of the Scotland’s Rock Art Project and is a guide describing the techniques for locating, identifying and recording rock art – it is probably aimed more at individuals, community groups, students etc. more than professionals, however, they hope that for those in commercial working across all site types and periods, it may well be a useful refresher.
Historic Environment Scotland are pleased to say it is issued under an OGL license (equivalent to creative commons), so anyone can also host a copy and share however they wish. ( So watch out for it on the BAJR Guides section as well. )
This is the second a new suite of guidance that is being delivered as part of Scotland’s Archaeology Strategy. You may remember the first which came out last year, about lithic scatters, authored by Caroline Wickham-Jones. The Recognition and Investigation of Lithic Scatter Sites in Scotland (historicenvironment.scot) .
The Archaeology Short Guides will be a new series of best practice guides and how-tos on a range of subjects about Scottish Archaeology. You will be aware of Managing Change in the Historic Environment, which these are not intended to replace. Managing change sits under Scottish Planning Policy and HEPS and has a formal status in that regard, and is all about informing changes to the historic environment.
The short guides will be equivalent to the old HS technical advice notices (TAN), if you remember them, and are more guidance about techniques or specialist subject areas in Archaeology.
The next one will be on geoarchaeology. HES are working work very closely with our partners in CIFA and ALGAO on these, so are confident this will be a useful additional suite of guidance which will complement what others in the sector are already doing UK-wide.
Important to note that although hosted and delivered by HES, these are very much a strand of Scotland’s Archaeology Strategy. We hope to get more general info on the guides online soon.
