Google helps discover Roman villa
Luca Mori, an Italian systems analyst who blogs, used Google Earth Maps to rummage around his village of Sorbolo, near Parma (near Bologna). He thought he saw "anomalies." For the duration of August he measured them, explored them, asked around, and eventually called up professional archeologists.
As they do in Italy, the archeologists had a look, only to find a previously undiscovered Roman villa! Luca has now made it to Italian television news, he writes.
All this is in Italian, but he has numerous posts over the past month detailing his search, including one with a map detailing the "anomalies".
Bravo.
(Via Intempestiva, who first saw it on TV.)
[Update 15.44 UTC: Being in a bit of a rush earlier, I forgot to add the big picture: This is what you get when you twin deep local knowledge with democratized geographic tools. Anybody else flying over that region would have assumed there was a known local explanation for the anomaly, but it took Luca to know there wasn't.]
Permalink |
Del.icio.us
|
Connotea
Comments
Ehi Thanks!
8)
Posted by: intempestiva at 12:45 UTC, September 07, 2005
Not sure why you struck out "Earth". I looked at his blog and he says "especialmente con Google Earth".
Posted by: Frank Taylor at 16:55 UTC, September 07, 2005
Indeed, he wrote that you can see it "especially well with Google Earth," and that's true, though earlier he writes that he first saw the anomaly using Google Maps "on my trusty Mac" ('il mio fido Mac'). So he discovered it on a Mac using Maps..! Intempestiva also refers to the post mentioning Google Earth, which is why I first thought it was a pure Google Earth play.
Of course, in most areas the image resolution is the same, though you can get closer in Earth than in Maps.
Posted by: Stefan Geens at 17:10 UTC, September 07, 2005
Your remark about democratized geographic tools opening new opportunities... There was a much commented Wired article in August about the past, present and future of the web in which the author, Kevin Kelly, mentions several mapping and locative marvels of the web (as of today) to emphasize the potential that lies ahead (I tried to summarize them here). One of his conclusions: Cartography has gone from spectator art to participatory democracy.
Posted by: Luistxo at 13:39 UTC, September 12, 2005
You can easily add a comment balloon to appear like this
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=44.8819,10.4224+(roman+villa)&spn=0.026288,0.059197&t=k&hl=en
The easiest way is to:
1) Double click the map to center your clicked position. then
2) Click on the EMAIL link to open your email client.
3) Find the Longitude and Lattitude numbers in the text.
it will look something like this
...44.8819%2c10.4224...
4) Change the %2c to a comma ' , '
so it looks like this
44.8819,10.4224
5) Copy and Paste the coordinates into the Google Maps search box.
6) Also in the Google Maps Search box type the text you want displayed in parentheses after the coordinates, like this {no quotes}:
" 44.8819,10.4224 (Roman Villa) "
7) Hit Enter, and ... Viola!
Now, Change the text and change the balloon message.
You MUST have some coordinates, or the text balloon will not take.
Posted by: CV at 19:26 UTC, September 15, 2005
CV, you can also use the Tagzania link I made in the body text. Tagzania gives the process you describe an intuitive GUI, and throws in some tags and feeds for nothing:-)
Posted by: Stefan Geens at 22:32 UTC, September 15, 2005
Luca Mori's CyberArchaeologist.net closes today.
8(
Posted by: intempestiva at 21:13 UTC, September 15, 2006
Post a comment
Blogs linking in
Ogle Earth: Recent posts
Ogle Earth's links
Archives
Movable Type 3.2