Description

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In England, more archaeological sites are discovered every year through the study of aerial photographs than by any other method. New reconnaissance flights continue to discover previously unknown traces of the past, while the study of historic photographs held in archives records even more. This book begins by telling the story of the first aerial photographs of an archaeological monument to be taken in this country. However, when a military balloon rose above Stonehenge in September 1906, aerial photography was already almost half a century old, and people had been flying since the late 18th century. The first half of the book tells the story of the balloonist-adventurers who first experienced the landscape from above and who pioneered the use of the airborne camera. The second half begins with the First World War, explaining the development of aerial survey on the Western Front and the subsequent adoption of these survey techniques by archaeologists. The book describes some of the key individuals and discoveries of the inter-war years, and outlines the role that many well-known archaeologists played as military air-photo interpreters during the Second World War. The book includes nearly 200 colour and black-and-white photographs and other images, ranging from the earliest known painted representation of the view from a balloon, some of the earliest images taken with cameras from balloons, and intriguing photographs from the Boer War as well as the First World War, in addition to a wide range of shots of archaeological sites from 1906 to the 21st century.

About the Author

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Martyn Barber is a Senior Investigator, Aerial Survey & Investigation at Historic England. He is the author of Bronze and the Bronze Age (2003), and co-author of The Neolithic Flint Mines of England (1999) and The Creation of Monuments (2001).