An early geophysical survey at Williamsburg, USA

✍ Scribed by Bruce W. Bevan

• Publisher: John Wiley and Sons
• Year: 2000
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 175 KB
• Volume: 7
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 1075-2196
• DOI: 10.1002/(sici)1099-0763(200001/03)7:1<51::aid-arp128>3.0.co;2-i

✦ Synopsis

The first known geophysical survey for an archaeological application on the American continents was carried out in 1938. An equipotential map was measured at the historic site of Colonial Williamsburg, in the USA. This type of survey is similar to a resistivity survey, and it located a high resistivity feature within a churchyard. The survey was designed to locate a stone vault buried below that churchyard; however, the geophysical anomaly was caused by a natural soil contrast.