Interactive virtual archaeology: Constructing the prehistoric past at Avebury henge

Falconer, Liz

Abstract

— Avebury Henge is situated approximately 20 miles north of Stonehenge in Wiltshire, U.K. and contains the largest known Neolithic stone circle in Europe. It is part of the Avebury, Stonehenge and Associated Sites World Heritage Site but is less well-known than Stonehenge, despite being an impressive monument with a ditch and bank system more than 400m in diameter. In the past 20 years or so many computer-based simulations of archaeological sites around the world have been created, but many of these digital reconstructions lack both the ability to enable personal presence of the user in the virtual landscape itself, and the facility for users to interact with others and the virtual environment around them in real time. The project described in this paper aims to research the issues of presence and interaction in virtually reconstructed ancient landscapes through a reconstruction of Avebury Henge in a virtual world environment, as it might have been circa 2,300 BCE. This paper describes and evaluates the construction phase of the project in a virtual world environment.

• Presentation Conference Type: Conference Paper (unpublished)
• Conference Name: Virtual Environments and Advanced Interfaces Workshop at IUCC 2016
• Start Date: Dec 14, 2016
• End Date: Dec 16, 2016
• Acceptance Date: Sep 3, 2016
• Publication Date: Jan 23, 2017
• Deposit Date: Sep 19, 2016
• Publicly Available Date: Apr 25, 2017
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• ISBN: 9781509055661
• Keywords: virtual worlds, Avebury, heritage, virtual archaeology, technology enhanced learning
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/899682
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1109/IUCC-CSS.2016.029
• Additional Information: Additional Information : © 2017 IEEE. Personal use of this material is permitted. Permission from IEEE must be obtained for all other uses, in any current or future media, including reprinting/republishing this material for advertising or promotional purposes, creating new collective works, for resale or redistribution to servers or lists, or reuse of any copyrighted component of this work in other works.; Title of Conference or Conference Proceedings : International Conference on Ubiquitous Computing and Communications 2016
• Contract Date: Sep 19, 2016