There is so much to discover in that region. On a geology class field trip, a few hours south of Lima, our instructor stopped and pointed out a mound that would not have caught my eye at all. Then he explained how it makes no sense for a geological feature like that to be there.
It was a covered structure. A Huaca. Lima has quite a few in the middle of the city. A stark reminder that we’ve been there ,intermittently, for millennia.
KurSix 36 days ago [-]
Civilizations rise, fall, and get buried over time, yet traces of them still shape the landscapes we live in today
PyWoody 35 days ago [-]
If you're a New Englander, Tom Wessels has a great series on YouTube on how to read the landscape to track prior use by humans, hurricanes or thunderstorms from hundreds of years ago, animal migrations, etc. in New England. Even if you're not a New Englander, it's really well presented and worth a watch.
Thanks for the recommendation! I'll definitely check out the series. Have you read any of Wessels' books
PyWoody 30 days ago [-]
No, but I know people who have read them and they're highly recommended.
timmg 36 days ago [-]
Have there been any recent books that try to reconstruct what pre-Columbian South America was like?
I know that 1491 was a pretty good book about this. But it's like 20 years old now. And Lidar seems to have really opened up new insights in the past decade or so.
Wow, the site is really well done. I wonder if that is really what things looked like. Things have changed.
newfocogi 36 days ago [-]
Wow! Thank you for posting this. I hope others see it too
thrownblown 36 days ago [-]
Not South America, but the story of Moncacht-Apé (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moncacht-Ap%C3%A9) is a fascinating—if slightly dubious—primary source describing his journey across North America immediately prior to European contact. I found a copy of his account as told to a French colonial officer on Amazon, and it looked like it was printed on a laser printer.
Cabeza de Vaca spent 1528–1536 wandering through the Southwest, living with multiple indigenous tribes. His experiences ranged from enslavement to becoming a medicine man. His firsthand account, Naufragios, is available, but I highly recommend A Land So Strange by Andrés Reséndez for a more accessible read. De Vaca also had a second adventure in South America, but it’s not as well-documented.
Another great read is River of Darkness by Buddy Levy, which covers Francisco Orellana’s journey down the Amazon. His expedition was roughly contemporary to Cabeza de Vaca’s own jungle survival story—though Orellana was a bit more conquistadorial than De Vaca.
I’d also love to see a proper follow-up to 1491 (1493 doesn’t count!). The closest thing we have might be America Before by Graham Hancock, which incorporates recent LiDAR discoveries—but it leans more into speculation than hard archaeology.
dendrite9 35 days ago [-]
I'd be curious about South America as well as North America.
I found Pekka Hämäläinen's Indigenous Continent to be a worthwhile history of North America, although mostly it was focused on events during European exploration of North America with a relatively short initial section about the state of civilization prior to the Spanish arrival.
sampo 36 days ago [-]
There is "America Before: The Key to Earth's Lost Civilization", from 2019 by Graham Hancock. But while Graham Hancock refers to lots of real research, he also mixes in his own unverified ideas and theories. In that sense, Charles C. Mann is a more serious reporter than Hancock.
timmg 36 days ago [-]
Reading the description of that book on Amazon — and skimming some reviews— makes it sound pseudo-science-y.
36 days ago [-]
RajT88 36 days ago [-]
> Chupacigarro
I love it when a plan comes together.
rburhum 36 days ago [-]
Most people will not understand how awesome your comment is, and if I could, I would triple vote you up.
gambiting 35 days ago [-]
Can you explain it for those of us who don't understand the reference?
barnickel 35 days ago [-]
Look up When a plan comes together meme. Chupacigarro translates to puffing on a cigar.
vincentpants 36 days ago [-]
I will assist in your endeavour. Art must be preserved!
vincentpants 36 days ago [-]
I had trouble writing this sentence due to all the laughing. Bravo.
folli 36 days ago [-]
Has anyone worked on AI/ML approaches for detecting ancient structures in LiDAR data?
Given that training data for identifying remnants of man-made structures (e.g., Roman or medieval ruins) is quite sparse, how would you approach this problem?
Some initial thoughts:
- Data Augmentation: Using synthetic or simulated LiDAR data from known structures to improve training.
- Few-Shot Learning / Transfer Learning: Training models on better-documented archaeological sites and applying them to new areas.
Would love to hear thoughts from people with experience in remote sensing, computer vision, or archaeology!
archaeoscape 36 days ago [-]
We work on exactly that, in application to ancient Khmer civilization (9th to 15th century). In fact, data is not that sparse, but it's hard to get it. Archaeologists just don't share data as much.
The basic answer is that you have to have at least some data to be able to do anything.
We found that in the data regime augmentation works a little bit, transfer learning much less so. What really works is simply sitting down and annotating the data, with on-the-ground surveys and follows ups.
folli 35 days ago [-]
Anything you can share? Papers? Examples?
archaeoscape 33 days ago [-]
Sure, you can check our paper where we describe the data scarcity issue, propose a dataset and some baselines: https://arxiv.org/abs/2412.05203
Here's also an interesting LiDAR segmentation paper for Maya settlements. Smaller scale, but you can see what people are trying: https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.03163
Here's another curious recent LiDAR paper, no computer vision, but shows the importance of the proper data processsing:
Auld-Thomas L, Canuto MA, Morlet AV, et al. Running out of empty space: environmental lidar and the crowded ancient landscape of Campeche, Mexico. Antiquity. 2024;98(401):1340-1358. doi:10.15184/aqy.2024.148
stevage 36 days ago [-]
Huh, I had not heard of Caral. This culture is apparently much older than the Incas. Like, 2000 BC rather than 1500 AD.
KurSix 36 days ago [-]
The fact that a pyramid was hidden for so long, just a kilometer from Caral, makes you wonder what else might still be buried in the region
lofaszvanitt 35 days ago [-]
alien fortresses under our nose :)
KurSix 32 days ago [-]
Jokes aside, it's wild how much history is still hidden beneath the surface
Rendered at 20:01:28 GMT+0000 (Coordinated Universal Time) with Vercel.
It was a covered structure. A Huaca. Lima has quite a few in the middle of the city. A stark reminder that we’ve been there ,intermittently, for millennia.
Tom Wessels: Reading the Forested Landscape
[Part 1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zcLQz-oR6sw
[Part 2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L81Ihhqe0gY
[Part 3] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tEAfFq3gb30
I know that 1491 was a pretty good book about this. But it's like 20 years old now. And Lidar seems to have really opened up new insights in the past decade or so.
Cabeza de Vaca spent 1528–1536 wandering through the Southwest, living with multiple indigenous tribes. His experiences ranged from enslavement to becoming a medicine man. His firsthand account, Naufragios, is available, but I highly recommend A Land So Strange by Andrés Reséndez for a more accessible read. De Vaca also had a second adventure in South America, but it’s not as well-documented.
Another great read is River of Darkness by Buddy Levy, which covers Francisco Orellana’s journey down the Amazon. His expedition was roughly contemporary to Cabeza de Vaca’s own jungle survival story—though Orellana was a bit more conquistadorial than De Vaca.
I’d also love to see a proper follow-up to 1491 (1493 doesn’t count!). The closest thing we have might be America Before by Graham Hancock, which incorporates recent LiDAR discoveries—but it leans more into speculation than hard archaeology.
I found Pekka Hämäläinen's Indigenous Continent to be a worthwhile history of North America, although mostly it was focused on events during European exploration of North America with a relatively short initial section about the state of civilization prior to the Spanish arrival.
I love it when a plan comes together.
Some initial thoughts:
- Data Augmentation: Using synthetic or simulated LiDAR data from known structures to improve training. - Few-Shot Learning / Transfer Learning: Training models on better-documented archaeological sites and applying them to new areas.
Would love to hear thoughts from people with experience in remote sensing, computer vision, or archaeology!
The basic answer is that you have to have at least some data to be able to do anything. We found that in the data regime augmentation works a little bit, transfer learning much less so. What really works is simply sitting down and annotating the data, with on-the-ground surveys and follows ups.
Here's also an interesting LiDAR segmentation paper for Maya settlements. Smaller scale, but you can see what people are trying: https://arxiv.org/abs/2208.03163
Here's another curious recent LiDAR paper, no computer vision, but shows the importance of the proper data processsing:
Auld-Thomas L, Canuto MA, Morlet AV, et al. Running out of empty space: environmental lidar and the crowded ancient landscape of Campeche, Mexico. Antiquity. 2024;98(401):1340-1358. doi:10.15184/aqy.2024.148