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– Resistance and magnetic mapping, ERTs and aerial photography put together. – Fusion was attempted through curvelet transform. – The useful information of all methods is given in a combined image at the site of Philippi in Greece.

– We use a new approach to combine magnetic and electrical geophysical data from two different archaeological areas in Greece (Europos & Doriskos). – Using the curvelet transform we express the feature of the images as a function of spatial coordinates, scale, and orientation. – A combined image is created in the curvelet domain through the objective selection of the most salient features. – The results show several potential archaeological structures.

In this article we provide a preliminary report of the work carried out between 2010 and 2012 as part of the Makrakomi Archaeological Landscapes Project (MALP). The programme of research is carried out in co-operation between the Swedish Institute at Athens and the 14th Ephorate of Prehistoric and Classical Antiquities at Lamia. The interdisciplinary project started in the summer of 2010, when a pilot survey was conducted in and around the hill of Profitis Elias, in the modern municipality of Makrakomi, where extensive traces of ancient fortifications are still visible. Systematic investigations have been conducted since 2011 as part of a five-year plan of research involving surface survey, geophysical survey and small-scale archaeological excavation as well as geomorphological investigation. The primary aim of MALP is to examine the archaeology and geomorphology of the western Spercheios Valley, within the modern municipality of Makrakomi in order to achieve a better understanding of antiquity in the region, which has previously received scant scholarly attention. Through the archaeological surface survey and architectural survey in 2011 and 2012 we have been able to record traces of what can be termed as a nucleated and structured settlement in an area known locally as Asteria, which is formed by the projecting ridges to the east of Profitis Elias. The surface scatters recorded in this area suggest that the town was primarily occupied from the late 4th century BC and throughout the Hellenistic period. The geophysical survey conducted between 2011 and 2012 similarly recorded data which point to the presence of multiple structures according to a regular grid system. The excavation carried out in the central part of Asteria also uncovered remains of a single domestic structure (Building A) which seems to have been in use during the Late Classical and Hellenistic periods. The combined data acquired through the programme of research is thus highly encouraging, and has effectively demonstrated the importance of systematic archaeological research in this understudied area of Central Greece.

Various edge delineating methods (edge mappers) are tested on different types of synthetic data produced by calculating the response of a model of buried ancient ruins. The model was constructed to resemble a commonly occurring situation with ruins of two historical phases buried one beneath the other. These weak signals of relatively small wavelengths of the archaeological prospection comprise tough tests for the mappers considered. Additionally, a particular mapper, the balanced horizontal gradient magnitude scaled by the analytic signal is introduced in this study. An example of applying the mappers to real data is also presented. All the mappers proved capable of locating the lateral limits of the subsurface targets but with varying success. Also some of them are very sensitive to noise, rendering them useless for practical application. Some others proved robust in the presence of noise. For a number of them, the varying strength of the aligned maximum values proves an indicator of the variation of the burial depth of the targets. Their merits and drawbacks are demonstrated and discussed with respect to their application on the various types of magnetic archaeological prospection data. Also, relative comparisons are presented. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

In his journey through Achaea in the second century AD, Pausanias mentioned the destroyed Classical site of Helike on the sea and noted that its ruins were still visible underwater near the southwest shore of the Corinthian Gulf. In 2001, the Helike Project excavators discovered on the coastal plain of Helike southeast of Aigion the first ruins of Classical buildings, buried under lagoon sediments 3 m deep. They also found segments of a major Roman road oriented NW–SE and buried 1–1.50 m deep under the contemporary surface. Pausanias referred to the main road through the Helike plain, which he followed during his visit. According to his description, he saw the submerged ruins of Helike toward the sea north of the Roman road. Tracing the exact location of the road would, therefore, help to locate the lost city. We employed resistivity tomography to explore the areas between trenches where the road had been unearthed and also to investigate its possible extension beyond those locations. Since 2004, resistivity studies performed by grids or single profiles have been carried out at 11 locations. As a result, the ancient road was detected for a length of about 2 km. It was also imaged either in two-dimensional or three-dimensional contexts at all the locations where it was detected. Copyright © 2009 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.

The area around the Church of Protaton at Karyes on Mount Athos (Holy Mountain) in northern Greece, was explored by means of resistance mapping and electrical tomography. Ruins of foundation walls were detected and mapped around the Church, and additionally geological information was retrieved by the tomography. The floor of the Church was investigated with ground-penetrating radar transects wherever was possible. The presence of reflection patterns, which appeared aligned in parallel transects, led to the conclusion that they were caused by structures concealed beneath the floor of the Church. The survey, which took place in and around an existing monument, required different geophysical methods, used in a synergetic manner. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.