MARS: The Monuments at Risk Survey

The Monuments At Risk Survey was established in 1994 to study the dynamic state of England's archaeological resource. Its main aim is to provide a systematic quantification of the resource in terms of:

The need for baseline data of this sort has been highlighted in a number of recent archaeological studies, and will also serve to complement the quantified assessments of land use and landscape change available to related disciplines and agencies. That such a study is long overdue can be gauged from the continuing professional debate about how many archaeological monuments remain in England, how much of the land surface the recorded sites cover, what is happening to them, and what effects certain land use practices have had, and continue to have, on their survival.

MARS is being carried out in association with the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England by a team of 30 researchers and field surveyors based in the School of Conservation Sciences at Bournemouth University. Following a period of extensive consultations and discussions with interested parties, the main phase of data collection began in August 1994, with four main strands of inquiry being pursued in parallel.

A national survey of the recorded archaeological resource is being carried out with the assistance of local sites and monuments records and the National Monuments Record. Data from these sources will allow a broad quantification of the total archaeological resource as presently recorded at local and national levels together with a breakdown of the main kinds of remains represented. This is important in its own right as well as providing the basis for assessing the confidence limits that can be attached to data from sampled populations. The national survey also includes a study of when items were added to local and national records, what events led to their discovery, and how records have been enhanced since their creation. As part of this work a review of the early development of archaeological records is being carried out.

The present (ie 1994-95) condition of the recorded archaeological resource in England is being studied through a nationwide programme of field survey. A random sample of 1,300 1km by 5km study areas, a 5% sample of England's land surface, is being field-checked. This involves taking the available record of monuments known in each study area and visiting each one for the purpose of recording its size, condition, current land use, and any evidence of damage. On average there are 12 monuments per transect to visit. By July 1995 the recorded monuments in nearly 60% of the sample units had been field-checked.

Changes in condition and survival are being studied through the use of aerial photographs. At present, the recorded monuments in half of the sample units subject to field-checking will be examined on aerial photographs available in the National Library of Aerial Photographs maintained by the Royal Commission on the Historical Monuments of England at Swindon. Photographs relating to as many as possible of the five decades since 1940 are used in order to document and characterise the nature and extent of any change, or lack of it, undergone by monuments in recent years.

Interpreting the evidence available from fieldwork and aerial photographic checks will be enhanced by the results of a series of detailed case studies that are being researched in more depth. This work aims to explore how the decay of a monument changes the potential archaeological information it contains that can be recovered through standard archaeological techniques. Thus well-preserved, moderately preserved, and poorly preserved monuments which have been fully excavated in the last 20 years or so are compared to see how land use and decay have affected data yields. Twelve monument classes are being studied, among them long barrows, causewayed enclosures, henges, Bronze Age round barrows, Roman roads, Roman forts, Roman villas, Anglo-Saxon cemeteries, motte and bailey castles, deserted medieval villages, and tanneries. Alongside this research a series of landscape types is being investigated to look at the effects of land use on monument discovery and survival. A selection of urban areas will also be considered in relation to the same questions.

Data collection is scheduled for completion in the spring of 1996, the final results being available in the summer of 1997.

For an update on the latest work on the MARS project see:

MARS: Introduction & Current progress

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