Grant awarded for research into prehistoric settlement in the Province of Zeeland
The research project Between Land and Sea (Tussen Land en Zee) was awarded funding by the Reuvens Fund for Innovation in May. The project brings together archaeologists, earth scientists, ecologists and public and heritage-sector partners to investigate the earliest settlement history of the Province of Zeeland.
It is often assumed that the first permanent inhabitants did not settle in Zeeland until the Roman period, but archaeological finds dating from the Late Prehistory continue to emerge. ‘These discoveries suggest that Zeeland was already densely inhabited before the arrival of the Romans and may have played an important role in wider Iron Age networks. We now want to study this systematically,’ says Leiden archaeologist Richard Jansen.
A particular challenge is that archaeological remains from the Iron Age are buried beneath one to two metres of clay. As a result, archaeological sites are rarely identified proactively and are more often discovered by chance during road construction or building projects. Once such work is underway, there is usually little time for extensive research, even though the remains uncovered are often unique and exceptionally well preserved.
Major developments in Zeeland
The project is highly relevant to society. Zeeland is facing major spatial developments, ranging from housing construction to the installation of cables and infrastructure. ‘In the coming years, parts of Zeeland could undergo significant development’, explains Ludo Snijders, an archaeologist at the Province of Zeeland. ‘If you don’t have a clear understanding of what is beneath the ground, you end up chasing after the digger, trying to save whatever you can.’
Careful management
One of the project’s key outputs will be a predictive map indicating where Iron Age settlements are most likely to be found in Zeeland. Municipalities and provincial authorities can use this map to support archaeological policy and to plan targeted archaeological research ahead of spatial developments. In this way, Between Land and Sea contributes both to our understanding of the earliest inhabitants of the Zeeland delta and to the more careful management of the archaeological record for future generations. The knowledge gained may also be applied in comparable landscapes elsewhere in the Netherlands.
What makes the project particularly innovative is the intensive collaboration between disciplines. ‘We’re working with specialists who have never worked in archaeology before’, says physical geographer Joanne Mol. ‘They approach the landscape from a natural systems perspective, while we focus on the human dimension. That interaction produces insights that would never emerge within a single discipline.’
Students from both universities will participate in the fieldwork, learning from an early stage to think and work across disciplinary boundaries. The project is therefore excellent preparation for professional life, where collaboration with other disciplines, municipalities and provincial authorities is part of everyday work.
A unique collaboration
Between Land and Sea is a transdisciplinary project in which researchers from different fields, government bodies and heritage organisations work together from the outset. Archaeologists and students from Leiden University are collaborating with earth scientists from VU Amsterdam, who are mapping the peat landscape on a large scale. Ecologists from the Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NIOZ) are modelling the historic coastal ecosystem. The Province of Zeeland, Zeeland Heritage, the Walcheren Archaeological Service, the Municipality of Schouwen-Duiveland and the Oosterschelde Regional Archaeological Partnership (OAS) contribute local expertise and help translate the research findings into archaeological policy.