145 CHAPTER FIVE THE TELL ATCHANA MAPPING AND GIS PROJECT STEPHEN BATIUK AND AARON A. BURKE OBJECTIVES In an effort to exhaust the plans published in Woolley’s volume on Alalakh, and in order to facilitate the consulta- tion by the Oriental Institute Expedition to Tell Atchana (AS 136), in 2002 complete “cityscape” plans for Level VII through Level 0 — the only levels with sufficient architecture worth this effort — were produced using GIS software (for completed plans, see Chapter Four: Alalakh Spatial Organization). This strategy would, first, make possible de- tailed renderings of complete city plans for these levels, insofar as the plans, sections, and textual descriptions permit- ted. While Woolley had in part already achieved this for Levels VII and IV (see Woolley 1955, pls. 14, 22), because these plans are drawn at so small a scale they are too schematic and are therefore of limited use. The second reason for this undertaking was ultimately to enable spatial location of Woolley’s excavations within the UTM coordinate sys- tem. This could be done after digitizing all of Woolley’s architecture (with respect to his grid system) by establishing the location and orientation of his grid with reference to remains of Level VII architecture, such as the six-pier gate and the “Yarimlim” palace (the Level VII temple was obliterated by the Temple Site sounding), and the Level IV Niqmepa palace. PROBLEMS Although Woolley frequently demonstrated that his methods were advanced for the time in which he worked, and it is frequently frowned upon to engage in the criticism of work by pioneers in the field of archaeology, a number of problems inherent to Woolley’s plans are worth cataloging. These problems (see Chapter Four: Alalakh Spatial Orga- nization) made it particularly difficult to achieve our objectives and they serve as the basis for understanding that the “cityscapes” presented in this volume should be considered preliminary drafts as they will probably be improved dur- ing the course of the Oriental Institute’s excavations, particularly with respect to projected features, such as the various city walls (fig. 5.1). Perhaps our greatest concern in the process of digitizing Woolley’s data was the orientation of Woolley’s grid with respect to true north. Almost every plan published in the final report provides the misleading information that the grid was aligned to true, and in some cases, magnetic north. But as figure 5.1 illustrates, the excavation grid as originally laid out appears to have been rotated at least 5˚ east of north based on the French cadastral map of 1930. The existence of this rotation appears to be confirmed when these features are superimposed on rectified CORONA satellite imagery (fig. 5.2). Despite this error we have detected no inconsistencies in Woolley’s grid during the course of his excava- tions (i.e., the grid appears to have remained firmly in place throughout the excavations). Before suggesting an exact deviation of Woolley’s grid from true north it will be necessary to locate prominent, surviving architectural features within the UTM coordinate system using GPS data during a future season. In light of this, and in order not to propagate false information, we have decided for the time being to omit references to true north in the plans of Tell Atchana (AS 136) published herein. Once the correct orientation has been established, all issues concerning the rectification of Woolley’s grid with the UTM coordinate system can be addressed. Among other problems encountered while digitizing Woolley’s architectural features were the following: (1) Uni- form adherence to stylistic conventions is lacking, which affects both the accuracy and clarity of presentation of Woolley’s plans and sections (e.g., Woolley 1955: fig. 58b). (2) Errors were made in stylistic conventions (e.g., some floors are represented so as to suggest that they were composed of mudbrick, while other floors not made of mudbrick are also indicated with the same convention; hatching styles also sometimes occur on the plans but are not included in the key; see ibid., figs. 43a, 53, 58). (3) Critical errors were made in the representation and the location of fragments of architecture that are intended to serve as points of reference. For example, the northwest corner of the Level VII pal- ace, which was represented in outline in the plan of the Level IV palace in Square P8 (ibid., fig. 44), is incorrectly ori- 145