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NTAS Monthly Meetings are held on the 2nd Thursday of the month, at 7:00pm except in June and December. The monthly meetings are located at the University of North Texas Health Science Center in the Research & Education Building, Room 114. The NTAS meetings are hybrid meetings held in-person and offered via Zoom.
NTAS meetings are a staple of our membership. In these meetings, we discuss NTAS Announcements, which include upcoming volunteer opportunities, upcoming NTAS events, upcoming Texas Archeology Society (TAS) events, and each month we feature a guest speaker. Our guest speakers deliver programs on various archeological topics. Past topics include geoarcheology, bioarcheology, regional archeological sites and topics, and more. NTAS meetings are open to the general public.
Guests are welcome to join all NTAS monthly meetings in-person or via Zoom. To receive the Zoom link for our programs, please email info@ntxas.org .
Guest Speakers: Sherman W. Horn III
Abstract:
The application of lidar to the Maya Lowlands produced a resurgence of settlement-pattern studies, as
the new technology revealed the remains of Maya civilization in previously unfathomable detail over
large areas. With the promise of lidar to revolutionize Maya settlement studies came challenges, as
archaeologists grappled with how to maximize its potentials and recognize its limits. Few studies have
tested these boundaries to the extent of the El Pilar Project, which has recently concluded a decade-long
effort to survey 20 km2 around an ancient Maya city center shrouded in dense tropical forest.
This presentation will reflect on lessons learned from lidar-guided field survey at El Pilar and discuss the
impact of lidar on archaeological practice in the Maya Lowlands. Stunning visualizations and the allure of
discovery continue to capture the public imagination, as archaeologists unveil the latest city center
imaged by lidar. Researchers revise population estimates up to previously unthinkable levels based on
counts of “houses” brought to light by the most recent lidar survey. While the power of lidar in
archaeological prospection is undeniable, our on-the-ground experiences validating – or invalidating –
remotely sensed settlement remains shows that lidar is but one tool in the archaeologist’s kit, and that a
large part of its utility lies in revealing the landscape inhabited by the ancient Maya. Understanding the
landscape of the Maya Forest is key to answering questions of population, land-use, and agricultural
sustainability, yet this area of research remains underexplored, and much work remains for the promise
of lidar to be kept.
About: Sherman W. Horn III
Bio: Sherman W. Horn III is a Project Manager at RC Goodwin & Associates and Director of Archaeological
Research at the Center for Human-Environmental Research in New Orleans, Louisiana. He also holds a research affiliate position at the University of California, Santa Barbara, and is the Deputy Director of the El Pilar Project, where he oversees field operations and coordinates laboratory analyses. Sherman has examined the origins and demise of ancient Maya civilization since completing a PhD at Tulane
University in 2015. He uses Geographic Information Systems (GIS) software to integrate remote sensing and archaeological data to investigate ancient Maya settlement and environmental modification at different scales. Sherman also studies archaeological materials, using microscopic methods to examine exchange relationships and interaction networks at periods of social change. He is particularly interested in incorporating stratigraphic, spatial, and materials analyses in GIS databases to unravel ancient
socioeconomic networks and understand their impacts on developing social complexity.
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