The project investigated novel ways in which electronic publication over the Internet can provide broad access to research findings in the arts and humanities, and can also make underlying data available in such a way so that readers are enabled to "drill down" seamlessly into online archives to test interpretations and develop their own conclusions.
The primary goals were to produce four sustainable exemplars of linked digital archives and publications, and to use these (a) to promote new electronic forms of dissemination and (b) to explore the issues raised by the blurring of the distinction between archive and publication. Two calls for papers were issued with £4000 grants offered to facilitate the preparation of exemplars.
Most applications were from archaeology and closely related fields. Exemplars were selected on the basis of (i) academic significance, (ii) potential of value-added by the ability to drill down from synthesis to primary data, (iii) ability to deliver within the project timescale, and (iv) inter-disciplinarity.
Four projects were selected:
(1) "Changing Settlements and Landscapes: Medieval Whittlewood, its Predecessors and Successors" by Richard Jones, Christopher Dyer and Mark Page
This article presents an interpretative synthesis of the development of a medieval landscape in the English Midlands, adopting an interdisciplinary approach. By presenting all the data on which reconstructions of these territories have been based, readers are able to test the veracity of the conclusions outlined here and in the paper monograph, and to identify the intrinsic strengths and weaknesses of each class of evidence.
(2) "Joining the Dots: Continuous Survey, Routine Practice and the Interpretation of a Cypriot Landscape" by Michael Given, Hugh Corley and Luke Sollars
One of the major challenges facing intensive surface survey is how to interpret surface artefact scatters in terms of past human activities and relationships. This study uses web-based GIS and database technologies to provide a complete landscape data set and a fully integrated interpretative text carefully grounded in current landscape theory. The material comes from the Troodos Archaeological and Environmental Survey Project.
(3) "Silchester Roman Town Insula IX" by A Clarke, M G Fulford, M Rains & K Tootell
The development of an urban property in the Roman town of Calleva Atrebatum (Silchester) is traced from the late 1st to the mid-3rd century AD. Three successive periods of building with their associated finds of artefacts and biological remains are described and interpreted with provisional reconstructions of the buildings. Links are provided to a copy of the Integrated Archaeological Database (IADB), archived by the ADS, which holds the primary excavation and finds records.
(4) "The urban landscapes of Ancient Merv, Turkmenistan: Where to draw the line?" by Tim Williams & S van der Linde
Merv straddles one the main branches of the ancient Silk Roads that connected Europe and Africa to the Far East. The succession of cities date from the 5th century BC to the present day. The article develops and test the methodology of documenting interpretation (and uncertainty) based on a variety of data sets.
In the course of the LEAP project the exemplars have also provided the project team with a number of secondary insights into (i) effective cross-linking, (ii) quality control, (iii) user and author expectations and (iv) interface sustainability, which will be deployed in future projects.