Cite this as: Löwenborg, D., Jonsson, M., Larsson, A. and Nordinge, J. 2021 A Turn Towards the Digital. An Overview of Swedish Heritage Information Management Today, Internet Archaeology 58. https://doi.org/10.11141/ia.58.19
Heritage management in Sweden has undergone a substantial transformation in recent decades. The process of monitoring and managing heritage information has become increasingly digital, relying on interconnected systems to monitor registered archaeological remains to manage investigations and contract archaeology excavations. This also has to work together with the digital systems of the County Administrative Boards that administer all permissions for excavations. Current developments deal with archiving and dissemination of reports, and documentation from fieldwork. Documentation of archaeological excavations has predominantly been digital for the past 20 years, which brings both possibilities and challenges in making sure the information will adhere to the FAIR Principles. This article outlines some of these developments and exemplifies the possibilities of reusing legacy data through the Urdar project.
Corresponding author: Daniel Löwenborg
Daniel.Lowenborg@arkeologi.uu.se
Department of Archaeology and Ancient History, Uppsala University
Maria Jonsson
Swedish National Heritage Board
Åsa Larsson
Swedish National Heritage Board
Johan Nordinge
Swedish National Heritage Board
Figure 1: The Swedish system for contract archaeology illustrated and simplified. The National Heritage Board sets rules and regulations for the system. The County Administrative Board (CAB) can approve the excavation of a site, whether on private or public land. Developers have to cover the cost of contract archaeologists decided by CAB. The results must be approved by CAB before they become public in the Historic Environment Record. Artefacts and analogue documentation are delivered to a museum. Illustration: Åsa Larsson, CC-BY
Figure 2: The Digital Archaeological Process implemented in Sweden in 2018. The County Administrative Board system (ASK) sends administrative data about planned archaeological excavations and surveys to the Historic Environment Record (HER). Via the web tool Fornreg the archaeologists can update HER with new information and upload the finished reports. Administrators at CAB can make the new data public and NHB can add information about which museum receives the artefacts. All content is open for public use through web search Fornsök and the Open Data Portal. Illustration: Åsa Larsson, CC-BY
Figure 3: The public web interface for the Historic Environment Record: Fornsök. Red geometries marked 'R' are protected sites, blue are historical sites with less degree of protection, grey are sites that have been destroyed or excavated. The striped red geometry is the area of an archaeological project. On the left is the info card, with a link to the report (PDF) and information about which museum received the artefacts
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