MODELING MOVEMENT AND USE PATTERNS WITHIN THE PALACE OF NESTOR: A GIS/SPACE SYNTAX APPROACH

Todd Brenningmeyer

Geographic Information Systems (GIS) have become important tools for understanding archaeological evidence with a spatial component. While most archaeological studies that implement this technology focus on evidence at a regional level, GIS analysis on a site-specific scale holds the prospect of understanding the potential effect of architectural and landscape modifications on site use. This study discusses the results of a computer based modeling project focused on the Palace of Nestor.

GIS and space syntax methodologies are implemented to understand the effect of LHIIIb architectural modifications on potential patterns of movement and accessibility within the palace complex. Detailed state plans recorded by the Minnesota Archaeological Researches in the Western Peloponnese (MARWP) are digitized in AutoCAD and imported into Arc-Info. The digitized plans provide a background layer over which potential paths of accessibility are mapped for the LHIIIb and Late LHIIIb period architecture. GIS based network topology is built for each remodeling phase allowing the generation of statistics representing the potential of different modes of interaction for different rooms during each period.

In this model, interior space is abstracted to a network model where rooms are symbolized as nodes and paths between rooms are drawn as connecting arcs. Relative measurements of privacy and social interaction are calculated for each period to understand changes in the degree of segregation of individual rooms within the complex as well as how closely connected these rooms are throughout the complex. Plotted distributions illustrate how architectural modifications altered the interior space to promote privacy or access from the exterior and interior rooms of the Palace.