Archaeologists’ use of excavation documentation : a study of the use of research documentation from Labraunda

This essay deals with the use of archival excavations documents among archeologists, with the focus on the Swedish excavation in Labraunda, Turkey. The purpose with this study was to facili- tate the work at archival institutions with excavation documents, and to create more knowledge about the use of archival excavation documents. This study can also help the archival institutions to preserve and mediate this type of documentation. In addition, this study also adds more knowledge about what type of archival documentation the users prefer to use. Method that have been used are interviews, which six persons that have or are working with documentation from Labraunda. In addition with, document studies are used as a complement, where publications, based on archival document from Labraunda, written by the interviewed individuals have been studied. Con- cluding of this study is that the archeologists using archived excavation documentation needs to process the documents before any contemporary analysis can be made. Moreover, it seems that it is a patchwork between using their own and others documentation, to fill in the information gaps or find similarities. Furthermore, some of the most used document types is, according to this study, photographs and drawings of ceramics.