Geoffrey & Françoise Summers

The Genesis of the BIAA Expedition

In 1991, on the perspicacious advice of David French, we carried out a survey of Çevre Kale, Yaraşlı, using a helium blimp and remote camera system, purchased for the BIAA from the Programme Budget of the Assistant Under-secretary of State to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office, (Summers and Summers 1992), as a rehearsal for the more ambitious project at Kerkenes.

Many excavations in the Hittite heartland, within the great bend of the Halys River, had revealed Iron Age settlement, yet our knowledge was surprisingly thin. A new approach was needed whereby a site of considerable importance and concomitant size could be tackled at a time when excavation was becoming increasingly difficult to fund. The focus would be on a combination of traditional survey and remote sensing. Excavation was to be the last resort, only embarked upon when other methods had created a frame-work. Kerkenes was of obvious importance, the nature of the remains making the new methodological approach particularly appropriate.

Page 3