Heritage Science最新文献

Historical, folk, and opera costumes are part of cultural heritage, embodying the history, culture, art, and spirit of given nations. Due to aging and various damages, handed-down and unearthed historical clothing is often fragile and complex to preserve. Recently, digital methods have emerged as a meaningful way to restore and reconstruct all kinds of heritage clothing. The appearance of heritage costumes can be preserved permanently and presented to the public in a more accessible and interesting way via digitization. However, there is a lack of systematic review on this topic. To fill this gap, recent progress in digital restoration and 3D virtual reconstruction of heritage clothing is reviewed in this article. On the one hand, the methods and advantages of digitally restoring damaged archaeological costumes and fabrics, as well as damaged clothing images in archaeological murals, are summarized and emphasized. On the other hand, the digital reconstruction and virtual simulation of heritage costumes from different prototypes with known or unknown original appearances using different digital frameworks are presented and discussed. Furthermore, general steps and challenges in the digital reconstruction process, as well as future directions for digitalizing heritage clothing, are also discussed.

Aiming at the problem of "crystallization" on the surface of Yuan blue and white ceramics, which causes reflections and loss of image texture, an image processing method is proposed to repair the image texture information. A multi-scale Retinex pre-processing method is proposed to enhance the contrast between the pattern and the background. A color factor is introduced to prevent color distortion. A weighted average function is constructed to enhance image details and improve texture information. The Yuan blue and white pattern can be effectively segmented from the background using a combination of multi-peak thresholding for segmentation and other techniques. The experimental results demonstrate that, in comparison to other algorithms, the multi-scale Retinex and histogram multi-peak threshold coupled segmentation method proposed in this paper exhibits the highest F1-score of 0.03067 and an accuracy of 92.67% in cross-evaluation with other algorithms. This indicates that the overall performance of the algorithm is the best. The proposed method has the potential to inform the protection of cultural relics.

Many historic buildings are at serious risk of deterioration due to changes in the moisture content of the soil under the buildings. Based on the typical deterioration problems of the Grand Deliverance Hall and the cultural relics in the hall, this study analyzes and concludes that the main factor affecting the generation and development of deterioration is groundwater erosion through environmental monitoring and geotechnical engineering investigation. The impact of changes in moisture content on the water-holding properties and pore distribution of the soil under the cultural-relics buildings was further assessed. Then, combined with the soil property, our study provides a novel and effective way to monitor and reflect the water-holding properties of the soil using electrochemical detection. The connected pore resistance and matrix suction decrease with the increase in the moisture content, both showing a power function law. Changes in moisture content cause changes in the thickness of the double electric layer, which in turn affects the connected pore resistance and matrix suction of soil. The greater the connected pore resistance, the greater the matrix suction and the water holding capacity. Finally, based on the research of this study and the conservation ideology of cultural relics that respects the original and minimizes intervention, protection recommendations to prevent groundwater erosion are proposed in order to provide guidance for future research.

Graphical Abstract

Historical urban districts are imbued with a multitude of elements, including historical heritage, cultural significance, social relationships, and daily activities, making them of significant research value. Through a review of previous literature, it is evident that research on the protection and renewal of historical urban districts has mostly focused on macro-level planning and development. Addressing the lack of spatial morphology quantification research at the meso-level, this paper proposes a method suitable for quantifying interface morphology in historical streets. Using the historical cultural street district of Xijie in Quanzhou, Fujian Province as a case study, this research employs parameters such as Distance-Height Ratio, Interface Density, Build-To-Line Rate, and Near-Line Rate to quantify and summarize the morphology of street interfaces. It then proposes transformation strategies to guide the protection and renewal of streets in the future. The study validates the feasibility of this quantification method and provides valuable insights for the protection and renewal of historical urban districts.

In the process of preserving historical buildings in southern Fujian, China, it is crucial to provide timely and accurate statistical data to classify the damage of traditional buildings. In this study, a method based on the improved YOLOv8 neural network is proposed to select aerial photographs of six villages in Xiamen and Quanzhou cities in Fujian Province as the dataset, which contains a total of 3124 photographs. Based on the high-resolution orthophotographs obtained from UAV tilt photography, the YOLOv8 model was used to make predictions. The main task in the first stage is to select the buildings with historical value in the area, and the model's mAP (Mean Accuracy Rate) can reach 97.2% in the first stage task. The second stage uses the YOLOv8 model to segment the images selected in the first stage, detecting possible defects on the roofs, including collapses, missing tiles, unsuitable architectural additions, and vegetation encroachment. In the second stage of the segmentation task, the mAP reaches 89.4%, which is a 1.5% improvement in mAP50 (mean accuracy) compared to the original YOLOv8 model, and the number of parameters and GFLOPs are reduced by 22% and 15%, respectively. This method can effectively improve the disease detection efficiency of historical built heritage in southern Fujian under complex terrain and ground conditions.

The impact of climate change on human social development has been a topic of research for a long time. Ceramic pipes, which are vital components of urban drainage engineering, are crucial means of managing rain hazards and floods. Exploring the historical evolution of ceramic pipes can help in better understanding the interplay between climate change and human behavior. This study examined the diameters of 86 ceramic pipes unearthed from six cultural sites in central China, including Pingliangtai, Taosi, and Erlitou, dated to 4600–3040 a BP. By combining speleothem records from the excavation sites with precipitation and temperature composite curves for China using Pearson correlation analysis, and verifying with pollen records. The results show that changes in rainfall were the main factor influencing the diameters of the ceramic pipes. This indicates that during this period, ancient people in the Central Plains of China were able to adjust the size of the ceramic pipes to regulate the water management capacity of urban water systems, thereby adapting urban development to climate change.

Six corroded glazed pottery figurines, which excavated from the Qibi Ming Tomb of the Tang Dynasty in Xianyang, were selected to study the corrosion mechanism. Optical microscopy (OM), scanning electron microscopy equipped with energy dispersive X-ray spectrometry (SEM–EDS), Energy X-ray fluorescence spectrometry (EDX), and micro-Raman spectroscopy were applied to analyze the pristine composition of the glaze layer and pottery substrate, the composition and microstructure of corrosion products. The results indicate that lead-glazed pottery figurines are low-temperature PbO-CaO-SiO₂ glaze, with Pb as the main flux, and Cu, Fe as the main colorant. The corrosion products include PbCO₃, CaCO₃, PbCO₃·PbCl₂, PbCl₂, PbO₂, and Si-rich layer. There are Aspergillus niger and Aspergillus sclerotiorum on the surface of glazed pottery. These microorganisms produce organic acids and mold spots on the surface of the pottery figurines, which in turn cause corrosion pits to form on the surface of the figurines. Chemical corrosion reactions mainly include dissolution–precipitation, combination reaction, and oxidation reaction. This article describes the corrosion process of lead-glazed pottery figurines and establishes corresponding corrosion models. This study provides new insights into the corrosion mechanism of lead-glazed pottery, which is of great significance for studying pottery corrosion.

The conventional perception of heritage conservators’ knowledge has primarily focused on their explicit knowledge rooted between science and humanities. However, this perspective on their knowledge is imprecise and often overlooks other intangible dimensions, particularly their accumulated practical (hands-on) tacit knowledge, which extends beyond the traditional view and is often reduced to a mere skill. This comment/perspective article challenges this traditional view and aims to explore the significance of this ineffable knowledge and the possible implications of repetitive practical sensorimotor motions on the conservator's brain, embodied cognition, intuition, and decision-making. This new vision aims to reflect on how we understand the scope of knowledge of worldwide heritage conservators and to open new doors for research and interdisciplinary collaborations.

Paper bookbindings have been disregarded for centuries by scholars since they were only considered temporary covering materials for manuscripts and books. Recently, there is a willingness to reconsider these bindings and to evaluate their role. Thanks to the collaboration with the Marciana National Library in Venice, which stores an impressive collection of 849 detached bindings, the current research provides a chemical-physical elucidation about the composition and the manufacture of paper bookbindings realized between the 16th and the eighteenth century in the Venetian area. A selection of bookbindings was analysed by the means of complementary methods (thickness measurements, Attenuated Total Reflection—Fourier-Transform Infrared Spectroscopy (ATR-FTIR), Pyrolysis–Gas Chromatography–Mass Spectrometry (Py-GC–MS) and X-Ray Fluorescence (XRF)). Data evidence the presence of cellulose as the main component of paper pulp; hemicellulose and lignin were identified too, probably related to the presence of linen/hemp rags in the paper production. Gelatine was detected muck likely related to paper sizing; among inorganic additives CaCO₃ was found in all samples. The presence of waxy material may be due to past undocumented conservation treatments.

The convergence of cultural and aesthetic elements in timber structures from China’s Tang Dynasty (618–907 AD) and traditional Japanese architecture provides a rich tapestry of architectural evolution and cross-cultural exchanges. Addressing the challenge of distinguishing and understanding the intricate styles of these structures is significant for both historical comprehension and preservation efforts. This research introduces an innovative approach by integrating the Multi-Head Attention (MHA) mechanism into the YOLOv8 model, enhancing the detection of architectural features with improved precision and recall. Our novel YOLOv8-MHA model not only demonstrates a notable improvement in recognizing intricate architectural details but also significantly advances the state of the art in object detection within complex settings. Quantitative results underscore the model’s effectiveness, achieving a precision of 95.6%, a recall of 85.6%, and a mean Average Precision (mAP@50) of 94% across various Intersection over Union (IoU) thresholds. These metrics highlight the model’s superior capability to accurately identify and classify architectural elements, especially within environments rich with nuanced details, utilizing the enhanced YOLOv8-MHA algorithm. The application of our model extends beyond mere architectural analysis; it offers new insights into the intricate interplay of cultural identity and adaptability inherent in East Asian architectural heritage. The study establishes a solid foundation for the meticulous classification and analysis of architectural styles in timber structures within an expansive cultural and historical context, thereby enriching our understanding and preservation of these traditions.