Using the Energetic Calculator for Ancient Buildings (EnCAB) to Understand the Growth of Cities
Channel: Recording Archaeology
Date: 2020-09-09

The Energetic Calculator for Ancient Buildings (EnCAB http://www.encab.net) examines the process  of  construction  leading  up  to  the  first  use  of  the  building,  exploring  this  process  by  disarticulating  it  into  discrete  steps,  using  algorithms  to  quantify  the  ‘cost’  in  terms  of  labor  and materials. These algorithms are presented as a web-based calculator which allow users to compare their results to a range of examples and explore the types of sources used in generating each algorithm. B. Trigger defines political power as the ability to control energy, and use that energy not only to maintain and expand that society but also to invest in non-utilitarian pur-poses. EnCAB can be used as a tool to calculate the labor that political entities invest in different types of architecture, eg. city walls, temples, irrigation systems and palaces. These construction projects are indirect indicators of a communities’ ability to invest energy in growth and control resources, giving scholars one snapshot onto some of the social dynamics driving increasing complexity in the development of cities. In order to map diverse types of change in urbanism, multiple snapshots can be generated and compared. Diachronic change at a single site can be analyzed by generating multiple snapshots from different chronological horizons; synchronic comparisons can be made between sites of different sizes within the same region to understand how  urbanism  is  tied  to  settlement  sizes  and  roles.  The  paper  will  discuss  EnCAB  as  a  tool,  propose research methodologies and present case studies relating to urbanism.


Federico Buccellati