How to find what was hidden there after 90-200-400 years? There is no tree, there is no that stone, there is no house, and even the ruins are left ... It's good when there are coordinates ... then you can narrow the search square.
- Coordinates? Where do you get it from? Asked, surprised, Dara.
Well, you that did not listen, me? I said, I put data from the road builders on old maps of the geographical and topographic of the 19th century. And for this I'm scanning them, then tying them to a modern co-ordination grid, setting the projection, choosing the zone according to Grues Krueger, choosing an ellipsoid ...
- And what is so difficult?
And you thought it was easy? You are a fool!
- Why do you swear right away? Offended noticed, Dara.
Well, you understand, before you go with a metal detector, you need to know where to go ?! And for this you need to conduct research.
Look for books, maps ... well, I talked about this.
After I snap the old map to a modern grid of coordinates. Then I digitize, vectorize the old map. I compose an attribute database, bind it to the map.
Then, I apply a vector layer to a raster with a satellite image or aerial photograph ... or a drone image.
I am looking for similar shapes on the surface ... I compose an interpretation key, and I create a preliminary version of a map of perspective places for searches.
After I leave for a place, with a navigator and a drone, I look for that place, and on the spot I already confirm or deny whether it was a place or not.
Sometimes I am mistaken. Then again I look in the archives and funds. But not everything is there ... since in different eras, 1917, 1930, 1950, 1989, and 90-00 of the 20th and 21st centuries, part of the archive and stock data was burned. Corrected the story, in an ideological vein. From the point of view of historical science, this is idiocy, falsification of history. But from the point of view of ideology, this is a very expected move. To form a commonality of lies, simply keeping silent about some facts, entire generations are being formed who do not know the truth and think in a given format. Actually turning into formatted robots. But it is, a fairy tale. Do not get hung up on this.
So you need to look for clues in foreign archives, not all of them are open to foreigners, and even individuals, without legal organization behind their backs. So ... you have to wool collector sites, auctions, a database of photographs, stocks ... second-hand books in Europe and Asia. You find something, something not ...
And then by the method of checking on the ground you begin to get to the point.
Sometimes in the place where there was a fortress on the map of 1871 and 1897, it is possible to find a handful of tiles and broken bricks ... and sometimes just ceramics of the 18th and 19th centuries. If it was a royal fortress, it was built from burnt bricks, and if the local principality of Small-An was made of adobe, clay bricks burnt in the sun.
As I said in the 50 years of the 20th century, the second empire wanted to catch up and overtake the production of agricultural products and US industry. There was a race for the leader. Then the leaders of the empire did not think about ecology, and simply willed decision, sowed the plains and steppes with rural cultures. And to increase the cultivated area, they cut down forests, demolished fortresses, castles, villages ... but of course hell didn't work. The US eventually won ... anyway. Also a dark story. Either the new leaders of the second empire just bought them and they surrendered their empire. In general, not a damn thing is clear. Although only 35 years have passed.
So, returning to our topic, I am looking in such areas for these ruins themselves or what remains of them. I put on the map, and already from this point I begin to conduct my searches. But here, of course, you understand that an error of a couple of mm will be initially laid down, that on the map and on the ground it can become a couple of tens or even hundreds of meters. So you have to comb thoroughly. Drones here provide me with indispensable help. Since they can cover a large area, and have special cameras and scanning equipment. Thanks to applications on archeology and special thematic software products, it is possible to decipher these images.
Then, I go to the desk work, in my base camp in the mountains, in the gorge, so as not to be in sight. There already, having a confirmed interpretation key, on the ground, I begin to draw up an updated thematic map, an electronic note. By searching for historical artifacts, I reconstruct old roads of the 9-10th centuries and sometimes 3-4 centuries, and of course the caravan roads of the 14-18th centuries.
I am breaking through old points, on such a road at 30 or even 1300 km there are dozens of villages, caravanserais, wells, underground reservoirs, customs points and fortresses. But now, if you go through this map from dozens of villages, only 3-4 of them remain.
- Where are the others?
Where? Gone. So I need to find them all. When I find their ruins ...
- But as? According to knowledge, where were the caravanserais found?
Oh, so you are in the subject! Yes, something like that. I know from the days of Persian and Arab sources that the caravanserais were located in the 8-9th century, 30 km from each other and later in the 14-15 centuries in 35-37 km.
Now about it is easier for me to search.