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The Use of Space Archaeology to Map the Lost Ancient City of Ubar


The ancient city of Ubar was long considered lost until its discovery in the summer of 1990 (Lem 2017). Satellite radar imagery was used to help discover this site buried beneath the desert sands of Oman in the Arabian Peninsula. In 1990, the use of remote sensing to find archaeological sites was a brand-new approach. The use of satellite imagery has become more accessible in recent years. Space archaeology and remote sensing are quickly becoming the preferred method for discovering archaeological sites due to their non-invasive nature. I propose that the use of modern-day USGS Landsat data will reveal new site features in the lost city of Ubar. 

The site of Ubar was so small, that even the Landsat 8 panchromatic band 8 could not detect it. I looked over this image and could not find any clues in the pixel data that showed any differentiation between where the lost city is in comparison to the rest of the map. The texture of the map where the city of Ubar is known to be is very rough. I was able to map the tracks that surround the site. With the construction of so many modern agriculture fields, it is hard to determine which of these tracks are historic and which are modern and regularly traveled.

Landsat satellite imagery is very useful for viewing topography at a macro level, but in the case of Ubar, the site is too small for Landsat imagery to detect. Landsat imagery can help to find archaeological sites through secondary detectors, such as ancient tracks in the sand as was the case for finding Ubar. I think that it is still possible to find more features, tracks, and geographic evidence of the Lost City of Ubar. However, I believe that this will require higher pixel resolution imagery, high-quality aerial photographs, and LiDAR.


References:

Lem, P. (2017). Peering Through the Sands of Time: Searching for the Origins of Space Archaeology. NASA Earth Observatory. https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/features/SpaceArchaeology   

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