From Oregon to Mongolia, art history and geography experts document landscape
The Mongolian Altai Inventory Project is an atlas, website and digital photo archive that showcase ancient archaeological discoveries from the mountainous region of northwestern Mongolia that was home to hunters and pastoral nomads for thousands of years. The inhabitants erected large stone altars, burial mounds, standing stones and image stones in the valleys. The inhabitants of the region also left behind vast concentrations of rock art in the high valleys; these images tell their life stories. 
The published 224-page atlas, "Archaeology and Landscape in the Mongolian Altai: an Atlas," the corresponding website, "Archaeology and Landscape in the Altai Mountains of Mongolia", and a digital photo archive are the result of 18 field seasons in the Altai Mountains of Russia and Mongolia. The project was made possible by a $316,000 Research Materials Grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities (2007-2009).
According to Esther Jacobson-Tepfer, the Maude I. Kerns professor emeritus of art history at UO and project director, the extensive materials represent the first broad inventory of surface archaeology in northwestern Mongolia.
Jacobson-Tepfer, initially a Chinese-art historian, became interested in nomadic cultures and decided to follow those interests north to a year-long study program in the Soviet Union to learn more about the deeper connection with landscape and rock art. She and her husband, Gary Tepfer, who is a photographer, spent 3 field seasons on the Russian side of the Altai Mountains and 15 field seasons in Mongolia identifying concentrations of archaeology and documenting them with field notes, photography and locational data.
"When you look at a monument in its physical context, you have to consider its view shed: that is, its orientation in the landscape, the larger features it seems to be addressing," said Jacobson-Tepfer. "Monuments and their relationships to people and landscapes are like open windows into the values and concerns of ancient cultures."
To document the region, she enlisted help from the UO geography department's InfoGraphics Lab. James E. Meacham, director of the InfoGraphics lab, is co-director of the project and accompanied Jacobson-Tepfer and Tepfer on three field seasons.
"This collaboration was a great opportunity for me and the lab's staff to bring our geographic perspective and skills in GIS technology to the project to assist in analysis, produce maps and present the research to a broader audience," said Meacham.
With vivid maps and photographs, the atlas and website present the cultural heritage of a rugged environment, focusing on the interconnection of the surface human-made structures and the landscape. The project was developed to appeal to geographers, archeologists, educators and general readers interested in ecotourism, preservation, geography and ancient human cultures.
The website includes extensive background information about the Altai region and its people. The central element in the website is the section on archaeology and cultural landscape. This is supported by an image gallery with digitized photographs of monuments linked to an interactive map. The interactive map and the maps in the printed atlas come from the project's detailed Geographic Information Systems (GIS) database. The interactive map is designed to allow users to display map layers dynamically, pan and zoom the Altai region, and view specific monument types.
The interdisciplinary approach to the project also involved two teams of specialists from the UO Libraries to help create the website and the digital photo archive. The archive, including approximately 1,400 images taken by Tepfer, offers a publicly accessible, web-based scholarly resource.
Jacobson-Tepfer and Meacham will speak at a UO Duck Store author event at 7 p.m. on Feb. 2, in the Knight Library browsing room, 1501 Kincaid St. The atlas will be available for purchase.
About the University of Oregon
The University of Oregon is a world-class teaching and research institution and Oregon's flagship public university. The UO is a member of the Association of American Universities (AAU), an organization made up of the 62 leading public and private research institutions in the United States and Canada. The University of Oregon is one of only two AAU members in the Pacific Northwest.
Contact: Julie Brown, 541-346-3185, julbrown@uoregon.edu
Sources: Esther Jacobson-Tepfer, ejacobs@uoregon.edu; James E. Meacham, 541-346-5788, jmeacham@uoregon.edu
Link: http://mongolianaltai.uoregon.edu/
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