The Giant, Airship
Archives photographiques (Médiathèque de l'Architecture et du Patrimoine)
© CNM
Several large portals allow us to familiarize ourselves with images of the ground as seen from the sky. These beautiful collections show how air photography has been used for several decades to provide a record of landscape that is continuously changing, to detect vestiges of archaeological sites invisible to the naked eye and as a management tool for the territory.
1. The beginnings of aerial photography
The first aerial photograph was taken in 1858 by the French photographer Nadar in a balloon from 80 metres. After this in Europe at the beginning of the 20th century many air photographs were taken of monuments using balloons; for example of Stonehenge in Britain, of Rome and Ostie in Italy.
During the 1914-18 War, aerial photographs were systematically used to guide troop movements on the ground and in the air. From the beginning, on the borders of the Eastern Mediterranean in desert and semi-arid areas English, German and French soldiers were detecting ancient monuments. In Syria, the Jesuit Poidebard obtained extraordinary photographs between 1925 and 1942.
In 1922, in the United Kingdom, O.G.S. Crawford was the first to detect archaeological sites that were completely levelled in areas where agriculture made detecting the locations more difficult. Crawford’s photographs revealed the “ghosts of Wessex”, phantoms of the past, which caused a great excitement when they were published.
Roger Agache, Noyelles-sur-Mer, (Somme), aerial view of a Bronze Age funerary enclosure
© Ministère de la Culture / R. Agache
2. The pioneers until present days
The most remarkable photographs were taken by Professor John Kenneth Saint-Joseph after 1939. After the Second World War, he continued to fly with the planes of the Royal Air Force. Then, on board a specially equipped University of Cambridge plane, and with the assistance of a well trained pilot, Saint-Joseph continued until 1980 taking hundreds of thousands of photographs in black and white. He specialized in photographing excavations of Roman camps.
Research was also carried out in Germany (by Irwin Scollar and Otto Braasch), in Belgium (Charles Léva) and more recently in Italy, Spain, the Netherlands, Romania, Switzerland, Luxembourg and Sweden.
In France, the Fifties saw a first generation of air prospectors including Roger Agache (born in 1926), who prospected the North of France until today with passion and constancy. His remarkable campaigns increased our understanding of the pre-Roman and Roman Somme. Author of many publications, he developed a methodology for aerial prospection. Agache gave the French Ministry for Culture his collection of several thousands of exceptional air photographs.
- Agache collections on Michael-fr
- Agache collections on Mémoire
- Roger Agache website edited by the French Ministry of Culture: Aerial archaeology in Northern France
Another French pioneer was Roger Henrard (1900-1975). He was an exceptional pilot of exception, a hunter of good images and flew over and photographed the whole France. Henrard even obtained authorization to fly over Paris. The Heritage Services that preserve parts of his collections have digitized photographs of the Centre and Poitou-Charentes regions, the départements of the Somme and Orne and the towns of Angers and Elbeu.
Roger Henrard, Château de Chenonceaux (Indre-et-Loire), aerial view taken in 1955
© Inventaire général, ADAGP
In Britain
The rich inheritance of aerial photographs taken by the Royal Air Force after the Second World War for map-making by the Ordnance Survey has been complemented by recent surveys commissioned by local authorities. These photographs are widely used by archaeologists for prospection and national collections are maintained by heritage agencies in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland. Norfolk County Council has digitised aerial surveys of the county taken in 1946 and 1988.
A number of regionally based archaeological air photographers have been active in Britain since the 1950s. Some of their photographs have been digitised and are available online. For example, photographs by Norman McCord are available through SINE.
Photographs by Paul Gilman and others are online available through ‘Unlocking Essex’s Past’, a service maintained by Essex County Council as part of the East of England Sense of Place project.
Tivoli, feuille IGM 150
Villa Hadriana, photographie infrarouge en couleurs, années 70
© ICCD /Aerofototeca
In Italy
Aerofototeca (the Aerial Photograph Archive) was founded in 1958 within the Ministry for Education to contribute to understanding and safeguarding the environmental, architectural, archaeological and artistic national heritage. Aerofototeca, which since 1973 has been part of the Ufficio Centrale del Catalogo, initially focussed on archaeological prospection before widening its activities to reconnaissance of landscape as a whole. For several years, Aerofoteca has had a policy of acquiring old collections of air photographs.
Websites:
- http://www.iccd.beniculturali.it/istituto/aerofototeca.html
- http://www.iccd.beniculturali.it/servizi/aerofototeca.html
- http://www.iccd.beniculturali.it/standard/fotoaeree.html
In Poland