The DOI matches its Crossref record; 27 of the 27 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Succeeding CORONA: declassified HEXAGON intelligence imagery for archaeological and historical research
Abstract
Over the past 25 years, CORONA satellite imagery has become an integral part of archaeological research, especially for arid, sparsely vegetated regions such as the Middle East. Since 2020, a new archive of satellite imagery gathered by the US spy satellite programme that succeeded CORONA—HEXAGON—has become widely available for download via the United States Geological Survey. This photographic archive has enormous potential for archaeological research. Here, the authors seek to lower the barriers to accessing and using this imagery by detailing the background, technical specifications and history of the HEXAGON archive. Four case studies illustrate the benefits and limitations of HEXAGON imagery for archaeological and historical research in the Middle East and beyond.
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“However, this method has limited value for site identification in mountains and valleys due to site and terrain morphology (Hammer, 2014;Hammer et al., 2022).”
From Predictive modeling for targeted archaeological survey of arsacid period sites in the iranian borderland region of the araxes river valley (2026) · cites this paper as Hammer et al., 2022
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Cites
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CORONA Satellite Photography and Ancient Road Networks: A Northern Mesopotamian Case Study
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Positional Accuracy Evaluation of Declassified Hexagon KH-9 Mapping Camera Imagery
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Research works printed but not linked: 11
- Chester, 1985, A history of the HEXAGON program: the Perkin-Elmer involvement
- Perry, 1973, A history of satellite reconnaissance: the Perry HEXAGON history
- Belli, 1999, Nahçıvan'da Arkeolojik Araştırmalar
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- Fowler, 2004, Archaeology through the keyhole: the serendipity effect of aerial reconnaissance revisited, Interdisciplinary Science Reviews, 29, 118
- Fowler, 2016, The archaeological potential of declassified HEXAGON KH-9 panoramic camera satellite photographs, AARG News, 53, 30
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Cited by
Wang, J., Soroush, M., Maziar, S., & Khazraee, E. (2026) · Journal of Archaeological Method and Theory · doi:10.1007/s10816-025-09733-5 · Cited by 3
Metadata
- Authors
- Hammer, E., FitzPatrick, M., & Ur, J.
- Venue
- Antiquity
- Publisher
- Antiquity Publications
- Published
- 2022-03-14
- Volume
- 96
- Issue
- 387
- Pages
- 679-695
- ISSN
- 0003-598X
- 1745-1744
- Cited by
- 67
- References
- 27
- Language
- en
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