The Alexandria Archive Institute

OPENING THE PAST, INSPIRING THE FUTURE

The Road Most Traveled: An Archaeological Survey Guide

by

On a dark blue banner in white reads "A Digital Data Story". Perpendicular to that in light blue across the top reads "The Road Most Traveled: An Archaeological Survey Guide". Below that is the Open Context logo of a blue rhombus with long edge oriented up and down on the left and light blue rhombus in the same orientation to form a door next to the words "Open Context". This is above words that say "The Alexandria Archive Institute". In the center is a series of trowels in dark blue, pink, light blue, and purple that are connected via swirling dashed lines to location tear drops farther down the page. This is meant to illustrate that this data story focuses on survey.

 This Solo Series Digital Data Story is now published.

This exercise is best suited to those with an interest in archaeological survey, archaeological data collection, or using mindful observation skills for archaeology and daily life. Users should have a basic understanding of observation and recording methods, such as handwritten, audio, or video recording, but previous experience with archaeology or data creation is not required.

This page provides access to the resource in two ways. The first is through a series of digital documents that represent the completed Digital Data Story. The documents include the:

    1. Teaching Guide
    2. Observation Guide
    3. An optional survey form

A single PDF for the combined Digital Data Story materials is available here. The text is also available through the Digital Data Stories code repository on Codeberg. These markdown files represent the source material for the text and primary images within the PDF and digital documents, minus additional formatting and with only a general placement of select decorative images. The markdown files may be altered and forked from the Codeberg repository for custom use in different contexts. This code represents our commitment to open science and transparency in our process.

These materials, either through the single PDF publication of record, dynamic digital documents, or the code, are designed to be used synergistically. However, any piece of this Digital Data Story may be used separately or re-ordered according to the requirements of the user or for specific educational goals. In addition, this Digital Data Story references Gabbing about Gabii: Going from Notes to Data to Narrative, specifically, Part One: Notes to Data. As of December 2025, The Road Most Traveled and its resources are available free to use under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license. The text for the Gabbing About Gabii are also available under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license, as of August 2026. Some decorative images within each resource may be under more restrictive licenses. See each resources’ credits for more details.

Thank you so much for utilizing our educational resources! Although this Digital Data Story is published, if you or your participants have the time, please consider contributing an open peer review for our ongoing review process. Such updates will be noted below and first available through the digital documents and Codeberg repository prior to PDF updating. 

To attribute this Digital Data Story or any of its parts, please use our suggested citation:

Paulina F. Przystupa and L. Meghan Dennis, 2024, “The Road Most Traveled: An Archaeological Survey Guide”, Data Stories Program, Alexandria Archive Institute / Open Context, Published Online, DOI: https://doi.org/10.6078/M79S1P6F

Page first published: November 2023

Page updated: 19 August 2024 – This Digital Data Story completed peer review in 2023 and, after revision, is now published. Major updates included reordering the observation rounds, adding more spaces for interaction within the document through internal hyperlinks in the digital documents and PDF, textual updates, a shortened URL shortened due to slight name change for the Digital Data Story, and updated or additional images. 20 and 21 August 2024 – Updated DOIs for Digital Data Story documents and updates to the wording on this stable page. 6 November 2024 –  Added suggested citation. December 2025 – The license for this Digital Data Story, as per Creative Commons guidelines, was updated to a more open license (CC BY) with the consent of all authors on the work. Any images within the resource that require more restrictive licensing listed as licensed separately from the greater resource. Minor updates include new images credits and other changes such as the single PDF DOI now routing to Version 2.1. Version 2.0 available at https://zenodo.org/records/15476291 for additional comparison. This page updated August 2026 to describe these changes, with the page getting some minor textual edits and an update to the heading image to match the new version.

Image credit: “The Road Most Traveled Header Title Updated 2.1” by L. Meghan Dennis and Paulina F. Przystupa (2025) from the Data Literacy Program (DLP) / CC BY. It includes “TRMT_MainImage_2025” with the same attribution information as the header itself. “TRMT_MainImage_2025” includes the following icons in various colors: “Location #7591911” by Funtasticon, “Trowel #7178619” by Fathur Rachman, “Trowel #5987233” by Hothouse Design, “Trowel #4604509” by Muhammad Atiq, and “brick trowel #7770351” by Uswa KDT from the Noun Project (https://thenounproject.com/icon/location-7591911/, https://thenounproject.com/icon/trowel-7178619/, https://thenounproject.com/icon/trowel-5987233/, https://thenounproject.com/icon/trowel-4604509/, https://thenounproject.com/icon/brick-trowel-7770351/) all under royalty-free licenses.