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‘Capacity’, the ULB Solution for Vessel Capacity Calculation

par Bavay, Laurent ;Ercek, Rudy ;Cateloy, Cydrisse
Editeur scientifique Tsingarida, Athena ;Schmidt, Stephan
Référence (Bruxelles), The Corpus Vasorum Antiquorum 1922-2022. A Century of Exploring Greek Vases: Typologies, Readings and Debates., page (469-484)
Publication Publié, 2024

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Résumé :

Vessel capacity is increasingly recognised as an important element for the definition of use and function of ceramic containers, as well as for classification purposes. It also offers a relevant way to approach standardisation and variation within pottery production, a topic which has seen considerable advances in recent years.In 2006, archaeologists and civil engineers from ULB teamed up to develop a computer solution to automatically calculate the capacity of a vessel from its scale drawing. This web-based application has been freely accessible online since then and has proved an easy-to-use and robust tool for pottery studies, credited in a large number of publications. Since 2020, a major revision of the solution was developed in two phases. Based on users’ feedback, new tools have been implemented to improve the user experience and offer the possibility to manually correct problems in the automatic treatment of the image. The user’s personal account also includes a library of all uploaded drawings which allows to easily retrieve previous calculations.In order to assess the accuracy of the application, a detailed comparative study has been conducted of direct and mathematical capacity calculation methods, applied on a corpus of 10 Etruscan amphorae from the Grand Ribaud F shipwreck which were documented by one of the authors. The results confirm the reliability of the ULB solution, which stands out as the most open and straightforward tool currently available for the calculation of vessel capacity.The new version is accessible at https://capacity.ulb.be