Giving New Life to the Hama Collections through 3D Digitisation

Nearly a century after they were unearthed, the artefacts from Hama continue to reveal new stories. While the objects themselves remain unchanged, the way we document, analyse, and share them has been transformed.

Located on the Orontes River in western Syria, Hama is one of the Levant’s most important archaeological sites. Excavated by a Danish expedition between 1931 and 1938, it preserves one of the region’s longest archaeological sequences, spanning nearly six millennia from the Late Neolithic to the Iron Age. Following the excavations, the finds were divided between the Syrian authorities and the Danish expedition. Today, the Syrian collection is mainly housed in the Hama and Damascus Museums, while the Danish share is preserved at the National Museum of Denmark in Copenhagen. Together with the excavation records, drawings, and photographs, these collections form an invaluable archive for investigating the history of ancient Hama (Hald et al. 2025, Lumsden et al. 2023). Through two ongoing interdisciplinary research projects (Hama-projektet, Hama, City in the Upper Orontes Valley), they are now being re-examined using modern analytical approaches, including radiocarbon dating, archaeometry, archaeomagnetism, archaeobotany, archaeozoology, residue analysis, and digital documentation.

The exceptional value of the Hama collection lies not only in the artefacts themselves but also in the outstanding quality of their documentation. During the Danish excavations, the expedition’s architect, Ejnar Fugmann, produced thousands of meticulous illustrations, from detailed pencil drawings to exquisite watercolours (Fig. 1). Combining scientific precision with remarkable artistic skill, these drawings remain among the finest archaeological documentation produced in the Near East during the first half of the twentieth century and continue to be an invaluable reference for researchers.

Today, digital technologies complement this legacy by providing new ways to document, analyse, preserve, and share archaeological collections. High-resolution 2D and 3D modelling produces highly accurate digital records that faithfully capture both the geometry and colour of artefacts, creating new opportunities for research, conservation, and public engagement. In this blog post, we present the workflow developed to produce these models within our interdisciplinary Hama research projects at the National Museum of Denmark and highlight their potential for archaeological research, museum documentation, conservation, and dissemination.

As part of our ongoing research projects, two digitisation campaigns were carried out at the National Museum of Denmark in 2022 and 2024 to create high-resolution digital models of the Hama collection, focusing primarily on terracotta artefacts. This material is particularly well suited to structured-light scanning, allowing us to digitise a large number of objects efficiently while maintaining an exceptionally high level of accuracy. Structured-light scanning works by projecting a pattern of light onto the surface of an object. As this pattern is distorted by the object’s geometry, two cameras record the deformation from different angles. Specialised software then reconstructs the object’s surface as a dense three-dimensional point cloud, from which an accurate digital model is generated. Beyond its high level of accuracy, structured-light scanning is remarkably straightforward to use. After only a few hours of training, users can confidently acquire and process data, making it possible to produce highly detailed 3D models of small- and medium-sized artefacts quickly and efficiently (Fig. 2). In many ways, this digital workflow continues the meticulous documentation initiated by Ejnar Fugmann almost a century ago. While the tools have changed –from pencils and watercolours to structured-light scanners– the objective remains the same: to record archaeological artefacts as accurately as possible for future research.

1. Figurines: 3D recording for preservation, publication, and technological analysis

The digitisation of a corpus of 105 figurines had a dual objective: first, to ensure the long-term preservation and accessibility of the data through the creation of digital twins; and second, to collect quantified morphological data that can support new analytical approaches. The majority of the figurines belong to Level J of Hama, dating to the second half of the 3rd millennium BCE. They were recovered from well-stratified domestic contexts, providing an exceptional opportunity to study not only their iconography and function, but also their production techniques within a precisely defined archaeological framework. To facilitate acquisition, each figurine was placed on a rotating platform. The different surfaces of the object were progressively scanned from multiple angles to ensure a complete three-dimensional reconstruction. With the exception of painted figurines, the 3D models were intentionally recorded without colour, allowing a clearer observation of the surface characteristics, impressed decorations, and traces left by the manufacturing process (Fig. 3).

The resulting 3D models were imported into the software Artifact 3D (Grosman 2022), which enables the automated extraction of various types of data, including orthographic views, profiles, and metric measurements exported in CSV format (Fig. 4). These datasets facilitate the production of standardised archaeological illustrations and allow the integration of quantitative measurements into statistical analyses. Beyond documentation and publication, this approach opens new perspectives for the study of Hama’s figurines. The combination of 3D data and archaeological contextual information will make it possible to investigate more precisely the chaîne opératoire, identify recurrent manufacturing gestures, evaluate degrees of standardisation, and better understand the organisation of production during the second half of the 3rd millennium BCE.

2. Ceramic decoration: using 3D to investigate the tools and techniques behind impressed motifs

A selection of jars and cooking vessels dating to Phase J of Hama was chosen for this study. These vessels preserve impressed decoration on their surfaces. The objective is to use 3D models to reconstruct, as precisely as possible, the tools (seals, stamps, or other implements) that may have been used to create these decorative patterns. The 3D models of ceramic fragments were first oriented in order to calculate their original diameters and reconstruct their vessel profiles (Fig. 5a). To investigate the tool used to produce the decoration on jar 3B800, the decorative band was extracted from the 3D model and digitally unwrapped following the orientation axis of the vessel. This procedure removes the distortion caused by the curvature of the vessel wall and produces a flattened representation of the motif with minimal deformation (Fig. 5b). The most complete and readable sequence of impressions can then be isolated for further analysis. In order to approximate the original dimensions of the seal responsible for the impression, the extracted motif was enlarged by 5%, corresponding approximately to the average shrinkage of clay during firing. Based on the height and width of the resulting pattern, it is possible to estimate the dimensions of the seal used to create the decoration (Fig. 5c). Because the impressed decoration represents the negative imprint of the motif engraved or carved on the seal, the 3D model is digitally inverted and then wrapped around an axis in order to reconstruct the original form of the tool (Fig. 5d). This procedure was applied to a selection of five cooking vessels whose decorations were sufficiently well preserved to allow the reconstruction of the seals used in their production. The reconstructed seals will be produced through 3D printing and tested through experimental reproductions in order to evaluate their ability to generate the same decorative patterns observed on the archaeological ceramics.

3. Seal digitisation: from 3D models to virtual impressions

In a complementary approach, five seals were digitised in order to simulate their impressions virtually. While the previous workflow aims to reconstruct the decorating tools from impressed ceramic motifs, this reverse procedure starts from the original objects themselves, allowing their impressions to be recreated digitally. These virtual impressions provide a powerful means of enhancing the study of engraved motifs. By manipulating the direction of virtual lighting and generating slope and depth maps, subtle details of the carved surfaces become much easier to observe and interpret than on the original objects alone. Such visualisation tools reveal the morphology of the engraved designs with exceptional clarity, facilitating the identification of manufacturing techniques, engraving gestures, and stylistic characteristics. Beyond improving documentation, this approach also creates a reference dataset of digital impressions that can be directly compared with impressed decorations preserved on ceramic vessels. Combining these complementary datasets offers new opportunities to investigate the relationships between seals, decorative tools, and ceramic production at Hama (Fig. 6).

4. Potmarks: high-resolution 3D analysis of production marks

Level J at Hama has yielded a remarkable assemblage of potmarks, the vast majority of which were incised or impressed on ceramic vessels before firing. These marks raise important questions regarding their significance and their possible relationship to ceramic production, whether they refer to individual potters, workshops, administrative control, ownership, commodities, or other aspects of the production and distribution process. To complement the ongoing study of this corpus, 203 potmarks were digitised on a wide range of ceramic vessels, including jars, bowls, goblets, and other forms. The marks occur in various locations on the vessels, such as the base, body, rim, neck, and handles. Most were made before firing, although a small number were engraved after firing. To achieve the highest possible level of precision, only the area bearing the mark was scanned at high resolution (50 μm). This approach makes it possible to extract detailed cross-sections of the grooves and impressions left by the marking tools, allowing different tool types and manufacturing gestures to be identified. Combined with the archaeological database previously established for the Hama assemblage, these data will help identify possible production groups and workshops (Fig. 7).

The 3D analyses will be integrated with other lines of evidence, including the typology of both marks and vessels, archaeometric provenance studies, fingerprint analyses, and archaeological context. By combining these complementary datasets, we hope to move beyond the description of individual marks and gain a better understanding of their meaning and function within ceramic production. More broadly, this multidisciplinary approach offers new perspectives on the social and administrative organisation of pottery production associated with the emergence of urban societies and city-states in the Northern Levant during the second half of the third millennium BCE.

The digitisation of the Hama collections marks the beginning of a new phase of research. Beyond creating a permanent digital archive and improving access to the material, high-resolution 3D models provide a wealth of quantitative data that can be integrated with archaeological, archaeometric, and technological studies. The analyses currently underway aim to shed new light on craft production, manufacturing techniques, and the social and administrative organisation of one of the major urban centres of the Northern Levant during the third millennium BCE. The results will be presented in the forthcoming publication of the Hama excavations, demonstrating how digital technologies are transforming the study of archaeological collections.

Bibliography

Delamare, S. 2024. La modélisation 3D en archéologie : objectifs, enjeux et contexte d’utilisation : Du terrain à la réalité virtuelle : études de cas en archéologie programmée et préventive, Thèse de doctorat, discipline Archéologie et Préhistoire, Paris, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne. ⟨NNT : 2024PA01H034⟩. ⟨tel-05075631⟩

Fugmann, E. 1958. Hama: Fouilles et recherches 1931–1938, ii.1: L’architecture des périodes pré-hellénistiques, Copenhagen, National Museum.

Grosman L, et al. 2022. Artifact3-D: New software for accurate, objective and efficient 3D analysis and documentation of archaeological artifacts. PLoS ONE 17(6): e0268401. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0268401

Hald, M.M., Haslund Hansen, A., Lumsden, S., Mouamar, G. 2025. 90 years and counting: ongoing research on Hama in Western Syria, Technè 59, 14-23

Lumsden, S., Mouamar, G., Haslund Hansen, A., Hald, M.M. 2023. Hama on the Rebel River. A Syrian town in the 1930s through the Eyes of Danish Archaeologists, Aarhus,University Press, Proceedings of the Danish Institute in Damascus 18.

Wallet, M. « Scanner laser 3D VS scanner à lumière structurée : lequel choisir ? ». 3Dnatives, 8 août 2019. https://www.3dnatives.com/scanner-laser-3d-ou-lumiere-structuree-08082019/#!.

Les auteurs

Sabine Sorin is Engineer Researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), based at the Archéorient Laboratory (UMR 5133), Université Lumière Lyon 2, France. She specialises in 3D surveys and data processing. ORCID:0000-0003-2340-8829

Georges Mouamar is a Researcher at the French National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS), based at the Archéorient Laboratory (UMR 5133), Université Lumière Lyon 2, France. His research focuses on archaeology and cultural heritage in the Near East, with particular emphasis on the Bronze Age, the emergence of complex societies and early urbanisation in the Levant and Mesopotamia. He also specialises in archaeological ceramics and pottery technology, using chemical and petrographic analyses to investigate pottery production and provenance. He has conducted fieldwork and research projects in Syria, Iraq (Kurdistan Region), Lebanon, and the Sultanate of Oman. ORCID: 0009-0006-9080-8629

Mette Marie Hald is a Senior Researcher at the National Museum of Denmark. She has a PhD in Archaeology from the University of Sheffield, Great Britain. Her primary research focus is on food and culinary practices in the past. She has worked as an archaeobotanist at Tell Brak and Tell Hamoukar in Syria and currently works on a number of archaeological field projects in Jordan, Iraq, and Egypt. ORCID: 0000-0003-3610-332X

Stephen Lumsden is an Emeritus Scholar at the National Museum of Denmark. He has a PhD in Near Eastern Archaeology from the University of California, Berkeley, and has taught at universities in Denmark, Sweden, and Türkiye.  He has excavated at a number of sites in the Near East, including Nineveh, in Iraq, Qaleh-i Yazdigird, in Iran, and Gavurkalesi, in Türkiye. He was employed at the National Museum from 2009 until 2025, during which time he worked on the Hama collection in the Museum. ORCID: 0000-0002-6823-1193

---

---