The NordArk website has been created to guide those seeking information chiefly about Nordic archaeology. Contact Gun Larsson at the Library of the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities if you have any views to share or if you want more information about NordArk.

NordArk consists of three autonomous main sections - a Swedish and an English information guide and a library with descriptions of and links to publications on the Internet (The Knowledge Archives). There are two ways to search for information in NordArk: you can navigate via the orientation maps of the Information Guide and the Knowledge Archives and the page menus, or you can use NordArk's search function.

Project NordArk, stage 2

Target groups

NordArk's main target group is students at Swedish universities, as well as teachers and researchers at Swedish departments of archaeology and librarians. We also hope that NordArk will satisfy the need for knowledge among the general public both inside and outside Scandinavia.

Texts and selection

All the texts have been produced as part of Project NordArk. The selection and texts are the work of Gun Larsson at the Library of the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities, National Heritage Board. In stage 2 of Project NordArk, Jenny Ericsson has also worked with NordArk. The translation of information texts, the entire Information Guide and the titles and descriptions in the Knowledge Archives has been done in stage 2 of the project by Alan Crozier. Updates and new English texts are to be undertaken by NordArk's editor. NordArk's content and texts have been reviewed by a reference group of 25 persons - representatives of the National Heritage Board, the Museum of National Antiquities, county museums (plus Stockholm City Museum), county administrations, university departments and libraries. The participants have suggested improvements. Project reports are published on the website of the Library of the Royal Academy of Letters, History and Antiquities.

We are profoundly grateful to all those who have made contributions to NordArk. One idea in our work with the project has been to form a small editorial board which could publish directly in NordArk. Interest has hitherto been low, but anyone with information or hints that they wish to publish in NordArk can contact the editor Gun Larsson.

In physical terms, NordArk is located on a server belonging to Gotland University in Visby. The university assists Project NordArk by providing server space and technical support. Anyone who has problems using NordArk should first contact NordArk's administrator and editor-in-chief, see contact addresses.

The present version of NordArk has a simple technical design. Only the Knowledge Archives contains Java script. The idea is that NordArk's basic documents will be accessible to a wide audience. However, it is important to know that NordArk has links to all kinds of resources, some of which make special requirements of web browsers or need access to plugins - see the search hints in the descriptions.

The original intention was to order a search function designed for NordArk, but several technical advisers suggested that we look at external search engines which could be connected to our own website. We chose Atomz, which today provides the search function in NordArk. Via the different Atomz customer forms, the search function has been adapted for NordArk.

What is the Information Guide?
   
By clicking on the blue wing to the left you get to the Information Guide, which leads visitors through archaeological information, types of publications and search tools and gives search hints.

The Information Guide contains texts and links arranged in "drawers".

The drawers are placed in levels and coloured according to the category to which they belong. The categories are: producers, intermediaries, information carriers, search tools and Internet publications.

There are also different-coloured drawers at the top for information about the website, for sending tips or comments to NordArk, the Knowledge Archives and News.

The Information Guide also has a Swedish-language mirror, the Informationsguiden. This means that almost all the documents in the Information Guide have a Swedish-language counterpart.

Kunskapslagret, The Knowledge Archives (formerly the Link Library)

By clicking on the yellow wing to the right the visitor gets to the Knowledge Archives, which is divided by subject.

The Knowledge Archives contains links and brief information about resources - websites and documents - arranged by period, archaeological method and theory, and subjects/groups of objects. A new feature since the completion of stage 2 is that each resource has supplementary information in English. New fields are: English title (or translated title), English URL and description. The Knowledge Archives is continuously updated with new resources. If you want suggest any links, contact NordArk's editor.

The start page of the Knowledge Archives is intended as a visual orientation map and an information tree to assist the visitor to navigate. Archaeological method and theory are the roots, and the periods are the branches of the tree. To navigate further, click on a period or where the axis of a period meets a subject line.

The map does not claim to reflect an archaeological reality. The idea is that the image/map will give the Knowledge Archives a visual and flexible start page and that the visitor will be able to navigate easily and methodically to a particular resource.