Tasks related to the inventory and cartography of archaeological sites due in last few years by the Municipality of Sabugal's Bureau of Archaeology, integrated on the project of municipal archaeological mapping, has suffered a methodological advance with the creation of the GIS Municipal Bureau. The tasks carried on by this unit creating and managing the geographic information has become a new contribution to the record and inventory of archaeological sites, as well to the management, analysis and data-cross. In a first phase, the sites were localized and mapped with GPS and their description was kept in a database as individual files, which made possible, in a second phase, the comparison of the several fields during a geoarchaeological research. It is presented in this paper a methodology showing that cross-information between the Bureaus of Archaeology and GIS could be fructuous for the management and distribution of information among the municipal services and to extend the knowledge provided by territorial investigations.

Humans always need to describe, represent and diffuse their territory, either by words or pictorial representations. Being Cultural Heritage an irreplaceable source to understand the past, its informative and documental value plays a major role upon the development of the Society of Information. Inventories and the traditional methods of producing and recording information are no longer adequate. We need a systematic methodology for the production and management of a lot of information and its spatial representation: an Information System for Cultural Heritage.

It is our intention to assess the urban archaeological activity carried out by the Service of Archaeology of the Faro Municipal Museum over the last years, referring to the progresses, regressions, successes, failures, and the difficulties of overcoming problems without any help, etc. All the above mentioned is integrated in the perspective of urban archaeology in Portugal and its most urgent needs. We also give examples from the British urban archaeology, which can be implemented in Portugal.

Language: Portuguese

Archaeology is undoubtedly the major source of materials for the Portuguese museums. But, what are we doing to establish the connection between those who coordinate the excavations and the places where the findings are going to be definitely deposited? How do we establish a clear and serious communication between those parts and how do we connect the museums to the public that is going to have access to those cultural items? Is there anything allowing the coherence of this process? The documentation gathered during archaeological excavations is the most important factor that enables museums to be efficient and serious in pursuing the tasks that have been entrusted to them. The incorporation of archaeological findings demands an accurate awareness and a scrupulous care. So, museums, as libraries in the past, have the responsibility of use and diffuse these rules, allowing those who relate with them the use of tools in accordance with their needs. Thus, we think it's time to expand the discussion of this question and to clarify and generalize the rules that should be used in Portugal. On these premises, we intend to outline some practices to be followed in the communication between those who have the responsibility to document and record the information concerning the fieldwork and those who, in the museum, will keep on with their work.

The aim of this paper is to introduce the reader to use-wear analysis. Thus, we thought it would be interesting to focus several topics related either to the theoretical-methodological realm and the practical issues. Knowing how use-wear is produced, which characteristics are present, which microscopes are used and which problems might arise during the analysis of prehistoric tools are the first steps that will make easier to understand how this method works. However, we think the best way of grasp the possibilities and limitations of use-wear analysis is to present the results of some case studies from investigations made at different sites with varied chronologies. As we will see, those analyses are not only centred on the technical issues concerning the tool form and function, but intend to produce historical explanations based on the socio-economic organization of the societies of the past.

This paper pays attention to the first moments of Archaeology during the nineteenth century, by examining the information about the news published in Portugal on this matter and referring also to the findings made abroad. Furthermore, those organizations that contributed to the development of the practice of Archaeology are scrutinized, as well as archaeological sites where the discovery of structures and the fieldwork caused more interest.

This paper starts by discussing the main concepts relating to heritage. It then turns to underwater heritage, particularly to the challenges of treasure hunting in Brazil. Underwater archaeology is considered as an archaeological endeavor, not an independent discipline, as a scholarly political activity, concerned with the menaces to underwater heritage.

"Contract Archaeology" is used in Ecuador in reference to the surveys and excavations of Salvage Archaeology. This paper analyzes the archaeological information referred to the county of Orellana (NE Ecuador). The archaeological information obtained by "Contract Archaeology" has been systematized and stored using a computerized database, and the geographic data was digitized by means of CAD software to generate thematic maps. Therefore, it is obtained an archaeological record system to use in future investigations in the Ecuadorian Amazon. Previous data have been used to carry out statistical analysis, using the chi-square test, to point out the relations between artefacts of material culture and the altitude of archaeological sites. Additionally, it is analyzed the relation of previous data and the location of the site with respect to the main river types.