S. Hermon1, F. Niccolucci2, A. Francesca3, M.-R. Iovino4, V. Leonini5
1 PIN, VAST-Lab, S.r.l., Prato, Italy
2 Università degli studi di Firenze,Italy
3 Università La Sapienza, Rome, Italy
4 Centro Internazionale di Sperimentazione, di Documentazione e di Studio per la Preistoria e l'Etnografia dei Popoli Primitivi, Siracusa, Italy
5 Università degli studi di Siena, Italy

Since its definition in the early sixties, fuzzy logic has been successfully applied to various fields of natural and exact sciences, mostly in researches related to predictive modelling or typological classification. While fuzzy logic concepts are presently applied to predictive models using GIS applications, few typological classifications of archaeological remains have adopted concepts of fuzzy logic. Previous research has shown the problematic of archaeological typologies based on Boolean logic, whenever the definition of types is loose or a subjected interpretation from researchers is required. Moreover, uncertainties which occur in many typological classifications are obscured by the need to assign each artefact to a single, distinct type. Fuzzy logic has been successfully applied, at an experimental level to classification of lithic artefacts in the past, the research being presented in the last CAA meeting. This paper presents further experiments in applying fuzzy logic to classification of lithic and ceramic archaeological artefacts, bones deriving from archaeological sites and interpretation of use-wear analysis on lithic artefacts. Consequently, a method of classification of archaeological materials using fuzzy logic will be presented, together with its implications to archaeological reasoning.
Keywords: typology, fuzzy logic, reasoning, classification, interpretation