Community on Fortification Research

The COMFORT group will be part of the biannual Kiel Conference in 2027 with two sessions covering different aspects of fortifications:

Session 07: The Big Picture

Showing, Sharing, and Synthesizing Fortification Data

This session is intended as a forum for discussing how such an integration might be achieved. The central idea is not to dissolve existing databases into a single central repository, but rather to enable the integration of independently maintained datasets in their current form at a given point in time. Achieving this will require the development of a metadata database capable of linking and harmonising the underlying resources. We therefore propose to use this session as an opportunity to plan and discuss the necessary data-management strategies.

Session 10: How to read fortifications

Fortifications for Mitigation, Defence, and Showing Power

This session aims to explore how these multiple interpretations can be integrated into coherent interpretative models that improve our understanding of past conflicts. Rather than considering these different interpretations as mutually exclusive, we encourage approaches that integrate them in order to better understand the role of fortifications within broader processes of conflict and conflict management.