Palimpsest: What Stood Here

Most archaeology apps show you a reconstruction and let you believe it. Whether Enclosure D at Göbekli Tepe ever had a roof is disputed. Drawing it as though the question were settled is not a rendering choice; it is selling an opinion as knowledge. Palimpsest is built so that it cannot do that. DRAG THROUGH TIME Eight places, each with its layers. Move one finger and the layers cross-fade: Troy I to Troy VI to Roman Ilion, Stonehenge's ditch to its sarsen circle. EVERY LAYER CARRIES ITS SOURCE A layer with no source cannot be created at all — the initialiser returns nothing. Author, year, and an identifier you can go and look up, under every claim rather than in a credits screen. THREE LEVELS OF EVIDENCE, ON SCREEN Measured: an excavation report and a date. Reconstruction: a published interpretation. Disputed: the same evidence read more than one way. The level is drawn as a shape, not…