Saima GULZAR / Muhammad NAWAZ CHAUDHRY / Jean-Pierre BURG
(University of the Punjab, Lahore, Pakistan)

Abstract:
Pakistan possess rich cultural heritage represented by a wide variety of standing monuments and archaeological sites nearly in all parts of the country. Built Heritage is the valuable resource as well as the reservoir of cultural heritage through which a society can relate its present to the past and can establish its future.
The acknowledgment of built heritage in our region is much more acute and different from those in other parts of the world. As a result much of our past has been lost. The ignorance and negligence is at the state as well as at public level. The present age of technological advancements, globalization and information technology has now brought awareness about this subject.
The main objective for this research was the scientific examination of the heritage materials based on advanced technologies to formulate the conservation and restoration methodologies within the local context. The selected site of Shahdara complex is the masterpiece of Mughal architecture in the subcontinent that comprises of three large beautifully landscaped tombs with ancillary historic structures.
The diagnostic study is a three stage process which ends up with the laboratory analysis on state of the art instruments to co-generate the ancient materials’ composition/ technologies with their modern interpretations.
The interpretations of results clearly depict the difference in composition and properties for two different sets of heritage materials; one being the originally used at construction time and the other used later repairs. The materials used for the restorations/ repairs of the historic structures during some past years are not found compatible with the original ones therefore they are still in deteriorated conditions.
The expected outcomes of the research were the characterization of materials and study the interaction of the materials with the surrounding environment with the impacts of environmental factors.

Keywords:
Historic Materials, Scinetific Examination, Advanced Technologies