The editor(s) of the EXARC Journal and EXARC Journal Digest are committed to promoting sustainable, responsible, and inclusive studies of experimental archaeology, archaeological open-air museums, ancient & traditional technology, interpretation, and education. We support, use, and follow the guidelines compiled and prepared by COPE regarding authorship and contributorship, intellectual property, and peer review processes etc. The full list of guidelines can be found on their website https://publicationethics.org/core-practices. All authors are expected to be aware of and comply with our editorial and journal policies, as outlined below. We also provide resources on how to publish experimental archaeology, please see https://exarc.net/journal/how-publish-experimental-archaeology.

Sustainability

Preservation of cultural heritage is linked to preservation of humanity and our planet, and archaeology provides a unique insight into this relationship. From site survey to the excavation, to conservation of artefacts and biodiversity, from social impact to environmental, archaeologists and open-air museums have a pivotal role to play in communicating and educating about sustainability. Researchers should use sustainable solutions where possible, promote inclusivity and diversity, and nurture partnerships and collaborations. For details on EXARC’s work with sustainability and the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals, please visit https://exarc.net/sdg.

Authorship, contributions, and plagiarism

By submitting articles to the EXARC Journal and the EXARC Journal Digest the author or corresponding author attest the following:

• The manuscript is the work of the author or authors.
• All authors listed have contributed to the manuscript through research design, data collection, conducting experiments, method development, analysis, manuscript development and/or manuscript revisions.
• All authors listed have approved the submitted version of the manuscript and agreed to its submission to the EXARC Journal and EXARC Journal Digest.
• Any contributions from Artificial Intelligence technologies are declared upon submission.
• This is an original manuscript that has not been published elsewhere.
• The manuscript is not under, or about to be submitted for, review in any other journals.
• Experiments, methods, and analyses are described in sufficient detail so that the study can be replicated by other researchers.
• No part of the manuscript is plagiarised from other sources.
• Proper reference is provided for all contents extracted from other sources.
• Any competing or conflicting interests by any of the authors is disclosed to the editor(s) upon submission. This includes, but is not limited to, financial interests such as employment, consulting fees, compensation or honoraria received, and financial support, as well as personal interests such as family relationships and academic mentorship or relationship (e.g., supervisor or thesis advisor) within the last 48 months.

Strong action will be taken against cases of plagiarism. Plagiarism includes, but is not limited to, omitting references and directly copying text, images, data or ideas from other sources without attribution. All submitted papers pass through an initial screening and will be checked through Duplichecker, advanced plagiarism detection software.

Ethics of studies

The study must meet discipline-specific ethical standards and follow the ethical conduct of research using animals and humans and handling confidential data. This means, for example, that informed consent must be obtained from all human participants. Authors must include a sentence on ethical clearance where this is relevant in their methods section or acknowledgements.

Reviewing & editing

The accepted articles for the reviewed sections are screened for plagiarism and go through a first round of editing for language and obvious problems (for example lack of references or not using Harvard referencing) before they are submitted for peer-reviewing. The authors are then consulted about any suggested changes and will have approximately three weeks to react to the reviewers’ comments.

The reviewers are anonymous (single blind review) and part of a permanent pool for each section. In cases of highly specialised topics or doubts from one of our general reviewers, we will approach a specialist for a second opinion. All reviewers and editors must disclose any competing interests that makes them unable to make an impartial review of a manuscript. The reviewers submit their recommendations (publish as is, publish with amendments, publish in Mixed Matters, or do not publish) and suggest amendments/ improvements. Once the texts are updated, they are then sent for a second round of editing/ proofreading, which includes a style check. The last step in text preparation is a bibliography and reference check where we also unify Harvard style referencing.

All pre-publication changes are done in consultation with the author and, with exception of minor formatting changes (for example use of italics or unifying Harvard referencing), we do not make any changes to the text without the author’s approval.

Corrections and retractions

The editor(s) may correct minor errors in a published manuscript without consulting the author(s) before the correction is made. Minor errors are mistakes that do not substantively affect the results, such as grammar mistakes or misspellings. The author or corresponding author should, however, be informed about the correction(s) and given the opportunity to voice any concerns in the matter. The author or corresponding author may request minor corrections to a published article by contacting the editor(s). Minor corrections are performed at the discretion of the editor(s). A note stating any post publication corrections will be attached to the updated article. Name changes, changes in pronouns or other changes to the status of authors are considered minor changes and a note of such changes will be attached to an article at the author’s request.

Major errors include errors of a scientific nature that do not alter the overall results or conclusion of a published article. If a major error is discovered in a published manuscript by the author or corresponding author, they should notify the editors of the EXARC journal. Similarly, the editor(s) should notify the author or corresponding author of any major errors discovered. A major error can be corrected through an independent article or short declaration in the EXARC Journal and/or EXARC Journal Digest and a note will be attached to the original article if a correction is published. The editor(s) will review notifications of major errors and decide if the errors warrant a correction and may consult with reviewers or get a scientific second opinion from others if necessary to review the case.

The author, the corresponding author, or the editor(s) may retract a published manuscript and remove it from the EXARC Journal website. Reasons for retraction include honest error, scientific misconduct, unsubstantiated or irreproducible data, and plagiarism. The editor(s) are obliged to retract any article that fails to comply with the editorial policies outlined in this document. A note will be published on the retraction of an article and the note may contain the reason for the retraction.

Copyrights and article sharing

All titles are open access. When sharing content, non-authors are bound to our Creative Commons BY-NC Attribution Non-Commercial License. Users have the right to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full text of articles in this journal, and to use them for any other lawful purpose. Please check https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/ for further details.

Author(s) holds the copyright and retain publishing rights without restrictions. Articles submitted, accepted, or published in the EXARC Journal or EXARC Journal Digest have no embargo period whatsoever. Authors are encouraged to share their article immediately after publishing via any channel they like. Authors can publish those at their own convenience at an Institutional Repository, PubMed Central, ArXiv, another Open Access Repository, a Pre- Print Server or at the author's Personal Website. The use of social media sharing is encouraged.

EXARC offers authors a PDF version of their published article. The authors may generate and download the PDF of their article at their own convenience using the PDF button in the heading section of the online article. EXARC also offers authors article download/read statistics, based on our Google Analytics, at request.