Category: bija-knowles - Part 9

Three Arrested for Illegal Dumping at Necropolis From Sixth Century BC

Burial grounds dating back to the sixth century BC are usually taken pretty good care of and considered important national heritage sites – or at least you would have thought so. This wasn’t the case recently in Puglia, where an archaeological site from at least 500 BC was used as an illegal dumping ground. It is reported that 135 tons of dangerous waste – including building materials, disused wagons and other heavy-duty items from the state railways, as well as out-dated pneumatic machines and vehicles was left at three sites near the town of Martina Franca, near Taranto in southern Italy.

Three arrests were made over the weekend by the Italian financial police (Guardia di Finanza), who are investigating the crime. Only one of the three sites where refuse was dumped has been reported to be an archaeological site of considerable importance, but it is thought to cover an area of 16,000 square metres although no further details have yet been released.

Archaeological Sites of Taranto

The Itria Valley, between Taranto and Martina Franca, was part of Magna Grecia from the eighth century BC and there are several important sites and necropolises in the area, including:

The Triglie archaeological area, which is hugely important for its traces of several different historical periods, including prehistoric (there is a Bronze Age village), Greek (burial chambers, which were also, bizarrely, used as houses during Middle Ages), Roman (there is an aqueduct-hypogeum), and the medieval period (as noted by a tenth century village).
The Cacciagualani archaeological area, where several objects have been found, including a golden diadem and two rings found in a fourth century BC tomb.
Amastuola Farm, which is thought to be one of the first Greek settlements in the region, having been colonised by a group of Greeks during the seventh and sixth centuries BC.

That one of the area’s archaeological sites is now under several tons of industrial waste is a shocking reflection of several deep-rooted problems in Italy. It will no doubt raise many questions about the country’s waste disposal problems, as well as organised crime and the protection and funding of heritage sites.

Photo by Zeta.

Coastal Erosion Near Rome Uncovers Prehistoric Warrior

After almost 5,000 years of peace and quiet, a warrior thought to date from the eneolithic age has been roused from his sleep. The discovery was made in May this year, after a winter of high tides and storms led to coastal erosion in the area of Nettuno, near Anzio, south of Rome. Click here to see a video of the discovery and excavation. It is thought that the tomb may be part of a larger eneolithic or Copper Age necropolis. The warrior, nicknamed Nello by his finders, is believed to date from the third millennium BC.

The discovery was made during routine checks of archaeological sites at Torre Astura in the Nettuno area by a branch of Italy’s armed police force, the carabinieri for the protection of cultural heritage (carabinieri per la Tutela del Patrimonio Culturale). The skeleton was found about 10 metres from the beach by officers when they noticed an unusual fissure in the ground, thought to have been caused by land erosion. When they investigated, they found the buried warrior, with an the tip of an arrow still embedded in his ribs and surrounded by funerary vases.

Important Discovery

At first they believed the skeleton was that of a Roman soldier, but it has now been certified as dating from the third millennium BC making this a very important discovery. Further examination of the surrounding area will take place.

Marina Sapelli Ragni, the superintendent for archaeological heritage in Lazio, said that the objects found with the skeleton consisted of six ceramic vases all of which are very well preserved and are consistent with finds of the eneolithic, or copper age culture, which covers the third millennium BC. The finds will undergo further analysis over the coming months at a regional laboratory in Tivoli.

Photo by the Ministry of Cultural Heritage and Activities (Ministero per i Beni e le Attivit Culturali – MiBAC).

The Original Venice: Pictures Show Roman Town Beneath Venetian Cornfields

Scientists from the University of Padua have, for the first time, been able to decipher the streets and buildings of a lost Roman town called Altinum, just north of Venice. They did this by flying over the site near the modern-day village of Altino, which is today no more than a few cornfields to the naked eye. They then took aerial photos with cameras using near-infrared and other light wavelengths. The result is an image of the Altinum that lies half a metre or more below ground level, and clearly shows streets, a basilica, an amphitheatre and a canal. Historians believe the site is unique, in that it is the only Roman city in northern Italy not to have been built upon in subsequent centuries.

During the Roman era, Altinum was occupied by the Veneti tribe. As an important trading centre, it thrived and is thought to have been about the same size as Pompeii (which had about 20,000 inhabitants). In 452 AD, it was completely destroyed by the Huns. A century later, an invasion by the Lombards forced the Veneti to flee to the islands in the Venetian Lagoon (such as Torcello and Burano). This is believed to have been the founding of modern-day Venice, which also became a crossroads for traders. While Altinum was on the mainland, it was nevertheless on marshy terrain, which became built up, incorporating water systems (as the discovery of the canal suggests) to make it more habitable. It is generally considered to be forerunner of Venice.

The team from the University of Padua used their aerial images to analyse differences in plant colour and humidity in the soil, which varied according to the structures that lie beneath the topsoil. A strip of riper crops to the south of the ancient city centre showed the location of the canal. The study by Dr Andrea Ninfo and colleagues, of Padua University, is called The Map of Altinum, Ancestor of Venice.

Although the study was carried out in 2007, the results were published recently in Science magazine, which quotes Paolo Mozzi, a geomorphologist at the University of Padua in Italy, as saying: “Altinum is unique because it was not built upon in later times.”

The magazine also quotes Margherita Tirelli, inspector of the Archaeological Superintendence of Veneto and director of the National Archaeological Museum of Altinum, as saying: “Before what Professor Mozzi has done, it was impossible to imagine the complexity and distribution of the main buildings and structures of the municipium.”

This video on the BBC web site shows a ‘virtual flyover’ of Altinum.

Photos by: Science/AAAS and Andrea Ninfo, University of Padua.

Italy Update: Roman Shipwrecks and Berlusconi Found in Deep Water

The Ongoing Silvio Saga

That Berlusconi is involved in a tangled web of political scandal and lurid details about his private life is nothing new. To date he’s been accused of bribery, an impropriety with an under-age girl, as well as involvement with the mafia, all with impunity (which makes me laugh, because in the UK all you need to make an MP resign is the whiff of a dodgy expense claims form). After all, Silvio is not stupid by any means, and at times when a problem has arisen, he has been known to conveniently have a law passed to protect his interests. Head of state not allowed to own private media channels? Not a problem – a change in the law meant that Berlusconi could keep his Mediaset business empire, while also controlling state-run Rai. About to face trial in a case of bribery (in which Tessa Jowell’s estranged husband David Mills was sentenced to four and a half years in an Italian prison)? Again, Silvio didn’t have to worry, he just made himself, as a senior politician, immune from prosecutions. So far it seems that there really hasn’t been anything that could seriously damage Italy’s gaff-making, perma-tanned premier. While it’s fair to say that most Italians find him acutely embarrassing, many admire his ‘spirit of survival’.

Silvio in Deep Water?

So has something finally come along that will topple the PM? Sure, in the past couple of months he’s been accused of hosting parties with topless women in his Sardinian villa (as well as an ex Czech prime minister?) and the non-Silvio-owned papers have questioned his relationship with 18-year-old Noemi Letizia (a pretty, wannabe Italian TV starlet). He was publicly ditched (she wrote a letter to a national news agency) by his wife Veronica Lario, who filed for divorce in May. The latest twist in this torrid tale is that an escort girl, Patrizia D’Addario, 42, has now come up with the ‘Silvio tapes’ (recorded one night at the PM’s Rome residence by D’Addario because she wanted to ‘prove she had been there’). These are hilarious and allegedly record Mr Berlusconi asking said prostitute (whom he denies paying, but that’s a minor detail) to wait for him in ‘Putin’s bed’. Well, I was *almost* starting to feel sorry for the poor old thing (him, not her). He’s suffered enough surely? Let the old dog lie (in whichever prime minister’s bed he chooses). What’s more, while these scandals might be enough to shame most politicians, you can bet Silvio is laughing about it all in private what 72-year-old man wouldn’t see the funny side of a night spent with Ms D’Addario? Berlusconi still seems to have the knack of brushing aside embarrassment or scandal.

But Try Explaining Away 30 Phoenician Tombs…

But there is news just in that could truly land Italy’s prime minister in deep water. It has emerged, as part of the recordings on the Silvio tapes, that 30 Phoenician tombs dating back about 2,300 years have been found on the land surrounding Silvio’s Sardinian Villa Certosa, just north of Olbia in the north-eastern corner of the island (for the voyeuristic, see the villa and its surrounding land here). Officials from Sardinia’s Department of Culture have said that the discovery of these tombs has not been registered – a culpable offence in Italy. If the presence of these tombs is verified they would signify an important new discovery for archaeologists. Berlusconi has already come under criticism for the apparent non-declaration of the alleged archaeological discovery.

Berlusconi has already come under criticism for the apparent non-declaration of the archaeological discovery.

The ancient graves could shed some light on the culture of the Phoenicians, who started to settle on Sardinia in the eighth century BC. It was a convenient stop-off point on their trade routes between the silver and lead mines on the Iberian peninsular and the eastern Mediterranean. However, it is thought that most of the Phoenician towns on Sardinia were on the south-western part of the island. The largest towns include Karalis, Nora, Bithia, Sulcis (on the island of Sant’Antioco), Tharros and Bosa. Tharros was believed by some to be the second most important Phoenician city after Carthage. However, new evidence of settlement on the north-eastern side of the island could be significant and suppression of this information is viewed as illegal in Italy.

Five Shipwrecks Discovered

But Berlusconi isn’t the only thing apparently in deep water this weekend: five Roman trade ships have just been found off the coast of Ventotene, an island between Rome and Naples. The team of divers and underwater archaeologists used sonar and robotic submarines to located the shipwrecks, which have been found in extremely good condition, according to the BBC.

Resting at about 150m below sea level, the five vessels, thought to date from around 100-400 AD, have been protected from strong currents by their depth and position. They sank without capsizing, which means their cargo of olive oil, wine and the ubiquitous fish sauce was undisturbed the terracotta amphorae are still in their original loading position. The vessels sank on one of the main trading routes between Rome and Africa in fact, Africa was a major producer of olive oil during the Roman empire, and was an important exporter to Rome (although most of Rome’s olive oil imports came from Iberia).

The BBC quotes Annalisa Zarattini, from the Italian Culture Ministry, as saying that this underwater discovery is part of a wider plan to locate and examine sunken treasures and artefacts before looters can get to them. New sophisticated technology means that underwater probing is increasingly within the reach of private organisations, who may not hand their finds over to the Italian state. Zarattini says: It’s important that we arrive there first.

In State Hands, or Safe Hands?

Meanwhile, it seems that when it comes to handing archaeological finds over to the state, the one person who should be reminded of this is the prime minister himself. I won’t lose too much sleep worrying about the consequences he may face as a result of his cultural oversight. He can no doubt get his lawyers to plead that he IS the state, and so any Phoenician tombs found at Villa Certosa are already in ‘state’ hands. Besides which, he is immune from prosecution. As with most scandals, Silvio will just shrug this one off too and make light of it in one of his many media outlets.

Photo by Alessio85.

Five Quick Questions for Classicist Mary Beard

Mary Beard is professor of Classics at Newnham College, Cambridge, and Classics editor of the Times Literary Supplement. Her academic work mainly focuses on aspects of Roman and Greek culture and she claims to be ‘particularly interested in the reception of Classics in the modern world’. This is borne out by her column for the Times Online, A Don’s Life, which comments incisively on modern life, often with a classical twist – I particularly liked her suggestions for Latin catch-phrases for London’s tube commuters.

She also has a long list of published books to her name, the two most recent ones about Pompeii: Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town and The Fires of Vesuvius: Pompeii Lost and Found. So, of all the Roman and Greek archaeological sites, what was it about Pompeii in particular that piqued Mary’s interest?

I asked her five quick questions to find out more:

BK: What inspired you to write Pompeii: The Life of a Roman Town?

MB: Well in some ways the project goes back 30 years or more – to when I first went to Pompeii. I was blown over by the place, yet it was so different from what the courses I had taken at university had led me to believe. Quite simply, I have wanted to share some of the excitement, and the puzzles of the city – and to set people up for enjoying and exploring the city on their own, if they are lucky enough to be able to go.

It is the most exciting thing to survive from the Roman world – the one place (despite all the difficulties of interpretation) where you get an up-close idea of what living in the Roman world was like.

BK:You’ve obviously spent a lot of time on the site – what was your most exciting moment there?

Roman baths hygienic? Come off it

MB: There were two moments – one was in a house usually closed to the public. We were walking round and came across two of those plaster casts of the dead/dying, on the stairway, just where they had fallen.

The other was wandering round the city with a friend who now works in the archaeological service there – and whose father had worked as a craftsman on the site. It was amazing having the work and the restorations carried out by the father 60 years ago pointed out. We tend to forget that Pompeii is still a community, people live near about, care for the site, make their careers there.

BK: What do you think your book offers that others about Pompeii miss out?

MB: For a start I think that it isn’t too preoccupied with the eruption, the pyroclastic flows etc. It is most of all interested in the living city. There are some other books like that, to be fair – but many concentrate on the disaster aspects!

Perhaps more special is that it shares the fun of making sense of the city with the reader. It is not concerned just to tell a story, but to show how we put together all the confusing and conflicting evidence to make some kind of sense. It’s as much about how as what we know.

It is also quite a lot more sceptical that most. Roman baths hygienic? Come off it.

BK: What are you working on as your next project/book?

MB: I’m working on a book about Roman laughter.

BK: What’s the most enjoyable part of your work… and the most frustrating?

Very hard to say… I don’t think that the Greeks and Romans were very nice (in our terms), but they are hugely interesting – and they have been found interesting for hundreds of years, in different ways. I suppose I enjoy the processes of historical reconstruction, but also trying to see in what ways the ancients can still speak to us. The frustrating bit is when people think that this is all terribly remote, hopelessly academic – and completely ivory tower. Sure, some bits of it are – but much of it is fascinating for anyone…

And yes understanding the past is essential to understanding the future.

New Finding: Tuscans are not Etruscans

New research suggests that there is no genetic link between the inhabitants of modern-day central Italy and the civilised race who lived there well before the rise of the Roman empire. Despite the fact that the Etruscans were never physically wiped out by the Romans, experts have concluded that for some reason they are not the ancestors of the modern-day Tuscans.

Etruria spanned from south of Rome up to the Po River valley during the civilisation’s most powerful period, and the Etruscans inhabited the area of Rome before the city claimed its independence from the Etruscan kings in 509 BC. Etruria was then reduced to a series of city states, each of which was conquered in turn by the invading Romans as they

Immigration and forced migration have diluted the Etruscan genetic inheritance so much as to make it difficult to recognise.

brought the whole Italian peninsular under their rule. However, in doing so, the Romans did not carry out one of their wholesale massacres, which were not uncommon as their territory expanded. Rather, the Etruscans were assimilated into the empire and continued to live in the area of modern-day Tuscany, Lazio and Umbria under Roman rule.

It is therefore surprising that researchers from several Italian universities have found that there is no genetic lineage whatsoever between the bronze-age Etruscans and modern-day Italians of Tuscany. However, there is shared DNA between Medieval Tuscans and those of today.

The Discovery Channel reports that the population in this area of central Italy have undergone significant demographic changes. The channel quotes two researchers, David Caramelli of Florence University and Guido Barbujani of Ferrara University, as saying: “Some people have hypothesized that the most ancient DNA sequences, those from the Etruscan era, could contain errors or have been contaminated, but tests conducted with new methods exclude this. Immigration and forced migration have diluted the Etruscan genetic inheritance so much as to make it difficult to recognise.

Photo by mdnicholson42.

Exhibition Preview: The Road Through the Forum

Via Dell’ Impero

An exhibition opening today at the Musei Capitolini in Rome shows the building of the city’s infamous via dei Fori Imperiali (previously via dell’ Impero), which also tore through the forums of Nerva, Augustus and Trajan, with little regard for the ancient Roman constructions that lay beneath.

Via Dell’ Impero – Nascita di una Strada (Birth of a Road) will feature photos, paintings and sketches by professional Roman photographers and artists, including Filippo Reale, Cesare Faraglia and Odoardo Ferretti. The exhibition runs until20 September, documenting the demolition of buildings and the excavations which took place before the via dell’Impero was constructed.

Mussolini’s Rome

In the 1930s, Italy was under the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini, leader of the National Fascist Party. The Fascists took some inspiration from the Roman empire and to a certain extent modelled their large, colonnaded constructions and expansionist ideologies on the civilisation they saw as their political and cultural predecessors. In fact, by 1936 Mussolini was using the title ‘Founder of the Empire’ as part of his official name. It is surprising then, that during the 1930s a strip of land 30 metres wide, between Piazza Venezia and the Colosseum in Rome, was stripped of its buildings (some medieval, many residential) in order to make way for a grand road: one that was worthy of a grand triumph in true Roman style.

Elephants in the Forum?

Also on show are some of the objects found during the excavation work, including marble statues and fragments of painted Roman plaster. While care was taken during the excavation to preserve thousands of these objects, most were stored in crates in the Capitoline Museums and were labelled simply as ‘Via dell’ Impero’, so little further information is available about their exact location of discovery.

Among the more surprising finds during the road’s construction was a prehistoric elephant’s tusk, proving that the Romans, or even the Etruscans (or should that be ‘Etuskans’?) were certainly not the first inhabitants of the Roman Forum.

Rome and Antiquity: A Give-and-Take Relationship

Sixty photos go on display, documenting the demolition of buildings and the excavations which took place before the via delll’Impero was constructed.

While Mussolini is usually the sole object of blame when lamenting the parts of the Roman Forum lost forever beneath Rome’s busy four-lane road, it is worth pointing out that Il Duce’s desire to ‘improve’ Rome, while giving what we would call insufficient regard to its heritage, was part of a wider movement that started when Italy was unified in around 1871.

At yesterday’s press preview, the museum’s superintendent, Umberto Broccoli, urged the gathering of assorted Italian journalists to see the creation of via dell’ Impero as a continuation of the siege of Rome in 1870, after which Rome and Lazio were annexed to the Italian state. During this siege, the Aurelian walls were bombarded and badly damaged showing that swathes of modern history will inevitably sweep over the remains of the past and leave their own marks. Following the unification, troops from Piedmont occupied Rome and, once again, the face of the city was changed, with many old buildings being painted in Piedmont’s colours.

That the politicians, archaeologists and architects of the past century had a different attitude to conserving Rome’s heritage is beyond doubt but,according to Broccoli, the via dell’ Impero was not simply a product of Mussolini’s crass desire to build a grand capital for his very own empire. Rather, it is set in the historical context of about 80 years (from 1870 to the end of the second World War), during which Italy as a nation was establishing its new political identity. This exhibition gives an insight into the construction and excavations of the 1930s, which changed the face of the Roman Forum, as well as modern Rome, forever.

An Aside:

(Insight into the world of Italian press conferences: journalist from a national daily scribbling madly on a leather-bound notebook, looks like a veteran of several Afghan wars but now reporting on the arts in Rome? Lots of elegantly dressed women not taking notes at all, digital cameras flashing and everyone jostling for interviews with the venerable archaeologists present, who have quasi-celebrity status in the world of Italian arts and culture. But who were the elderly couple heckling in the corner?)

All photographs provided from the exhibition, from the Museo di Roma-Archivio Fotografico Comunale.

Libya’s Terracotta Army

Terracotta armies are certainly in the news at the moment. The long-awaited third dig of Qin Shihuang’s tomb finally got under way last month in China, while a slightly more idiosyncratic clay army was causing some consternation in Germany last week: prosecutors are investigating whether the saluting garden gnomes created by artist Ottmar Hoerl are in fact breaking strict German code that bans Nazi symbols and gestures.

Libya’s Terracotta Army

While these terracotta armies grab the limelight, there is another ‘army’ of 4,500 small terracotta figurines, which were uncovered during excavations at the Greek and Roman ruins of Cyrene near Shahhat in Libya. Although most of the figurines were discovered during a previous excavation phase, it is thought likely that more terracotta votive figures may lie undiscovered at the site. The site was excavated between 1969 and 1978 when thousands of the clay figurines were discovered at the Extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone. The sanctuary was once the focus of cult worship from the early sixth century BC, until it was destroyed by an earthquake in 365 AD. The Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone was one of Cyrene’s most important religious sites, and was where the annual religious festival, the Thesmophoria, would be celebrated to pray for safety and agricultural prosperity.

As a corpus they represent the largest and most diverse assemblage for North Africa that has been brought to light thus far, even though the sanctuary has only been partially explored.

The terracotta figurines were discovered alongside other items at the Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone, including pottery, sculpture, lamps, jewellery, coins, glass and personal ornaments. The figurines were far from the most important votive offerings made at the sanctuary; in fact they represented a cheap form of thanksgiving and were readily available. They were found scattered at different locations around the sanctuary during 10 years of excavation work.

In 1981 archaeological work came to a halt as the relationship between Libya and the West deteriorated and 23 years passed before the excavation could recommence. In 2004, the sanctuary again became the focus of study for the Cyrenaica Archaeological Project (CAP), a joint venture between Oberlin College (USA) and the University of Birmingham (UK), directed by Professor Susan Kane of Oberlin College. However, the project is currently on hold due to visa restrictions.

North Africa’s Largest Assemblage of Terracotta Figurines

While the Cyrenaic votive figures may not be able to compete with the Terracotta Army’s 8,000 clay soldiers, it is nevertheless a fascinating find that has received little international attention. Professor Emerita Jaimee Uhlenbrock, from the State University of New York’s department of Art History (at the New Paltz campus), has been studying the figurines from the Extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone at Cyrene and is also Chair of the Coroplastic Studies Interest Group. She told Heritage Key: “As a corpus they represent the largest and most diverse assemblage for North Africa that has been brought to light thus far, even though the sanctuary has only been partially explored.”

The earliest figurines (from the seventh century BC) found at Cyrene were brought to Cyrenaica from other terracotta-producing centres in the Greek world. By the fifth century they were being produced locally, probably using methods of serial-production. Most of the figurines from the Extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone date from the early fifth to the later fourth centuries BC and experts believe they were offered by the city’s Greek population (the Extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone being a Greek sanctuary complex consisting of several buildings over a sprawling area).

Many terracotta small-scale sculptures have been found at Cyrene at various other sanctuaries as well. The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston currently holds some figurines from the Sanctuary of the Chthonic Nymphs, which is on the acropolis of Cyrene, at the other end of the ancient city from the Extramural Sanctuary of Demeter and Persephone.

Photo by Martin Beek.

Cultural Crisis in Libya as Roman Statues Looted

Libya’s Roman and Greek heritage is disappearing as we speak according to a report in the UAE English language paper The National.

Sites such as Leptis Magna, Cyrene and Sabratha have been extremely well preserved by Libya’s dry climate and the encroachment of the Sahara, which covered them for centuries. Mosaics, temples, theatres and Roman homes remain very much intact in these ancient cities, providing valuable evidence of the Roman empire’s occupation of Northern Africa during the first to the fifth centuries AD, as well as the pre-Roman Punic and Greek habitations.

But a lack of government funding and scant security has left these sites vulnerable to looting by art smuggling cartels, as well as locals digging for Roman coins to sell to tourists. In 2000, the heads of 15 statues disappeared from Cyrene (once a Roman town built at the site of an original Greek settlement). According to The National’s correspondent Iason Athanasiadis, looting originally started back in 1987 when Libya opened its border with Egypt. Since Libya’s improved relations with western Europe in 2003, the problem has accelerated, with what Athanasiadis calls an unprecedented gutting of Libyas ancient heritage sites.

There are estimates that the business of smuggling antiquities provides the largest turnover in the world, second only to oil and equal to arms sales.

To give an idea of the scale of the problem, Colin Renfrew of Cambridge University, who is working to stop international antiquities thefts, told Athanasiadis: There are estimates that the business of smuggling antiquities provides the largest turnover in the world, second only to oil and equal to arms sales. But you cant put a figure on a secret trade.

In fact this problem has been going on for a long time and has also been reported by the BBC: Libya fears for its stolen heritage. However, the problem is now escalating.

Libya, which officially renounced terrorism and weapons of mass destruction in 2003, has since sought to make tourism one of its main bread-winners. This seems unlikely to happen if the government continues to allow the country’s heritage to disappear.

Photo by Xavier de Jaurguiberry.

New Finding of Iron Age Town Suggests Boudica Revolt at Silchester

Silchester in Hampshire, UK, stands on the site of the Roman town of Calleva Atrebatum, which is currently being excavated by a team of archaeologists from the University of Reading. The project has been running since 1997, but the archaeologists now believe they have found traces of a settlement that pre-dates the Romans.

The excavation has uncovered remnants from a town with a planned street grid possibly one of Britain’s oldest Iron Age towns. The director of the Silchester Town Life Project, professor Michael Fulford, told the BBC: “After 12 summers of excavation we have reached down to the first century AD and are beginning to see the first signs of what we believe to be the Iron Age and earliest Roman town. The discovery of the underlying Iron Age settlement is extremely exciting.

Any Old Iron

The professor added in a BBC report that the finds of a settlement pre-dating 43 AD beneath a Roman town were not unique. The Roman towns at Verulamium (St Albans), Durovernum Cantiacorum (Canterbury) and Camulodunum (Colchester), also show signs of earlier settlements beneath their foundations, but they are not as extensive or planned on a grid like the site at Calleva.

They have also found evidence of a widespread fire throughout the Roman town between 50 and 80 AD signs perhaps of the torching that Calleva Atrebatum may have received at the hands of Boudica in 60 or 61 AD? If this is proved to the be the case, it would be a major piece of new evidence for the Roman history of Britain. Boudica’s uprising is not known to have affected Calleva, but the exact extent and towns affected by the Iceni revolt are not known. The location of her defeat is still a matter of debate, with some historians saying the location was in the West Midlands, while others argue for evidence in Essex.

Visit the Site

Tomorrow, 18 July, and Saturday 1 August are open days and visitors are welcome to participate in a range of activities including expert tours, talks and demonstrations. There are also a range of children’s activities, such as a mini excavation, dressing up, finds handling and planning. Admission and activities are free.

Otherwise the site is open to visitors every day between 10am and 4.30pm, except Fridays, until 9 August when the excavation ends. For more information see the Silchester Excavation web site.