Plans for Season 2007
In the summer of 2007 we will again divide the excavation between that of the Roman pars rustica, which we hope to complete this year, with, perhaps, a view of its still-hidden lower storey, and the medieval church and its monastery precinct. In front of the church, the deep cemetery will be excavated by our physical anthropologist Walter Pantano, who will use this opportunity to train students in the techniques of cemetery excavation, while conducting a seminar in the recording of human skeletal materials in the evening. A deep sounding in the valley below the main site will test the depth of the colluvial stratigraphy and provide a first glimpse of a paleobotanical sequence: as yet no midden deposits for the inhabited monastery have been found, and we hope that this may reveal an area of dumping. The graphic documentation of the architectural remains and their important ornamental veneers will also be undertaken. The British School geophysics team will complete the survey of the site initiated last summer, which has already revealed extensive villa buildings, including a series of huge apsidal rooms. A team from the Consiglio Nazionale di Ricerca will carry out a traditional Total Station survey of the site as well as a Differential GPS survey so as to have a full record of the landscape in three dimensions. These will be added as layers to our GIS recording system. This work-in-progress is being carried out by our collaborators in the commercial British unit L – P : Archaeology .