Villa Magna

Area D, 9-15th June 2008

This week we completed excavating the latest phases of the rooms enclosed by walls 5008 and 5037. These phases appear to date (in at least one room) to the 6th century (based on pottery dates from 5047). We’re leaving these rooms at this level until we can excavate them in phase with their compatriots in the newly uncovered area. We had the bulldozer this week, and we opened on Tuesday 5 meters to the N and 3 meters to the W. The 5 meters to the N revealed that our structure continued. It appears that we have a series of three rooms running E-W, a corridor to the N of that, and another series of three rooms, which also run E-W, to the N of the corridor. This building, which we have seen through aerial photographs, seems to continue further to the N, and one possible interpretation of its function is as barracks (?). We are clearly in the latest phases of the occupation of the building, which is being reused by the 6th century, although we are unclear how (storage?). On the W side of the trench, we opened three meters of the trench to make the total open area 20 × 20 meters. We continued to find a destruction level on the W side of the ditch, and I am no longer convinced that this is the foundation for a defensive fortification. I think instead it’s the destruction of a wall that remains under the W edge of the section. Within the destruction, at least one room that appears to belong with the structure on the E side of the ditch is becoming apparent. We also have the top of the wall corresponding to the N wall of the corridor on the E side of the ditch. One interesting part of our excavation is that we have a definite uplift on the W side of the ditch, which may be the result of an earthquake, which itself could have caused the large swath of destruction that we have found.

— Ryan Ricciardi· Jun 15, 08:44