Ancient Roman Villa Discovered Beneath an Italian Apartment Complex
Next month is the unveiling of an underground museum of intricate Roman mosaics located under an apartment complex in the Italian capital.
Six years ago, BNP Paribas Real Estate, which owns the property, found the site during the construction work, an announcement made on Tuesday.
On the site, which is situated on the Aventine Hill, one of the seven hills of Ancient Rome, archaeologists from the Special Superintendence of Rome worked on the site.
Visitors will be able to see the mosaics when the museum opens in November.
A mosaic discovered beneath an Italian luxury apartment complex
During the excavation, they discovered mosaics, structures and other artefacts, and a multimedia exhibition using video mapping and projections will help explain the site’s history to visitors.
There were some signs that the area was inhabited around 900 BC, according to the statement. The site also includes a block wall dating from 700-400 BC that may have been the foundation of a watchtower.
Black-and-white mosaic tiles displayed on a wall bearing Latin inscriptions
The mosaics were laid in an upper-class Roman home.
The installation now resides in the basement of a residential luxury apartment complex. Starting in November, visitors will be able to take guided tours of the site twice per month. The building may open the museum up to more visits depending on the amount of interest.
Archaeologists also found that the area was levelled to increase the available flat surface, and around the middle of the 2nd century BC, a Domus — a type of private residence for the upper classes — was built.
The piece de resistance is a mosaic in black and white tiles from the end of the 1st century BC, and there is also a mosaic fragment dating from the reign of Emperor Trajan (98-117 AD).
Then, during Hadrian’s reign (117-138 AD), more black and white mosaics were laid in geometric patterns, one of which will be on display, followed by five more mosaics from the Antonine period (150-175 AD).
Perfectly preserved ancient Roman mosaic floor discovered in Italy “In recent years we have worked as a team with the Superintendency to complete a unique archaeological project for the city of Rome: a museum inside an apartment building,” said Piero Cocco-Ordini, CEO of BNP Paribas Real Estate Italy, who called the site “a hidden treasure chest, a thousand-year witness to our past.”
In May, another beautiful ancient Roman mosaic was uncovered in northern Italy.
The remarkably well preserved mosaic floor was uncovered in a vineyard in Negrar, north of the city of Verona, almost a century after the remains of an ancient villa were found on the site.
Pictures of the floor posted by the town’s officials show its intricate patterns and colourful detail, much of which has been preserved perfectly through the centuries.
A 3,500-year-old Minoan vase carved from rock-crystals
Ideally situated in a sheltered gulf surrounded by mountains, Zakros (or Kato Zakros) in south-eastern Crete, was the fourth largest Minoan settlement after Knossos, Phaistos and Malia.
The ancient name has been lost and the present one derives from the nearest local town. Inhabited since Neolithic times, the settlement achieved its greatest influence in the palatial period c. 2000 BCE to c. 1450 BCE.
The palace was destroyed (possibly by the eruption of the Thera volcano, although the date of this is much disputed) and abandoned c. 1450 BCE with the surrounding settlement also being abandoned c. 1330 BCE.
The site was first excavated in 1901 CE by D. Hogarth of the British School of Athens and once again from 1961 CE under the supervision of N. Platon, Ephor of Cretan Antiquities.
The excavations discovered a large palace complex and surrounding settlement displaying many typical Minoan architectural features.
These include a large central court (30x12m), secondary courts, colonnades, light-wells, a monumental stepped entrance, lustral basins (sunken rooms), storage magazines, archive rooms, stairs to a second floor, and paving with large flagstones and red plaster interstices.
Some rooms were also covered in fresco similar to (but fewer in quantity than) those at Knossos, depicting spirals, double axes and bull horns of consecration.
Unique to the Zakros site is a large circular cistern (5m in diameter) with seven steps leading down into it and originally surrounded by columns. An interesting and unique find in the extensive settlement around the palace complex is a large furnace with four exhaust ducts, perhaps used for metallurgy.
Zakros Minoan Site
The presence of more than 500 large storage jars (pithoi), over 50 fine stone vases, seals and Linear A tablets, quantities of ivory and bronze ingots, fine libation vases and rhyton all suggest the palace, as in the other Minoan towns, was a prosperous administrative and commercial centre, not only locally but with trade links to the Cycladic islands, Egypt and the Peloponnese on mainland Greece.
Other archaeological finds of note are fine gold jewellery pieces, Marine style pottery and gold objects such as a bull’s head and engraved bowl.
Roman Woman’s Trendy Earring Unearthed in Bulgaria
Archaeology in Bulgaria reports that an intact gold earring has been discovered in what was a room of the public bath at Deultum, a Roman colony founded in the first century A.D. by veterans of Augustus’ Eighth Legion near Bulgaria’s Black Sea coast. The artefact matches earrings shown in the second century A.D.
A genuine ancient gold earring that can be used in some of the so-called Fayum Mummy portraits of Roman Egypt was found by archaeologists in south-east Bulgaria excavating the Deultum Ancient Roman colony near the town of Debelt, district Burgas, near the Black Sea coast.
Deultum was a Roman colony, which according to Roman law signified a status equal to that of the city of Rome itself. In today’s Bulgaria, there are only three Roman cities which enjoyed this status – Deultum (Colonia Flavia Pacis Deultensium) near Burgas, Ratiaria (Colonia Ulpia Traiana Ratiaria) near Archar, Ulpia Oescus near Gigen.
Fayum mummy portraits are portraits on wooden boards which were attached to the mummies of upper-class residents buried in Egypt during the Roman Era, in the 1st century BC – 3rd AD.
Such mummy portraits have been discovered throughout Egypt but most famously in the Fayum Basin, in Hawara and the Roman city of Antinoopolis from the time of Emperor Hadrian (r. 117 – 138). The term “Fayum mummy portraits” is used both as a geographic and stylistic description.
The Roman gold earring discovered in the city of Deultum in Southeast Bulgaria has been found to appear exactly the same as earrings of women depicted in some of the Fayum mummy portraits. Based on that similarity, the earring is dated by the Bulgarian researchers to the 2nd century AD.
The Ancient Roman city of Deultum (Colonia Flavia Pacis Deultensium) was built in the 1st century AD near a previously existing Ancient Thracian settlement called Debelt or Develt. It was settled by Roman military veterans from the Augustus’ Eight Legion (Legio VIII Augusta) near the Mandra Lake (today the Mandra Water Reservoir) where it also had a port connecting it to the Black Sea.
The gold earring found in the Roman city of Deultum – Debelt in Southeast Bulgaria appears to be the same as the earrings worn by the woman depicted in this Fayum mummy portrait.
The present archaeological excavations in the Deultum – Debelt Archaeological Preserve began on October 1, 2020; the Fayum mummy portrait gold earring was discovered two days later.
The Roman gold earring was found in the joint between tiles in one of the rooms in the ruins of the thermae (public baths) of Deultum, beneath an embankment, informs Krasimira Kostova, head of the Deultum – Debelt Archaeological Preserve, as cited by the Bulgarian National Radio.
“The gold earrings of a noble lady depicted in one of the Fayum Portraits are exactly the same as the earring that we have discovered here in Deultum,” the archaeologist says. She points out that the thermae of Deultum was destroyed in 357 – 358 AD during a major earthquake.
“The gold earring probably was lost as it fell between the tiles, and when the thermae were destroyed by the earthquake, it remained there. Subsequently, the site was levelled with embankments, which is how it remained there. Because the spot of the thermae remained inhabited after that,” Kostova explains.
“This jewel is extremely sophisticated, it is very interesting. We found it has parallels to one of the Fayum mummy portraits, which has led us to date it to the 2nd century AD,” she adds.
“We are construing the discovery of the gold earring like the earrings depicted in that Fayum mummy portrait as evidence that the female inhabitants of the Roman colony of Deultum were following the fashion trends in the Roman Empire, and were up to date with fashion,” the archaeologist emphasizes.
The Fayum portrait gold earring from Deultum – Debelt is fully intact save for a slight bent in its upper part.
It has a cassette filled with white glass with a slight yellowish nuance; below it comes a filigree holder with three pendants, each of which ends with a white glass ball. The patina on the three balls gives them the appearance of pearls.
In addition to the gold earring similar to those in one of the Fayum mummy portraits, the archaeologists excavating the ruins of the Roman city of Deultum have already discovered a large number of bronze coins.
Their digs are now focused on exposing more from the ruins of the thermae (public baths) of the Roman colony. The later homes, which were built on top of the ruins of the Roman thermae in Deulum, were researched during last year’s archaeological season, with the current excavations now targeting the layers beneath.
Once it is fully studied, the gold earring similar to the ones seen a Fayum mummy portrait from Roman Egypt is going to be put on display at the museum of the Deultum – Debelt Archaeological Preserve.
What Lies Beneath? Finding North America’s lost medieval city
At the time of its existence, this city was larger than Paris or London and housed about 30,000 citizens. This is around the size of Juneau Alaska today (if you include the surrounding boroughs). If this estimate is correct, It was the largest city in the United States until the 1780s, when the population of Philadelphia finally surpassed it. So where was this lost historic capital?
The city was known as Cahokia. It reached its peak population in 1050 and was then abandoned in 1400. We don’t even know the name of the people who lived there. The city was named after the tribe of Cahokia who lived there, but the tribe of Cahokia claimed no connection with the city; it was the European explorers who named it.
A group known as Mississippians are the original inhabitants. They were great builders and craftspeople, and they had a significant influence on the surrounding areas—just check out the extent of the territory they have been reported to have impacted.
Artist’s recreation of downtown Cahokia, with Monk’s Mound at its centre.
Studies suggest that Cahokia was in fact the first melting pot in North America, drawing in people from surrounding areas (as much as one-third of their population consisting of immigrants from other tribes and groups). These people could have migrated away after the decline of the city, meaning that the Cahokia tribe might not be the descendants of the city builders.
So again, where was this metropolis hiding? How do we know it even existed at all? I bet you wouldn’t guess it was buried under the suburbs of St. Louis, would you? If this city was right under our noses all this time, why are we only really exploring it now?
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot
Exploration of the area occurred sporadically, and earthen mounds don’t make for particularly exciting discoveries like gold or jewels. So, this lost city went the way of most—instead of preserving the shifting space, for monuments or museums, it was used for growing room as the population in the area expanded.
The growth of human civilization can be a bit unforgiving at times to ancient historical sites. Famous historical cities of the world are built on the ruins of their own past. Cahokia is no different.
Up goes a drive-in movie theatre here, a subdivision there, and a variety of other infrastructure required of our time. The area today is like any other in modern America, crisscrossed by roads and highways like veins in an ever-changing landscape, but underneath all of that, it is filled with a rich history.
What was in the city?
While we have known about the ancient city for hundreds of years, our knowledge has largely been restricted to the awareness of mounds seen above the surface. Those mounds are pretty impressive though. Consider that all the mounds in Cahokia were built by hand. People dug up clay and transported it by hand, likely in woven baskets.
Aerial view of Monk’s Mound via WesternDigs
Evidence of the human sacrifices uncovered at Mound 72.
One of the most notable mounds is the one called Monks Mound. Monks Mound rises 100 feet high (about 30 meters) and has three distinct levels. Archaeological evidence shows that there was a building at the peak of the mound which could have risen another 50 feet (15 meters).
This mound is estimated to have taken as much as 250 years to build, but new evidence suggests it might have been completed in a mind-blowing 20 years. The entire structure was made up of an estimated 22 million cubic feet/623 thousand cubic meters of the earth (that’s a lot of baskets).
To put the size of the mound into perspective, the base of the mound is comparable to the Great Pyramid at Giza, and it is the largest prehistoric earthen construction in America north of Mexico.
Archaeological studies suggest that the city is so much more than just mounds. There are extensive ceremonial areas, including at least one Woodhenge – a structure similar to Stonehenge in the UK, that was used to monitor the movement of the sun and stars to predict events such as harvests.
There are also extensive living areas, the grand plaza gathering area, a copper workshop, burial sites, and evidence of an extensive wooden palisade (estimated at 15 feet tall, or 4.6 meters). Over 1,000 years ago, this was a pretty happening place.
Unfortunately, as the construction techniques in Cahokia involved using wood and earth, there are no stone ruins like we might see in Egypt or Rome. This means that the city was more easily reclaimed by nature—but that doesn’t make it any less impressive than its ancient counterparts.
Lessons from the past
If you’re thinking Cahokia sounds pretty amazing, you’re right. So, the obvious question is, why was it abandoned?
This is one of the most interesting questions about abandoned cities. In modern times the idea of abandoning a fully-formed city seems ludicrous (especially considering real estate prices in Toronto and Vancouver).
New studies of the flood patterns of the Mississippi River might be shedding some light on the situation. The rise of Cahokia falls in line with periods of relatively low flooding. This would have made farming and city expansion relatively easy. Then, towards the end of the city’s life, the floods returned, with one flood around the year 1200 being as much as 33 feet (10 meters) high. That’s the kind of stuff we make disaster movies about, so it is pretty easy to understand how that could contribute to the decline of the city.
Flood researchers are also careful to say that there was likely a multitude of causes contributing to the decline of the city, such as war or disease. It boggles the mind in many ways. Think of our modern cities. What would it take for us to abandon New Orleans, New York, or another metropolis?
The whole area was designated as a state historical site about 40 years ago and made a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1982. It is always comforting to see history receive the recognition it so richly deserves, but this ancient metropolis also has a lesson for all of us in modern times: the greatest cities of mankind are often very dependent on specific environmental circumstances, and if those circumstances change they can have a very dramatic impact on the people who live in and around them.
The Qasr Al-Farid, The Lonely Castle Of The Nabataeans
Among the Dozens of ruins located in the archaeological playground of Mada’in Saleh, one literally stands alone. Carved into a massive boulder, Qasr al-Farid, or “The Lonely Castle,” is a stunning ancient structure that rivals the majesty of any carved architecture in the world.
Created around the 1st century CE, the tall facade was never actually finished. The Nabateans had a unique construction technique that saw their tombs being chiselled right out of the rock from the top down.
Such is the case with Qasr al-Farid, although the monument appears to never have been completed, so the craftsmanship and precision of work slowly deteriorate closer to the base of the structure.
The Nabataeans were skilled craftsmen who carved their monuments out of solid roc
One of the most famous monuments of the Madain Saleh archaeological site, listed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
Called the “lonely castle”, Qasr Al-Farid is nevertheless a tomb. It was carved out of a rock that appeared out of nowhere about 2,000 years ago.
A construction left in suspense, suggested by the contrast between a facade meticulously carved with columns and crowns, and the other part of the rock still intact.
There seems to be no evidence of burial inside. With its unfinished taste and unusual location, the tomb of Qasr Al-Farid cultivates its mystery.
A tune from Petra to Madain Saleh
Between Qasr Al-Farid and the city of Petra, the resemblance is striking. And for good reason, both sites are from the Nabataean civilization.
The same meticulous work on the rock can be seen, although the Saudi tomb was carved from a block of stone stranded in the desert and not from a gigantic cliff.
The location of the Qasr Al-Farid tomb may suggest that it is completely independent. However, it is part of the vast archaeological site of Madain Saleh. Long unknown, the latter was only explored at the beginning of the 20th century, when a Franco-Saudi mission was commissioned to carry out excavation work.
Over 500 hectares, more than 100 tombs – remains of the Nabataean city of Hegra – have been discovered. In 2008, the site was declared a UNESCO World Heritage Site. A must if you are going to Saudi Arabia!
1,200-year-old pagan temple to Thor and Odin unearthed in Norway
The remains of the 1,200-year-old pagan temple were dug up in Norway and provide a rare insight into the Viking religion. Archaeologists have dated the remains of the large wooden building to the end of the 8th century.
The Old Norse “god house” was built from wood about 1200 years ago to worship gods like Odin, Thor, and Freyr. Post-holes that show its distinctive shape, including its central tower, have been unearthed at the site.
The god house (shown here in a digital reconstruction) was strongly built of beams and walls of wood; some lasted for hundreds of years. It included a central tower, patterned on Christian churches seen in lands further south.
They think it would have stood 40 feet high and was 45 feet long and 26 feet wide.
That’s just over half as tall as Buckingham Palace. It’s thought sacrifices and feasts would have occurred inside to honour the gods during the midsummer and midwinter solstices.
A large white penis shaped stone was previously found near the site and was linked to ancient fertility rituals. This is the first Old Norse temple to be found in Norway.
Old Norse is the ancient language associated with the Viking’s Archaeologist Søren Diinhoff of the University Museum of Bergen told Live Science: “This is the first time we’ve found one of these very special, very beautiful buildings.
“We know them from Sweden and we know them from Denmark. … This shows that they also existed in Norway.”
He added: “It is a stronger expression of belief than all the small cult places.
The temple was unearthed during a dig taking place before planned housing work
“This is probably something to do with a certain class of the society, who built these as a real ideological show.”
The foundations of the ancient building, or “god house” as they’re often called, were unearthed last month in a Norwegian riverside village called Ose.
Digging was happening there in preparation for new houses. Traces of early agricultural settlements were also found nearby. They dated to the earlier time of around 2,000 to 2,500 years ago.
The remains of the temple date to a later time when the area is thought to have been dominated by elite wealthy families. It is thought the families would have led the cult worship.
Experts think the elite likely wanted a “god house” built based on more Christian structures with a high tower on top. Before this time, Viking gods were more commonly worshipped in simplistic settings.
The wood of the temple no longer remains but you can see the postholes where the main beams would have stood and the area where the tall tower would have been.
Evidence of cooking pits and animal bones fit in with the theory that feasts and sacrifices occurred there. Food, drink, animal sacrifices, and precious metals were often offered to Old Norse gods.
The worshippers would then feast and enjoy the goods themselves because they knew the gods couldn’t come and join them. Instead, wooden figurines may have been used to represent the gods.
Popular Old Norse gods include storm god Thor and war god Odin. Norway’s kings enforced Christianity from around the 11th century so burned down a lot of Old Norse temples and religious sites. There’s no current evidence to suggest the Ose temple was burned down.
Viking Grave in Denmark Holds Remains of Mother and Son
The Copenhagen Post reports that researchers at the Roskilde Museum have analyzed DNA samples from the remains of a man and woman discovered in a 1,000-year-old burial known as the Gerdrup Grave, and determined that the pair were mother and son.
The grave contains the skeletons of a child and a woman, and archaeologists have long speculated who they might be and why they were buried together.
Another element of the mystery is that the child was killed at some point and buried next to the woman.
The Gerdrup Grave has another important aspect to it: it was the first discovery that proved that Viking women were buried along with a weapon – in this case, a lance.
Familial link
Well, now some new information has surfaced about the longstanding mystery. DNA testing has revealed that the pair are actually mother and son and, as previously believed, a sacrificial slave.
“It’s an incredibly exciting and surprising result we have here. We need to thoroughly consider what this means,” Ole Kastholm, an archaeologist and senior curator at Roskilde Museum, told TV2 Lorry.
The revelation means that the history of the Gerdrup Grave needs to be rewritten and that a new mystery needs to be solved.
“We need to look at whether other graves and other source material from the Viking Age could reveal some patterns that might help us solve this case,” said Kastholm.
Do Sagas hold the key?
The key to solving the enigma could be found in one of the old Icelandic Sagas, a series of narratives written between the 12th and 15th centuries covering Viking history.
The man in the grave looks to have been executed, hung, and bound before being laid in the grave. Meanwhile, the woman was weighed down with large stones.
One theory is that the lance belonging to the woman in the grave is actually a sorceress’s staff.
Something Odd about them?
One of the sagas tells the story of the sorceress Katla and her son Odd who were persecuted and executed. Odd was hung and Katla was stoned to death.
While the plot thickens and archaeologists work to solve the latest part of the puzzle, the skeletons can be viewed at Roskilde Museum.
The Rome of America: What Lies Under Teotihuacan? – The Real City of the Gods
It was a Massive, one of the first great cities of the Western Hemisphere. And its origins are a mystery. It was built by hand more than a thousand years before the swooping arrival of the Nahuatl-speaking Aztec in central Mexico. But it was the Aztec, descending on the abandoned site, no doubt falling awestruck by what they saw, who gave its current name: Teotihuacan.
The Pyramid of the Sun (top) is the largest structure in the ancient city of Teotihuacan, Mexico, and one of the largest buildings of its kind on the Western Hemisphere.
A famed archaeological site located fewer than 30 miles (50 kilometers) from Mexico City, Teotihuacan reached its zenith between 100 B.C. and A.D. 650. It covered 8 square miles (21 square kilometers) and supported a population of a hundred thousand, according to George Cowgill, an archaeologist at Arizona State University and a National Geographic Society grantee.
“It was the largest city anywhere in the Western Hemisphere before the 1400s,” Cowgill says. “It had thousands of residential compounds and scores of pyramid-temples … comparable to the largest pyramids of Egypt.”
Oddly, Teotihuacan, which contains a massive central road (the Street of the Dead) and buildings including the Temple of the Sun and the Temple of the Moon, has no military structures—though experts say the military and cultural wake of Teotihuacan was heavily felt throughout the region.
Who Built It?
Cowgill says the site’s visible surface remains have all been mapped in detail. But only some portions have been excavated.
Scholars once pointed to the Toltec culture. Others note that the Toltec peaked far later than Teotihuacan’s zenith, undermining that theory. Some scholars say the Totonac culture was responsible.
No matter its principal builders, evidence shows that Teotihuacan hosted a patchwork of cultures including the Maya, Mixtec, and Zapotec. One theory says an erupting volcano forced a wave of immigrants into the Teotihuacan valley and that those refugees either built or bolstered the city.
The main excavations, performed by Professors Saburo Sugiyama of Aichi Prefectural University in Japan and Rubén Cabrera, a Mexican archaeologist, have been at the Pyramid of the Moon. It was there, beneath layers of dirt and stone, that researchers realized the awe-inspiring craftsmanship of Teotihuacan’s architects was matched by a cultural penchant for brutality and human and animal sacrifice.
Inside the temple, researchers found buried animals and bodies, with heads that had been lobbed off, all thought to be offerings to gods or sanctification for successive layers of the pyramid as it was built.
Since 2003, archaeologist Sergio Gomez has been working to access new parts of the complex and has only recently reached the end of a tunnel that could hold a king’s tomb.
It’s unclear why Teotihuacan collapsed; one theory is that poorer classes carried out an internal uprising against the elite.
For Cowgill, who says more studies are needed to understand the lives of the poorer classes that inhabited Teotihuacan, the mystery lies not as much in who built the city or in why it fell.
“Rather than asking why Teotihuacan collapsed, it is more interesting to ask why it lasted so long,” he says. “What were the social, political, and religious practices that provided such stability?”
Megalithic stone blocks scattered in the vicinity of the pyramid of the Feathered Serpents at Teotihuacan.
Megalithic stone head from the earlier layer of construction.
Megalithic stone blocks scattered in the vicinity of the pyramid of the Feathered Serpents at Teotihuacan.
Megalithic stone blocks scattered in the vicinity of the pyramid of the Feathered Serpents at Teotihuacan.
