1.3 Talking with earth, stones and bricks: from layers and walls to History

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En provenance du cours de Sapienza University of Rome

The Changing Landscape of Ancient Rome. Archaeology and History of the Palatine Hill

72 notes

Sapienza University of Rome

The Changing Landscape of Ancient Rome. Archaeology and History of the Palatine Hill

72 notes

Studying ancient - as well as medieval or modern - cities basically means telling local urban stories based on the reconstruction of changing landscapes through the centuries. Given the fragmentary nature of archaeological evidence, it is necessary to create new images that would give back the physical aspect of the urban landscape and that would bring it to life again. We are not just content with analyzing the many elements still visible of the ancient city. The connections between objects and architectures, visible and non visible buildings, which have been broken through time have to be rejoined, to acknowledge the elements that compose the urban landscape. Landscape and its content are a very relevant and still vital part of any national cultural heritage. The course will introduce students to the way we have been reflecting on over the last twenty years and still are engaged with the study of the past of our cities, beginning from the most complex case in the ancient Mediterranean World: the core of Italy and of Roman Empire. On the other hand, knowledge means also preservation and defense of material remains and cultural memory. “The Changing Landscape of Ancient Rome. Archeology and History of the Palatine Hill” presents to a large public the topographical lay-out of the most relevant part of the city (according the Greek and Roman Historians Rome was founded on the Palatine). Research developed on the Palatine since the end of last century by the team of Sapienza Classical Archaeologists opened a new phase in the urban archaeological investigation and in the scientific debate about the relation between archaeological features and literary tradition as well as the “correct use“ of both kind of evidence, key issues of wide archaeological and historical significance.

À partir de la leçon

From ruins to a full evidence local history (methods, procedures, tools)

As a welcome module, the course will start discussing how we can move back through time and space to draw an updated archeological chart of the Palatine, to be integrated when possible with missing or lost part of the ancient overall framework, in order to be turned into the basic tool for describing diachronically architectural and topographical continuity and discontinuity. This aiming at the reconstructions of sequences of facts and at a historical reconstruction tout-court. By the end of this module you will able to: - classify archaeological evidence - draw an archaeological chart - try to integrate missing part of buildings/monuments if possible

Introduction1:12

1.1 Classical Archaeology: artifacts (objects, architectures, landscapes) and history.4:11

1.2 Talking with objects: from pots to Chronology.2:29

1.3 Talking with earth, stones and bricks: from layers and walls to History8:17

1.4 Introduction to ancient Rome.11:40

1° tutorial1:21

2° tutorial1:01

3° tutorial2:01

Rencontrer les enseignants

Paolo Carafa
Prof.

Hello, everybody, I'm Sarah.

Today I am here to talk to you about one of

the most interesting and peculiar fields of activity of Roman archaeology.

I'm talking about architecture and building techniques.

This field of activity is so important - architecture,

in general, is so important because we are what we build.

We live in what we build.

And so from the analysis of ancient architecture,

we are able to gain a large amount of informations about people who built buildings,

their lifestyle and their necessities.

It is very easy for us to recognize buildings from their own shape.

For example, this is a collection of examples from modern architecture.

Of course, it is easy for us to recognize a stadium

from a mall from a nice house on the beach,

depending on the shape of these buildings or

depending on the materials used for the construction.

This same identical process can be applied to ancient architectures too.

Architecture, as a building in general,

should be - should have three main characteristics.

The first one is the solidity;

the strength of the walls,

the strength of the structures.

A building should be solid;

a building should be resistant.

The second one is the usefulness;

a building should be comfortable for people who use it;

for people who go inside it.

And third, why not?

A building should be beautiful.

Ancient people had these three characteristics for their own buildings too.

They called it firmitus,

for the solidity; utilitus,

for the usefulness; and venustas, for the beauty.

Investigating these three categories,

we can gain a large amount of informations about

the necessities of ancient people in the moment of

construction about the lifestyle of these people.

There are many - many categories of informations that we

can gain from the analysis of structures and from the analysis of architecture.

I will now try to show you some particular fields of interest.

The first one is the materials that were used in antiquity for building.

They are quite important,

because they show a great change during time and dependent on places and space.

The most ancient buildings in the Roman world were built with perishable materials.

The roof, as you can see in this image,

were constructed with vegetal materials substained by wood branches.

For the elevations for the wall,

the Romans used, at the beginning,

just clay or other kind of earth,

other kind of soil,

pressed and sustained by wood poles.

The pavements were made of beaten ground or beaten and powdered pieces of stone.

This is what archaeologists usually find as a trace of these structures.

They are very small,

usually - especially in height - because of the nature of these materials;

which is, as I already said, perishable.

In some cases - and especially during the 7th Century BCE,

some roughly-cut pieces of stone start to be employed into structures; at first,

to give more solidity to the foundations - like in this example

- or just like in this another case,

to make some kind of a basement,

some kind of a place to the elevation wall to

provide safety from the humidity coming from the ground.

These roughly cut pieces of stone were,

probably during the 6th Century BCE,

substituted by a more precisely cut kind of block.

We can actually call this kind of

structure a block structure, because the carvers gained,

now, finally the ability to cut the stone with a precise rectangular shape.

This example comes from the capitolinus and is the basement -

the podium - the basement of the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus.

Moreover, during the centuries and gradually with the expansion of the Roman territory,

new quarries of stone were found and new quarries of stone were used.

So new kinds of stone, even more resistant,

could be applied in through - it could be introduced into Roman architecture,

with the possibility to create

even more elaborate kinds of

structures like this arch inside the Servian walls in the Aventine.

But the most characteristic and important invention of Roman architecture is,

for sure, the concrete or cement.

The concrete is a mixture of a mortar and of some aggregates or inerts,

which were usually roughly-cut pieces of stone or broken tiles or broken bricks.

The concrete collects together the three categories of - of firmitus,

solidity, usefulness and beauty.

In particular, the solidity is assured by the incredible strength of the concrete.

In fact, most of the buildings which we

have nowadays preserved of the Roman architecture is made of concrete.

The usefulness is clear because to put in place a wall

in concrete is much faster than an old wall in blocks.

And third, the beauty.

In some examples - and in particular in the elevations -

the concrete was covered by two revetments on the two sides.

This revetments were - were made usually with

stone pieces or with block or with - sorry - with brick pieces.

And in some examples,

this revetments - this cover - was so beautiful that the Romans

loved to see this kind of decoration inside their own houses.

But the materials, in particular in Roman architecture,

were, in some cases, of second-hand.

This is another important feature of the archaeological study of architecture.

And it's extremely peculiar of the Roman architecture,

because we do not have this reuse,

this recycle of building materials so much today.

In Roman architecture it had, at first,

an economic reason, but it was - it is so important for us, for the archaeologists,

because it gives us a lot of informations about what was there before the new building;

what was destroyed for the construction of the buildings - reusing,

recycling these materials - and it gives us

information also on the availability of materials,

which changed during time and space.

I hope you like this lesson. See you soon. Bye.

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