Devi Taelman

Ancient quarries are intriguing archaeological sites, but their detailed recording is complex. This paper presents a cost-effective approach to mapping of the Roman quarry site of Pitaranha (Portugal–Spain). First, aerial photographs were acquired using a radio-controlled digital reflex camera attached to a Helikite, which allowed the acquisition of the necessary low-altitude aerial footage in the very unstable wind conditions above the quarry. Using computer vision algorithms, the resulting set of photographs was semi-automatically transformed into a Digital Surface Model (DSM) and a corresponding orthophotograph. Besides focusing on the acquisition and processing method, this paper evaluates the accuracy of the generated products. The orthophotograph proved to be satisfactorily accurate for 1:200 hard-copy mapping.

The 200-year period following the reign of the Severan dynasty (AD 193-235) proved to be an era of significant changes for the central Adriatic section of the Italian peninsula. While it cannot be denied that the regional archaeological record breathes some echo of stress in this period, there are also indications for a still flourishing economy. One interesting observation, for instance, is the frequent reuse of large stone architectural elements as grape and olive press components. The reworking of older monumental stones in Antiquity is often considered as an indicator of overall economic decline, but such an assumption actually overlooks the clear economic benefits that are to be gained through this practice. The import of heavy and bulky stones such as base blocks and counterweights proved to be a costly affair in pre-industrial times, as it involved both the costs of the raw material, the quarrying, the manufacturing and the transport. As such, it was more economical to cut-up the large quantities of stone material that were available in the area in the form of demolished pre-existing structures resulting from large-scale building activities in the Early/High Imperial period.
One important motivation for this habit seems to have been a still prospering local wine and oil/olive business. Indeed, some of our archaeological evidence in the Marche region indicates the functioning of grape and olive processing installations on several urban and rural sites in the 3RD-5TH century AD. To this regard, one may recall the mentioning of Picenian wine in Diocletian’s price Edict on Maximum Prices in AD 301 and the presence of the Hadrianum – a wine from southern Picenum – in three Egyptian papyri in the 3RD century AD. And let’s not forget the wide appreciation of the excellent Picenian table olives, famous for their taste among the Roman elite and commemorated on numerous occasions by authors such as Martial, Silius Italicus and Ausonius. These large green olives – which were often gently pressed in order to release some of their juice and flavour – are known to have been exported as far as north-eastern Gaul until the 3RD-4TH century AD.
This paper would like to highlight the interaction of the local stone industry and the region’s grape and olive trade in this period by illustrating how processes of urban and rural transformation could be integrated with changes in economic mentality.

This first volume in a new series about Belgian archaeological research in Italy brings all relevant data together about the newly discovered and systematically surveyed sites in the Potenza Valley Survey project (2000-2017). The well-illustrated book presents the wide array of new archaeological finds and topographic and chronological data about sites, assembled via systematic prospections by a team of Ghent University in a valley of central Adriatic Italy. The many spectacular survey data from a series of now abandoned ancient urban centres and protohistoric agglomerations, are combined here with non-invasive prospection results from sites found in their rural hinterlands. The analysis and documentation of all these discoveries, and of their relation with environmental change in the past, now provide a crucial understanding of an ideal section through the diversified central Italian landscape, linking the Apennine Mountains with the Adriatic coastal plain. In this way the survey project reveals a spectrum of settlement situations, ranging from a Roman colony on the coast and a series of pre-Roman Iron Age inland centres, to the smallest dwelling places of indigenous and immigrant communities living in this specific settlement chamber of the Mediterranean between the early Iron Age (circa 900 BC) and the end of Antiquity (circa AD 600). The intensive use of landscape survey archaeology and remote sensing approaches, of which this book is a reflection, has enabled the scholars involved in this team effort to study diachronic patterns of urban and rural habitation and land use with much greater precision than before, thus contributing to the "longue durée" landscape and settlement dynamics in this part of the ancient world.

In the years following the death of Commodus, a long period of transformation began that undermined the structure of the Roman Empire. These changes initially affected only aspects of succession to the Princedom, especially involving the military sphere, but they also modified the social and structural organization of the Roman State.
After this period of military anarchy, interrupted by a brief phase of prosperity with the accession to the imperial throne of Septimius Severus and his successors, there followed a period of economic stability that determined a new political and institutional empire. The time of Diocletian’s reforms, however, culminated in a serious crisis after the death of Constantine the Great (337 AD). The lands bordering the Adriatic were disputed by the heirs of the Emperor, starting a period of economic and cultural changes that manifested themselves initially as a diffuse form of recession in the dynamics of occupation of the territory. Urban and rural settlements show signs of abandonment and crisis. In the following decades, waves of peoples from northern and eastern Europe disrupted the political unity of the Empire even more. The Empire was only partially rebalanced after the Gothic War, due to the devastation of many urban centers and a drop in the number of sites in the area caused by continuing military clashes.
As was demonstrated at the last conference in Ravenna (Economia e Territorio, 28 February-1 March 2014), now being published, in recent years field research has revealed new evidence that allows us to draw a more complete picture of this important historical period which has been the focus of debate in recent decades. The research area discussed in Ravenna was mainly restricted to the central Adriatic, although there was communication with some eastern Adriatic areas.
This time the focus will extend to the basin defined as Adriatic Europe, according to geographical and cultural rather than political patterns, thus considering all territories facing the Adriatic Sea. These areas are affected by similar phenomena of transformations (barbarian conquest (crossings of the territory), the formation of barbaric countries, Justinian's Reconquest), at least until the Lombard invasion of Italy and Istria in the second half of the 6th century. After this point, they follow different trajectories that are still poorly understood. Such close relations between the two sides have always suggested direct cultural influences. The handicraft productions and forms of settlement in many ways tend to follow 2 common lines, but the progress of field investigations have not been sufficiently compared, especially with regard to the Early Middle Ages.
This new meeting will analyze these transformative phenomena in the areas research has neglected, including the time span between the 2nd and 8th centuries, especially on the Eastern Adriatic coast, from the short period before the establishment of the Severan dynasty up to the end of the Carolingian period.

We thank all participants for the interest shown for Trade conference and the numerous and very compelling themes proposed. Also, we wish everyone a fruitful conference and a pleasant stay in Zadar,

the Organizing commitee

Pre-industrial societies were all dominated by agricultural production. What distinguishes them is the importance of the non-agrarian sector of the economy against that agricultural background. While not escaping the limits of an organic economy, the Romans stand out for having developed a wide range of manufacturing businesses and services (e.g. construction, fuel supply, metal-and pottery production). This development stimulated the widespread and large-scale extraction of raw materials like stones, ores, clay and wood. Compared to other premodern economies, raw material consumption rates in the Roman world were thus high. The way in which both renewable (wood) and non-renewable (stone, minerals, metal, clay) resources were exploited is an important determinant for the functioning and longevity of a pre-industrial economic system. Even in a territory as large as the Roman Empire, such activities put considerable pressure on the land. Strategies of resource-exploitation and conservation were thus essential in dealing successfully with this situation in the long-term. The question of how the Romans dealt with the uncertainty of natural reserves and the unpredictability of consumption is very much at the core of the debate on the non-agricultural ancient economy. The issue revolves around whether their decisions and actions merely reflect a 'substitution of resource sources' mentality – that is, exploiting a particular resource until depletion, after which new possibilities were simply explored further afield – or if optimal extraction strategies may be identified. In other words, how rational were the Romans in their exploitation of raw materials, and to which extent did they counteract over-exploitation for economic and ecological reasons? With this panel, we would like to explore if, when, where and how the Romans pursued a harmonious balance between the limited availability of a particular resource and the law of supply and demand. We are hereby particularly interested in identifying measures that show environmental concerns in their management strategies. This may be through specific case studies on both smaller and larger territorial scales, or by reflecting on the issue on a more theoretical level. We especially welcome proposals that focus on innovative approaches and/or draw on inter-disciplinary datasets (geo-and bioarchaeology, paleoecology, etc.).

Divergent Economies in the Roman World: holistic views on habitual and aberrant practices, ca. 300 BC–AD 300

International conference & book project organized and edited by Dimitri Van Limbergen, Devi Taelman & Adeline Hoffelinck

Ghent, November 19–21, 2020

An initiative of MARU, HARG & SDEP at Ghent University

The Faculty of Archaeology of Leiden University hosts an international conference on the archaeology of the Roman period in Portugal and its place in the Roman West. The conference brings together archaeologists and ancient historians from different academic backgrounds who are working in the Iberian peninsula and the wider Western Mediterranean. It aims to present new data and insights from various fields and approaches, and to discuss their significance for our understanding of Roman expansion and colonialism.
Five sessions revolve around new insights from landscape archaeological projects, developments in the economy, the process of military expansion, processes of centralization and urbanization, and the ritual and religious sphere. A key goal of the conference is to discuss how the Portuguese panorama compares to other areas in the Iberian peninsula, and to foreground its contribution to current debates about Roman expansion and incorporation in the Central and Western Mediterranean.
With a view to assess the potential of integrating best practices in archaeological approaches and methodology, different national and disciplinary research traditions and historical frameworks will be explicitly discussed. As such, the conference aims to explore ways to collaborate more closely between various Mediterranean areas and research projects, and to develop a shared research agenda.

Archaeological surveys have the power to generate important information about the human past. On the one hand, extensive surveys are the main source of information to gain insights in large-scale phenomena such as settlement dynamics and to generate regional historical narratives. Intensive, intra-site surveys, on the other hand, can develop knowledge on internal organisation and structuring of individual sites. Intra-site surveys can fine-tune observed larger scale, regional phenomena obtained from regional surveys. With this session, we aim to explore how archaeological work evolves from actual field work, in particular survey, to knowledge production, and eventually the construction of historical narratives, following the chaine-operatoire system proposed by Gardin. We will overpass the earliest stadium of data collection, which has been explored in other fora (discussion on Methods by García Sánchez, 2017).
This is an occasion to study the passage from data to knowledge in the many theoretical approaches present nowadays in archaeology. We wish to focus on how visual narratives (i.e. mapping approaches and geovisualisations) can generate archaeological knowledge and historical narratives, in particular related to archaeological survey. Of extraordinary relevance is conception of space, since any human action has a spatial dimension.
Nevertheless, as Hacıgûzeller has pointed recently (Hacıgûzeller, 2012), current archaeological GIS tools are uncritically bonded to epistemological positivism. We can think of distribution maps of pre-and protohistoric cultures or maps of Roman expansionism to visualize of these representations and theoretical background shape our understanding of phenomena.
The session will explore theoretical decisions assumed or latent within cartographical representations and how does these graphical representations of knowledge influence or relate to narratives.

This paper presents the first results of the research project 'Marble and the Vesuvian Cities' begun in 2014, whose central aim is to provide the first comprehensive study of elite marble use in Roman sites around Vesuvius (Herculaneum, Oplontis, Pompeii and Stabiae). The project aims to document completely all instances of polychrome marble use in the houses of this area, which offer a rich source of information due to the state of preservation at these sites. This paper focuses on one aspect of this on-going research - the spatial distribution of marble varieties within insert pavements. In particular, we focus on the ways in which marble placement acted as a visual cue and aided in the movement of people throughout the spaces that they decorated. As such, this paper presents results of the documentation of seventy-nine well-preserved pavements with marble inserts roughly dating from the 1st century BC to the 1st century AD (79 AD) from Herculaneum, Oplontis, Pompeii and Stabiae.

Most major studies on marble pavements are devoted to classification, dating and the evolution of decorative motifs over time, but the materials employed are often addressed only cursorily. The overall quantification of marble types and sizes is rarely, if ever, noted. While these studies do note the correlation between these pavements and certain room types, the full impact of marble placement has not been addressed. The 'Marble and the Vesuvian Cities' project, and by extension this paper, is concerned with the spatial position of marble varieties within insert pavements and how that position relates to each pavement’s specific context, such as the placement of entrances and windows. Moreover, through a careful spatial analysis it is possible to understand how the layout of marble inserts changes based on room function and, consequently, what this can tell us about how these designs functioned both physically and socially.

In order to accomplish these goals, the current authors have utilized a new method for documenting and analysing marble insert pavements. The documentation implements an image-based modelling technique that allows for a fast, effective, low-cost and accurate recording. This technique allows for the generation of geometrically-corrected orthophotographs, which can be used to create detailed plans that cannot be obtained using manual recording techniques. These datasets can then be combined in a spatial database for in-depth statistical analyses of the location and distribution of individual marble types in insert pavements. The results of this method have allowed us to demonstrate that marble placement in Roman insert pavements was not random. The preliminary results of the current project suggest that the intentional placement of marble inserts acted as a guiding element in Roman houses, chosen to suit the varying functions of individual spaces. Overall, this paper further emphasises the importance of marble decoration in Roman society.

Painted imitation marble can be seen in numerous wall paintings from houses in Pompeii from c. 150 BC to AD 79. Surprisingly, their relationship to the stone trade has not been fully explored. This paper presents an analysis of the use of painted imitation marble at Pompeii, especially in the 4th-Style Period, in order to explore the relationship between the varieties of marble being depicted in paint in relation to an on-going survey of all houses with real marble at Pompeii for the Marble and the Vesuvian Cities Project. The painted imitation will be explored in relation to the marble available on the contemporary market in Pompeii and its immediate environment. Comparison with painted marble shows that the use and choice of specific varieties of painted imitation marbles was in fact closely related to the wider currents in the marble trade. New varieties of painted marble were introduced either concurrently or shortly after the real stones were introduced into the city.

The processing of aerial imagery acquired over Montarice hill (central Adriatic Italy) during the Potenza Valley Survey will form the key focus of this paper. Since this site has repeatedly revealed itself in terms of interesting vegetation and soil marks, the most interesting footage, acquired during two observer-directed sorties more than a decade ago, will be examined. First, the potential of state-of-the-art image-based modelling (IBM) techniques is explored to create high-resolution orthophotographs from these analogue frame images. Since dense image matching-as a part of IBM-allows to model the vegetation surface at the moment of the photographic survey, a geometrical three-dimensional representation of the plant canopy is possible. This contribution shows how the latter can be the focus of its own information extraction process, using techniques mainly developed in the field of airborne laser scanning. However, the true interpretative power lies in the combination of the co-registered spectral and geometrical dimensions of the vegetation. Using Montarice as a case study, it will become clear that crop height data allows for powerful visualisations that can aid and even alter interpretative mapping that is solely based on colour differences in orthophotographs.

Roman society was highly hierarchical and its elite class was in constant search of means to showcase, maintain and
increase their power and prestige. Sponsoring the construction and decoration of monumental, public architecture was
one of the most powerful material means for this. Monumental public architecture was often decorated excessively. The
orchestra and scaenae frons of the Roman theatre stand out as the object of benefaction par excellence.
For the architectural decoration of Roman theatres in the Western Mediterranean area, white marble elements (capitals, column bases, cornices, etc.) were generally combined with elements in coloured marbles (column shafts and
wall and floor veneer), thus creating an impressive polychromatic effect. In Southern France and Italy, this effect was
achieved by using marbles imported from Greece, the Aegean Islands, Asia Minor and North Africa. On the Iberian
Peninsula, locally and regionally available marbles (white and coloured) were combined with imported stones. From the
second century AD onwards, valuable marbles from the Eastern Desert in Egypt were imported and incorporated in the
decoration of the theatres in the Western Mediterranean.

CAA Netherlands/Flanders is pleased to inform you that the 2019 local chapter meeting will be held in Leuven, Belgium, October 29, 2019. The event is organised by the Department of Archaeology at the KU Leuven in collaboration with the Ghent Centre for Digital Humanities. The aim of the meeting is to bring together academic and commercial archaeologists, as well archaeology students. The conference will be preceded by a workshop-day (October 28th, 2019).

With ever increasing ubiquity of digital tools and practices, and applications related to data science in archaeology, the organising committee is expecting a prolific event that critically focuses on the theory and practice of digital and quantitative methods in archaeology.

It is with great pleasure that the organising committee can confirm keynote lectures by Prof. Dr. Mark Gillings (University of Leicester) and Prof. Dr. Gary Lock (University of Oxford), two leading scholars in the field of digital archaeology.

The conference will be preceded by a workshop-day on October 28th. Topics for the hands-on workshops are: agent-based modelling in archaeology, spatial databases in archaeology, archaeological linked data and semantic web, and archaeological spatial data visualisations using R.

Registration
The registration form for both the conference and the workshops can be accessed through this link: https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScZzvYKEnMsMNgjR-UkoTbQRXzVr4lhzUTIdbV_doAFqTSKnA/viewform

Registration for the event is free.

Location
The meeting will take place in the Justus Lipsiuszaal of the Faculty of Arts of the KU Leuven.
Address:
Justus Lipsiuszaal (room: lett. 08.16)
Blijde Inkomststraat 21
3000 Leuven

For further information, see the conference website (http://www.caanlfl.nl/?q=node/69)

Computer Applications and Quantitative Methods in Archaeology is pleased to inform you that the 2019 local NL/FL chapter meeting will be held in Leuven, Belgium, October 29th-30th, 2019! 

We are now accepting paper proposals. More information on www.caanlfl.nl/?q=node/69