TY - JOUR

T1 - Surrounded by the sea: re-investigating the villa maritima of Capo di Sorrento

AU - Filser, Wolfgang Thomas Gerhard

AU - Fritsch, Bernhard

AU - Kennedy, Will

AU - Perrella, Rosaria

AU - Klose, Christoph

PY - 2017

Y1 - 2017

N2 - In three campaigns covering 10 weeks of fieldwork we documented a series of featuresthat shed new light on this villa. Thanks to its good state of preservation and the verylimited amount of later building activities and other interventions, we gathered crucialinformation on the villa’s original appearance using traces in the construction ground.New features were discovered by re-measuring and re-excavating, while archaeological and geological surveys conducted by land and under water have fundamentally enhanced our understanding of the villa as a whole. Our new reconstruction of the harbour with an inner and an outer port, once connected by a natural rock arch that had been closed by a rockslide after (or during) the destruction of the villa, changes our overall understanding of the layout and functioning of the whole complex, which now appears to have interacted to an even greater extent with the natural landscape and the open sea. The immediate contact zone between the sea and the rock on which the villa is built yields information on the ground of cuttings made in the rock in order to attach decorative elements along the coastlineand in the inner port. The decoration and design of the seaward side seems to havebeen an element of luxury that was stressed.

AB - In three campaigns covering 10 weeks of fieldwork we documented a series of featuresthat shed new light on this villa. Thanks to its good state of preservation and the verylimited amount of later building activities and other interventions, we gathered crucialinformation on the villa’s original appearance using traces in the construction ground.New features were discovered by re-measuring and re-excavating, while archaeological and geological surveys conducted by land and under water have fundamentally enhanced our understanding of the villa as a whole. Our new reconstruction of the harbour with an inner and an outer port, once connected by a natural rock arch that had been closed by a rockslide after (or during) the destruction of the villa, changes our overall understanding of the layout and functioning of the whole complex, which now appears to have interacted to an even greater extent with the natural landscape and the open sea. The immediate contact zone between the sea and the rock on which the villa is built yields information on the ground of cuttings made in the rock in order to attach decorative elements along the coastlineand in the inner port. The decoration and design of the seaward side seems to havebeen an element of luxury that was stressed.

M3 - Journal article

VL - 30

SP - 64

EP - 95

JO - Journal of Roman Archaelogy

JF - Journal of Roman Archaelogy

ER -