Field Campaign 2005
Prof Anne-Marie Leander Touati, SU: project director
SUMMER CAMPAIGN
Doc Arja Karivieri, SU: joint field director
FD Renée Forsell, SU: joint field director
Ezequiel Pinto-Guillaume: architectural drawings, ceramics specialist and chief finds illustrator
Michel Hagedorn, GU: assistant
Berit Kaussel, GU: assistant
Lena Kristensson, GU: assistant
Petra Nickson, SU: trainee
Abstract:
Arja Karivieri and Renée Forsell jointly directed the summer campaign 2005. Work continued in Casa di Caecilius Iucundus (V 1,26) and work commenced in the backstreet and in the adjoining taberna V 1,25.
Work in Casa di Caecilius Iucundus (V 1,26) and Taberna V 1,25
Forsell and Karivieri documented masonry, wall decorations and floors of the eastern part of the building, in the rooms that open to the peristyle garden. Pinto-Guillaume measured and drew plans, assisted by Kaussel. Hagedorn, Kristensson and Nickson cleaned the whole mosaic floor of the atrium and the impluvium for supplementary documentation with both slide and digital photography.
A crack in the wall of the northwestern corner of the atrium (next to the lararium) was reported to the Soprintendenza and a support was consequently erected in the doorway into room c. Ivy roots had grown through the wall in the northeastern corner of cubiculum p and this wall also required a support. At the same time, the heavy vegetation in this and surrounding rooms was removed by the gardeners and documentation work was thereby much facilitated.
The backstreet of Casa di Caecilius Iucundus and its pavement were cleaned and documented. Four openings of a drainage system were uncovered, leading excess water from the peristyle garden out into the street.
Taberna V 1,25 was cleaned and documented. In the filling on the floor was the find of a small, double-sided relief with mythological motif. A latrina was encountered in the northwestern corner of the building and it was partly excavated; it contained a complete amphora of Dressel Type 1.
AUTUMN CAMPAIGN (5th Sept – 14th Oct)
Dr Phil Margareta Staub Gierow, SU, stationed at Archäologisches Institut, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität, Freiburg: field director
FD Henrik Boman, SU: archaeologist
FD Monica Nilsson, SU: archaeologist
Ezequiel Pinto-Guillaume: architectural drawings, ceramics specialist and chief finds illustrator
Carin Pettersson, conservator: plaster analysis
Hans Thorwid: photographer
FM Carola Liebe-Harkort, SU: osteologist
Thomas Staub, Albert-Ludwigs-Universität, Freiburg: assistant, logistics
Marie-Laetitia Pieri-Agopian, Université de Provence: draughtsperson
Anna Lindqvist, assistant
Karin Lundkvist, assistant
Julia Habetzeder, assistant
Mónica Saldías, assistant
Mats Bergman, assistant
Linda Öhman, assistant
Susanna Blåndman, trainee
Maria Wiseman, trainee
Erika Lindgren, trainee
Mats Holmlund, trainee
Ann Lundberg, volunteer
Joint project in the peristyle of Casa degli Epigrammi greci:
Mark Robinson of the Museum of Natural History in Oxford, with Jennifer Robinson and a group of three students from Oxford and one from Naples.
Abstract:
In Casa degli Epigrammi greci (V 1,18) Margareta Staub Gierow continued her analysis work while Mark Robinson excavated the peristyle garden. Henrik Boman and Monica Nilsson worked on Building complexes V 1,13 and V 1,14-16 while Nilsson also undertook an excavation in Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento with the objective of finding prehistoric layers.
Work in Building complex V 1,13
Boman had the main responsibility of the ongoing work in V 1,13 while Nilsson supervised the excavation in Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento. Assistants were Lindgren, Wiseman and Staub. Rooms b, e and the northern part of d with a staircase were cleaned, after which floors and walls were photographed by Thorwid and measured and drawn by Habetzeder and Pieri-Agopian. Documentation of the walls in room f was concluded with the photographs of Thorwid. The northern exterior wall of V 1,13 faces Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento and Boman took the opportunity to study it after the cleaning of the street and its pavements. Thorwid also photographed the whole length of the exterior wall. Pettersson sampled wall plaster from rooms b, d and e, which will be analysed next year.
Work in Building complex V 1,14-16
Boman and Nilsson continued the investigations of V 1,14-16 by uncovering the water conduits and studying the one remaining oven and the built structures of the viridarium. Comparative material was searched for in 23 Pompeiian bakeries.
Work in Casa degli Epigrammi greci (V 1,18)
Staub Bierow continued her analysis of wall decorations. The results of the plaster analyses could now be connected to the paintings and Pettersson supplemented the samples after confering with Staub Gierow. Saldías continued excavating room x where earlier floor levels and structures shed light on the history of the building; for instance, the hypothesis that a latrina had earlier been in use in the northwestern corner of the room could be confirmed. Pinto-Guillaume produced a section drawing of the eastern wall in room y as well as plans of the excavations in the peristyle garden, but Pieri-Agopian carried out most of the measurements and plans that were required. Thorwid, assisted by Blåndman and Holmlund, photographed most of the walls and floors. The peristyle project continued under Robinsons’s supervision and Habetzeder, Lundkvist and Öhman joined the excavations of the British team. Pottery finds were numerous, but palaeobotanic and palaeozoological material was of particular interest for the reconstruction of the garden and for the identification of sacrificial pits.
Work in Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento
Nilsson, assisted by Bergman and Holmlund, undertook excavations in Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento in the hope of finding prehistoric material. The street and pavements were first cleaned and documented with Pieri-Agopian drawing plans and Thorwid taking photographs; the workmen of Vitiello were then able to remove the large paving stones with the help of a Bobcat. A trench, approximately two square metres in size, was laid out and under an earlier non-paved street and a thick layer of sterile soil, were layers of prehistoric finds, all assigned to the Palma Campania culture, and a hard ash stratum. Ca. 3000 pottery sherds were collected, most of them very small, together with soil samples, some bones, sea shells, bronze fragments and stone tools. At the end of the campaign, the street was put back to its original state.
Other activities
Liebe-Harcort investigated the bone material collected from the 2001 investigation of Building complex V 1,20-21 and from excavations in room x of Casa degli Epigrammi greci. Pinto-Guillaume was assisted by Lundberg and Lindqvist in the processing of the excavated pottery. A preliminary report on the viridarium and water conduits of Casa del Torello di bronzo (V 1,7) was put together by Staub and he will expand his investigations of the building next year; he also continued his work on the thresholds of the insula. Pettersson analysed plaster samples from rooms e, f, g, h, k, l, m and n in Casa di Caecilius Iucundus; she was then able to construct a reference system for wall plaster in the whole building.
Colleagues from other projects in Pompeii visited and discussed the fieldwork and prehistorian Claude Albore Livadie came to view and advice on the finds from Vicolo delle Nozze d’Argento.
Report: Margareta Staub Gierow & Renée Forsell
Edited and translated into English by Monica Nilsson
