ROME TRANSFORMED: STRUCTURAL SURVEY AND ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS IN SOUTHEAST ROME

According to its original timetable ROMETRANS, 'Rome Transformed: interdisciplinary analysis of political, military, and religious regenerations of the city's forgotten quarter C1-C8 CE' (https://cordis.europa.eu/project/id/835271), aimed to complete field data capture by May 2022. Managing the long-term impact of COVID on project schedules, resurveying especially challenging areas and capitalizing upon the opportunities arising from earlier investigations, however, meant that ROMETRANS team members were still actively involved in fieldwork into 2023. In previous reports, we have summarized the project's extensive programme of geophysical survey led by Stephen Kay (BSR), Salvatore Piro (CNR) and Gianfranco Morelli (Geostudi Astier). Evaluation of the voluminous data recovered in that programme continues, but no new geophysics fieldwork was undertaken during this reporting period, and accordingly we do not discuss it further here. The borehole programme that supports our environmental analysis work and feeds our RT3D system for topographic modelling did, however, continue in the field during this time. The cores extracted were subjected to geomorphological analysis by Carlo Rosa of TecnoGeo, before having their archaeological content and organic materials. Key deposits were then subjected to radiocarbon dating; a majority of samples recovered dated from the mid-Republican to early Imperial period. For ease of reference the other fieldwork undertaken is summarized below from west to east across the project's research area. Under the Lateran Baptistery, Thea Ravasi carried out further structural analysis of the bath complex which preceded the baptistery. The work is illuminating changes to the building made from the second half of the third to the early fourth centuries AD, an important stage in the development of the complex, that preceded the development of the monumental octagonal structure that is visible today. Detailed analysis of the transformation of the hydraulic system under the baptistery was undertaken by Elettra Santucci. Above ground, Gianluca Foschi and Thea Ravasi also completed the laser scanning of the structures of the Lateran Baptistery. The integration of this data with earlier scans generated by the Lateran Project team produced the first-ever comprehensive point cloud of all the surviving structures of the baptistery from subsurface to ceiling. To the north, Elettra Santucci led a detailed inspection of ancient and late antique drains, channels and conduits in the grounds of the Ospedale San Giovanni (project Area 2). This work covered the sites at the Corsia Folchi, CorsiaMazzoni, the horti of Domitia Lucilla and the especially challenging complex preserved beneath the Ospedale delle Infermiere.Much of this research required access to confined narrow spaces underground, and for safety reasons was carried out with the assistance of our specialist colleagues of Roma Sotterranea. In the archaeological area of Corsia Folchi, a new hydraulic channel was identified, documented and surveyed, while in the archaeological area of Corsia Mazzoni, the so-called Domus Anniorum, detailed analysis reviewed crucial but previously unobserved detail, such as the identification of a brick stamp on the cappuccina vault. A development of the research carried out in the horti of Domitia Lucilla in Area 2 has been the sampling of fabric from dolia assemblages in imperial properties for comparative analysis, led by Thea Ravasi, with Luciana Randazzo, Maureen Carroll, Valentina Pescari and Giuliana Galli. The project has included recording stamps and sampling fabric from the doliaria of the horti of Domitia Lucilla and of the villa of the Quintilii along the Via Appia, to investigate the origin and distribution of dolia in imperial properties. To the east of the project area, in the Archaeological Area of Santa Croce (project Area 3), work led by Gianluca Foschi expanded laser-scanning coverage of the structures of the Circus Varianus, of the Basilica Civile and the southeastern side of the Basilica of Santa Croce, an achievement which allows for the development of an updated plan of the Circus Varianus by Gianluca Foschi and Francesca Carboni. Area 3 was also the focus of a major effort by Elettra Santucci to sample hydraulic structures within and beyond the research area. This is part of a programme undertaken in collaboration with Duncan Keenan-Jones, and it focuses on the collection of two types of samples: calcium carbonate deposits and hydraulic mortars. Integral to the project's fieldwork is the development of 'provocations', visualizations that are developed and presented to advance analysis and debate about the form of spaces and structures. It was fitting therefore that the reporting period culminated in the Rome Transformed Provocation Colloquium held at the BSR on 22-24 March 2023. The visualizations are available for viewing and feedback on the Rome Transformed SCIEDOC platform (https://rometrans.ncl.ac.uk/rtsciedoc).