Roman Necropolis

The period between the 3rd and 1st centuries BCE generally suffers from poor archaeological documentation. The materials from necropoleis of this time raise various theoretical questions, as they are associated with the transitional phase between the Iberian and Roman worlds. This article analyzes some of the reasons contributing to the difficulty of the study of funerary contexts from this period, and the changes in funerary rituals that resulted from Roman colonization, using the specific example of the necropolis of Castulo (Linares, Jaén)

Dans un premier temps, je ne mettrai pas de pdf de l'article qui se rapporte aux découvertes de la nécropole fouillée près de la place E. Wernert (Lyon 5). Voici seulement en pièce jointe une photographie d'un sarcophage qui remploie une architrave-frise d'un mausolée et une liste de quelques mots-clefs : Lyon ; églises Saint-Just et Saint-Irénée ; paléochrétien ; remplois ; nécropole ; sarcophage ; mausolées antiques ; sanctuaire du culte impérial ; décor architectural ; sculpture ; griffons ; Méléagre ; stèle funéraire avec un portrait ; Eros sur un sarcophage.

Die römischen Grabdenkmäler aus dem Siedlungsgebiet der Treverer sind in vielerlei Hinsicht exzeptionell. Sie bilden sowohl aufgrund ihres Anteils am erhaltenen Denkmälerbestand als auch ihres charakteristischen Erscheinungsbildes eine wichtige Fundgruppe und haben einen hohen Stellenwert für die Erforschung der kaiserzeitlichen Kunst und Architektur im Moselraum. Die Beiträge in diesem Tagungsband geben einen Über-blick zu aktuellen Forschungen, stellen neues Material vor und demonstrieren an konkreten Fallbeispielen die Anwendung innovativer methodischer Zugänge. Erst-mals wird dabei das gesamte Treverergebiet mitsamt den benachbarten Regionen in den Blick genommen und in überregionaler Perspektive behandelt. Die römischen Grabdenkmäler aus dem Siedlungsgebiet der Treverer sind in vielerlei Hinsicht exzeptionell. Sie bilden sowohl aufgrund ihres Anteils am erhaltenen Denkmälerbestand als auch ihres charakteristischen Erscheinungsbildes eine wichtige Fundgruppe und haben einen hohen Stellenwert für die Erforschung der kaiserzeitlichen Kunst und Architektur im Moselraum. Die Beiträge in diesem Tagungsband geben einen Über-blick zu aktuellen Forschungen, stellen neues Material vor und demonstrieren an konkreten Fallbeispielen die Anwendung innovativer methodischer Zugänge. Erst-mals wird dabei das gesamte Treverergebiet mitsamt den benachbarten Regionen in den Blick genommen und in überregionaler Perspektive behandelt. Die römischen Grabdenkmäler aus dem Siedlungsgebiet der Treverer sind in vielerlei Hinsicht exzeptionell. Sie bilden sowohl aufgrund ihres Anteils am erhaltenen Denkmälerbestand als auch ihres charakteristischen Erscheinungsbildes eine wichtige Fundgruppe und haben einen hohen Stellenwert für die Erforschung der kaiserzeitlichen Kunst und Architektur im Moselraum. Die Beiträge in diesem Tagungsband geben einen Überblick zu aktuellen Forschungen, stellen neues Material vor und demonstrieren an konkreten Fallbeispielen die Anwendung innovativer methodischer Zugänge. Erstmals wird dabei das gesamte Treverergebiet mitsamt den benachbarten Regionen in den Blick genommen und in überregionaler Perspektive behandelt.

The largest city necropolis of Naissus in the period of Late Antiquity was formed east of the fortress, along the road to Ratiaria. Since it is located in today’s city quarter of Jagodin Mala, it became known by that name in the literature. In Late Antiquity, this area had been used intensively for burials, from the end of the 4th century to the 6th or beginning of the 7th century.

During the systematic exploration of this area, five church edifices, a crypt (martyrium?), over 65 brick lined tombs, a large number of brick lined graves and around 300 graves of the deceased, interred in the ground, have been identified. Between the tombs and in the free spaces, the deceased were buried in simple grave holes or in wooden coffins. The area has revealed different types of sepulchral structures, building methods, and materials that were used, as well as the funeral practices of the inhabitants of Naissus in Late Antiquity, during Early Christianity. The wealth of grave goods and inventory suggests that the population lived in a time of social and economic prosperity.

"Representations", N. 129, Winter 2015.

The essay analyzes the project of maintaining the body of V. I. Lenin in the Mausoleum in Moscow for the past ninety years, focusing on the unique biological science that developed around this project, and the unexpected political role this body has performed.

The results are presented of archaeological rescue excavations in Zrinsko-Frankopanska Street in Zadar. This street is located in the city quarter of Relja, where a large Roman period cemetery was located. Of the 37 excavated grave units, 24 of them were inhumation burials and 13 cremation burials. On the basis of the grave goods, two horizons of burial were distinguished. The earlier layer of burial was in the 1 st century and beginning of the 2 nd century AD with predominantly cremation burials in stone and
pottery urns, while the later horizon of burial was in the 2 nd and 3 rd centuries AD with cremation burial in pottery urns and also inhumation burials under tegulae.
The arrangement of these graves is tied to the specifically
organized areas of the grave plots, whose remains can be rec-
ognized in the excavated walls numbered 1, 2, 4, 5, and 7. The
regular network of grave plots was supplemented by two walled stone structures, which most probably represented the foundations of some large sepulchral structures, ediculae or mausoleums at this necropolis of Iader.
Two groups of grave goods stand out in the catalogue in
terms of number. Most of the glass objects can be classified as imports from northern Italian workshops, but forms are also represented that attest to a probable local production of glass. The pottery material is dominated by imported items from two production areas, from the northern Italian workshops and from the pottery centers of the eastern Mediterranean.
Key words: Zadar, Roman necropolis, Relja, grave plots, crema-
tion, inhumation.

Il recupero di una quarantina di sepolture, avvenuto nel 2002 in seguito a lavori per la rete autostradale presso la città di Manerbio, offrì l’occasione per accostarsi al rituale della cremazione così come era praticato da una piccola comunità della pianura bresciana della prima età imperiale, quanto tale modalità costituiva il romanus mos per eccellenza nella pratica funeraria.

The discovery of about forty graves in 2002 during motorway construction work near the town of Manerbio provided an opportunity to study cremation burial as conducted by a small community on the plain south of Brescia in early imperial times, when this funerary practise was the principal Romanus mos.

798 sépultures comportant du petit mobilier ou du matériel métallique ont été inventoriées sur le territoire de
l’Aquitaine augustéenne. Cet inventaire a permis dans un premier temps de mettre en évidence les différentes
catégories de mobilier présent dans les sépultures. Il a ensuite permis l’étude des rites funéraires des peuples
aquitains, en constatant les associations entre les différentes catégories de mobilier dans les incinérations puis
dans les inhumations, dans les sépultures isolées et dans les nécropoles, afin de déterminer : quels objets et
quelles associations sont sexuellement discriminants et permettent de déterminer l’âge au décès ; quels objets et
quelles associations permettent de déterminer la position sociale du défunt ; enfin, de constater l’importance des
dépôts issus de l’héritage celtique et de l’introduction de pratiques romaines. Sont développés de manière plus
précise quelques exemples comme les rites funéraires des Lémovices (les tombes de cette cité représentent
environ un tiers du catalogue) et une étude comparée entre les grandes nécropoles de l’Aquitaine. Dans une
troisième partie, nous nous sommes intéressés au mobilier contenu dans le groupe dit des « sépultures
privilégiées » et dans les tombes « à caractère exceptionnel », d’une part afin de compléter un inventaire
inachevé ; d’autre part afin de montrer la différence entre ces deux dénominations. Un chapitre est également
consacré aux armes, généralement représentatives de tombes socialement privilégiées, afin de constater leur
réelle fonction en contexte funéraire, et un dernier chapitre à l’unique tombe à char d’époque romaine mise au
jour sur le territoire aquitain.

The finds of 798 Augustan-era burial tombs located across the Aquitania region in southwest France have been
inventoried. This inventory first revealed the various kinds of finds (including metal items) contained in the
tombs and second, it facilitated the study of the funerary rites of the peoples of Aquitania by noting the
associations between the various kinds of objects used in cremations and burials, in isolated tombs and in
necropolises, in order to determine: which objects and which associations are sex-specific and allow us to assess
the age of the individual at death; which objects and which associations make it possible to ascertain the
deceased’s social position; and lastly, to establish the importance of finds of both Celtic origin and those linked
to the introduction of Roman practices. Particular attention has been paid to cases such as the funerary rites of
the Lemovices (the tombs of this civitas make up nearly one third of the whole catalogue) and a comparative
study of Aquitania’s greater necropolises. The third part of the thesis focuses on the objects belonging to the socalled
‘privileged tombs’ group and to the group of tombs I refer to as ‘exceptional’, in order to both complete
the unfinished inventory and to demonstrate how different the two denominations are. There is also a chapter
devoted to weapons, typically a marker of social privilege, which aims to establish their actual function in a
funerary context. The last chapter bears on the only tomb found in Aquitania to contain a Roman carriage.

The paper examines the presence of food remains, connected to silicernium and offerings made at the closing of the burials in roman Aquileia's necropolises: it appears cleraly the deposition of dates, olives, pine cones (closed with pine nuts), shellfish and crustaceans in all the burial sites of the city. It reconsiders, therefore, the finding made in the final decades of the nineteenth century by Eugen Riiter von Zahony: he rediscovered a pit, closed and sealed with great care, full of fruits and animal bones remains, with features related to the practice of collective offerings for all the dead of the necropolis site, dating in the third century AD and located on the final part of the Via Annia. The study concludes with the reinterpretation of a finding attributable to early medieval age occurred in 1876, described by Carlo Gregorutti.

Aquileia, necropolis of the Augustan age. Some observations

The article examines some inscriptions dating from the end of the first century BC to the beginning of the first century AD. They come from all over the suburbs of Aquileia, with prevalence of the portion gravitating on the roads for Tergeste and Emona (Colombara and S. Egidio) and report the measures of the tomb, indicating a regulated  utilization of available spaces.
Several grave goods show the presence of  the strigil as well as that of funerary beds. On the road to Noricum (Zuccherina) an urn in alabaster was found  out (containing the remains of a woman), wrapped in a flax cloth, placed in a stone urn and fixed by lime.

Nel tratto dell’Appia compreso fra porta San Sebastiano e il sepolcro di Cecilia Metella, l’antica pavimentazione stradale
in basoli di leucitite è sparita ormai da tempo, sostituita prima da battuti e selciatelle, poi dal lastricato in sampietrini e
infine dall’asfalto, rimosso in occasione dei lavori realizzati dal Comune di Roma per il Giubileo del 2000. Dall’analisi
della documentazione d’archivio e dei frammenti di basolato e resti di antiche crepidini rinvenuti durante i lavori, si cerca
di ricostruire il percorso e le quote originali della via Appia in questo settore, soffermandosi su alcune interessanti vicende
moderne della regina viarum.

Along the stretch of the Appian Way between the San Sebastiano gate and the tomb of Cecilia Metella, the ancient paving
– consisting of large blocks of leucitite rock – disappeared long ago. It was first replaced by beaten earth and selciatelle
(small paving stones obtained by reworking the ancient ones), then by sampietrini (small quadrangular blocks of stone
used for paving in Rome since the 16th century) and more recently by asphalt. The asphalt layer was removed during
work carried out by the City of Rome for the 2000 Jubilee Year. By studying archival documents as well as the fragments
of the ancient Roman paving and the vestiges of the crepidines (raised footways that ran along the sides of the road) found
during the Jubilee work, the author seeks to map the original route and elevations of this section of the Appian Way, and
describes several interesting things that affected to it in modern times.

El reto del proyecto de investigación MBC y de la publicación que el lector tiene en sus manos es avanzar sobre el conocimiento del ritual
y de la ideología de la muerte en un ámbito provincial, marginal geográficamente hablando, y en el que el sustrato autóctono y su posición abierta, en medio de una zona de contacto como era –y es– el estrecho de Gibraltar, configuraron unos modelos de enterramiento y unos rituales originales. Creemos que el nivel de exigencia científica en los tiempos que corren y el avance del conocimiento arqueológico sobre
el mundo de la muerte en época romana nos obliga necesariamente a profundizar en estos, dejando de lado el establecimiento de lecturas e interpretaciones clásicas y unidireccionales, cada vez menos válidas según se incrementa la información sobre cada urbe y sus necrópolis.

In the 19th century four tombs dated to the Roman age were found under fortuitous circumstances in the territory of Zanica. The funerary assemblages were retrieved by Count Paolo Vimercati Sozzi and Gaetano Mantovani;currently the finds are kept at the Bergamo Archaeological Museum. The study of the assemblages and thedocumentation written by the two Scholars allowed to trace the chronology of three tombs back to the 1 st century AD and of the forth one to Late Antiquity. The tombs were framed within a territorial organizationof Roman age (streets and centurial system) and related to other similar finds at both a chronological and atopographical level. Finally, continuity was recognized between the Roman cemetery and the one that willdevelop in the Early Medieval age.

Највећа градска некропола у периоду касне антике формирана је на лесном платоу на десној обали Нишаве, источно од тврђаве, дуж пута за Рацијарију. Некропола се налази на месту данашње градске четврти Јагодин мала, по којој је постала позната у литератури. Од периода касне антике овај простор је интензивно коришћен за сахрањивање, од  IV до краја VI или почетка VII века.  Некропола у Јагодин мали систематски се, са прекидима, истражује већ осам деценија.
The largest city necropolis in the period of Late Antiquity was formed on the loess plateau on the right bank of the Ni{ava, east of the fortress, along the road to Ratiaria (fig. 56). Since it is located in today’s city quarter of Jagodin Mala, it became known by that name in the literature. In Late Antiquity, this area had been used intensively for burials, from the end of the 4th century to the end of the 6th or beginning of the 7th century.11 Systematic investigation of the necropolis in Jagodin Mala has been conducted intermittently, for no less than eight decades.