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A shocking new discovery has been made at an ancient Roman excavation site that archaeologists once considered "hopeless".
With no visible ruins, Interamna Lirenas, located in modern central Italy, was originally conceived as a "backwater" town that declined in the early turn of the first millennium.
But a 13-year study of excavations and radars found evidence that it "flourished" until the 3rd century AD, when civil wars, barbarian invasions, and political conflicts began to plague the Roman Empire. This means that the lives of many ordinary Romans may not be going downhill as quickly as previously thought.
Dr Alessandro Launaro, a professor at the University of Cambridge who led the study, said: "We started with a hopeless site and no one has ever tried to excavate it – which is very rare in Italy.
There is nothing on the surface, no obvious signs of construction, only a few broken pottery.
But what we found was not that we were poor. Over 900 years, we have found a thriving town that has adapted to every challenge. ”。
We're not saying that this town is special, it's far more exciting than that. We think many other ordinary Roman towns in Italy have the same resilience.
It's only recently that archaeologists have begun to apply the right techniques and methods to observe this. ”
The site, located about 130 kilometers from Rome, is now mostly farmland, but Dr. Launaro's team found the remains of a roofed 1,500-seat theater, a market, a temple, a bathhouse, and a large warehouse, suggesting that the town was a river port.
They conducted a series of excavations and used magnetic ground penetrating radar on 60 acres of land.
Dr. Launaro added: "The fact that the town has opted for a theater with a roof, a building so refined that it does not fit in with the declining backwater. ”。
This theater is an important status symbol. It showcases the town's wealth, power, and ambition.
It is believed that there is no theater here, which is evidence of the early decline of the town.
In a nearby Roman town, archaeologists saw the remains of a theater protruding from the ground.
The remains of the stunning theater of Interamna Lirenas have always been there, just completely buried. ”
The team had previously discovered that Julius Caesar had become a patron of the International Society of Lirenas in 46 BC.
Dr Launaro said the town was "very valuable" to Romans because it was "strategically located between a river and a major road and was a thriving node in the regional urban network".
It was founded in 312 BC and was eventually abandoned in the 6th century AD as Germanic invaders penetrated deep into modern Italy.
The study was published Tuesday in the Italian journal Roman Urbanism.