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Archaeological Sites

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Gravisca

In the town of Porto Clementino, near the modern shore of Tarquinia, one can find the remains of the Etruscan port of the city, dating back to the Roman époque of around 180 B.C., in part upon a colony of Gravisca.
Thanks to excavations, started in 1969, we discover that the Etruscan settlement was founded around 600 B.C. and remained up until the 3rd century B.C. It occupied a vast area of an irregular rectangular form that extended up to 800 meters, on the longest side, along the coast and the shortest side, along the road to Tarquinia, measured at around 300 meters.
From the archaic installation, which seems to have undergone a re-facing during the 4th century B.C., pieces of road are evidenced with central sewers and ruins of habitations conserved in the lower part of the loft, done with large limestone blocks.
On the extreme southern outskirt of the Etruscan habitat, archaeological research have brought to light an important sanctuary where, as epigraphic and ceramic testimony documents, Greek cults were exercised. Initially, in fact, the place was frequented by merchants coming from the islands and coasts of Asia Minor (Samo, Efeso and Mileto). The divinities that were worshipped here were Aphrodite, Hera, and Demetra whose names we know thanks to the graphite inscriptions on the vases dedicated to them.
At the end of the 6th century B.C. the merchants of the Greek city of Egina temporarily substituted the Ionic civilization.
Proof of this fact was found in various dedications to the God Apollo, among them, the anchor given by Sostratos of Egina that is remembered by Erodoto along with other treasures accumulated through commercial activities of the time offered in thanks to the gods.
Around 470 B.C., the sanctuary was redone according to a monumental conception. The structures of the last phase belong to three buildings done with large stone and river pebbles, conserved only on a floor surface level.

The Roman Colony, dating back to 181 B.C., extends for about six hectares. Other small sections, lined by roads and occupied by buildings, were discovered and analyzed also thanks to the use of aerial photography, and besides thermal spring environments, other habitations, showing layers which witnessed fire probably due to the passage of the Goths in 408 A.D., were discovered.

Brick Manufacturers of Mugnano for antique Roman monuments

The largest monuments of antique Rome like the Pantheon, Colosseum, Baths of Caracalla and Diocletian, Villa Adrian and Tivoli, were all erected with bricks made in two furnaces in use from the 1st to the 4th or 5th century found near Mugnano in Teverina, a fraction of Bomarzo, on the north side of the Valley of Rio with a stream of the Tiber on the right.
The two productive settlements were discovered during the course of a reconnaissance: on the surface done by the cathedral of Tuscia in collaboration with the Archaeological Superintendence of the Meridional Etruria.
The studies conducted, brought to light how the bricks and tiles that were used in the construction of Roman buildings, have the same branded name as that on the bricks coming form Mugnano.
This particular detail determined that the building material used in the capital city is exactly that which was manufactured in the Valley of Rio. In Mugnano, the environmental and topographic conditions were ideal for the installation of a brick production on an industrial scale; the presence of clay. Water, forests for wood not to mention being close to the Tiber, which made shipping the product, by boat to Rome, easy.
Furthermore, the analyse of the factory brand name demonstrated that for the first 100 years of their history, the furnaces were property of the Domitii family, who were among the major producers of brick in ancient times.
The name Domitii, besides being found on the bricks, appeared in an inscription" "iter privatum duorum Domitiorum" translated, private street of the two Domiti, incised on the rocky walls of a street which ran to the summit of the valley where the factories were found.
The inscription, compared to what might be today a sign written "private road", marked the entrance to the large estate where the two production plants were found.
Besides the production of buiding materials, the Domitii furnaces specialized in the production of two different types of containers; doliums, used for the transport and conservation of agricultural and food products and mortars, used for grinding and preparation of food products.
Doliums and mortars branded with the name Domitii and produced in Mugnano were found all over the Mediterranean basin, primarily I France, Spain and West Africa where they were sent thanks to the commercial traffic that travelled by both land and sea.
Between 155 and 161 A.D., the furnaces found in Mugnano were inherited by the future emperor Marco Aurelio, descendent of the Domitii by the part of the mother, Domitia Lucilla Minor, remaining part of the imperial monopoly up to the end of its production function between the 4th and 5th century A.D.

Sutri

Situated along Via Cassia on a tuffaceous plain between the valleys of torrente Promonte and Rotoli, Sutri held an exceptional strategic importance in its antique era due to the geographic connections between Etruria meridional, the Faliscan territory and Latium.
The sources remind us, together with Nepi, at the beginning of the 4th century B.C., when, after the fall of Veio (396 B.C.) the Romans put up an outpost between Rome and Etruria and a bulwark against Tarquinia. The city became a municipal after the social war of 90-89 B.C. and was again colonized at the beginning of the 1st century B.C.
The continuity of life, that of which was the aim of the urban plain, made the original structure that hosted the settlements, unrecognizable.
During the first colonization, the construction of a protective wall belt in blocks of tufa in alternate rows by size. One can still see long tracts incorporated in the medieval fort. The so-called Porta Furia, opens up on the western side of the wall, most likely for a tie to the road which took you to Nepi. The "Porta" (door) is surmounted by a double metal ringed arch dating back to the 2nd century B.C.
In the same urban area one can find the ruins of a small thermal installation and underground passages of an undetermined date. The Etruscan period is documented by various tombs with dates from the 6th to 4th centuries B.C., found in the immediate area of the land occupied by the city. The oldest can be confronted with similarities to tombs in Blera and S. Giovenale, characterized by Cerite ascendants.
On the head of the tuffaceous ridge that faces Sutri to the south, next to the road Via Cassia, one can see the most impressive nucleus of the urban Necropoli, constituted by about sixty tombs covering two or three rows dating back to the 1st century B.C. and to the 3rd and 4th century A.D.
Not far away we find the main monument of the city, the amphitheatre measuring at 49.6 x 40.8 meters, entirely excavated from the tufa from between the 1st century B.C. and the beginning of the 1st century A.D. The area also conserves a very old church dating back to the 3rd century A.D. later transformed into a Christian church dedicated to the Madonna of Parto. Carved completely into the rock, it consists of a rectangular form covered by a vault and entirely divided into three naves by pilasters.
The cult of the god Mitra is witnessed in Sutri also by the findings of a Roman époque slab with the figuration of the divinity. The territory results particularly rich in antique settlements; Roman époque buildings are documented in Casale Mezzaroma Nuova, in Castellaccio and in Salfatara where, besides the findings of a tract of road, underground passages and pavements of a Roman Villa were brought to light.
Instead, in Monte della Guardia, archaeological excavations done at the end of the 1950's by the British Academy of Rome, discovered the remains of a furnace for ceramics active between the years 60 and 70 A.D.