Mapping Agricultural Landscapes in Roman and Post-Roman Italy

Summary

This is an abstract from the "New Work in Medieval Archaeology, Part 1: Landscapes, Food, and Health" session, at the 89th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the context of an archaeological excavation in northern Lazio, Italy, this paper will discuss solutions for incomplete datasets in the study of pre-modern agriculture. The focus of excavation is a Roman imperial period, monumental fountain located 300 m from the western coast of Lake Bolsena in central Italy. Its high quality of construction and materials and its remote rural location suggests the fountain was part of a larger complex, likely a Roman villa. Answering questions about the identity and motivations of the fountain’s patron hinges on uncovering how its construction related to the agrarian economy, to local export and import and consumption of goods in the region. Reconstructing pre-modern agriculture is nearly impossible because it inevitably depends on incomplete datasets; but theoretical models are possible. The presentation speaks to the value of adopting a digital praxis to the study of historical source materials and turning sources into data. My approach blends analysis of historical documents with modern datasets of the physical environment, when relevant, to generate hypothetical ancient and medieval landscapes and practices in GIS databases for analysis.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• New Work in Medieval Archaeology, Part 1: Landscapes, Food, and Health   •
• Society for American Archaeology 89th Annual Meeting, New Orleans, LA (2024)

Keywords

Spatial Coverage

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 37860.0