Press Release:
New research and discoveries at the necropolis of Porta Nola, Pompeii.
Project institutions
The British School at Rome
Ilustre Colegio Oficial de Doctores y Licenciados en Letras y Ciencias de Valencia y
Castellòn. Departamento de Arqueologia
Museo de Prehistoria e Historia de La Diputación De Valencia
With the support of:
Ministero dei Beni e delle attivita culturali e del turismo - Soprintendenza Speciale
per i Beni Archeologici di Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia, dott.ssa Annalisa Capurso.
Co-directors
Stephen Kay (The British School at Rome) s.kay@bsrome.it
Prof. Llorenç Alapont Martin (Ilustre Colegio Oficial de Doctores y Licenciados en
Letras y Ciencias de Valencia y Castellòn. Departamento de Arqueologia) llor.alapont@gmail.com
Prof.ssa Rosa Albiach (Museo de Prehistoria e Historia de La Diputación De
Valencia) rosa.albiach@dival.es
Project Overview
In December 2014 the British School at Rome, the l’Ilustre Colegio Oficial de
Doctores y Licenciados en Letras y Ciencias de Valencia y Castellòn (Departamento
de Arqueologia) and the Museo de Prehistoria e Historia de La Diputación De
Valencia, with the support of the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di
Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia, agreed a three year research project for the study of the
necropolis at Porta Nola, Pompeii.
The international multidisciplinary project studying the necropolis of Porta Nola
(Pompeii) has as its objective the investigation of the population of Pompeii, and
more generally the Roman population, using new archaeological data and
tedchniques. The study of the necropolis permits the study of the physical
characteristics of the the inhabitants of Pompeii, as well as their diet, way of life and
funerary practices. The necropolis offers a unique opportunity as different levels of
social strata are represented around the cemetery, from the monumental tomb of
Marcus Obellius Firmus, to the burials of the Praetorian guards to the so-called poor
graves alongside the city wall. Finally, during the first excavation of the area in the
mid-1970s, several casts were made of 15 individuals discovered fleeing Pompeii,
18 hours after the beginning of the eruption. These casts are also being examined,
as preserved within the plaster casts are the skeletal remains of the individuals.
Results of the 2015 excavations (27 July – 28 August)
The Tomb of Obellius Firmus
The tomb, whose inscription on the front pediment records the funeral of M. Obellius
Firmus, aedile and joint magistrate during the reign of the Emperor Nero, was
discovered and partially excavated in 1976. The excavation recovered the funerary
stele and a glass cinerary urn.
The new research of 2015 has discovered of a further cremation burial inside the
tomb. The ceramic vessel was accompanied by grave goods including a coin, dating
to between AD 66 and AD 69, which provides new information concerning the dating
to the structure. Furthermore, over 200 fragments of the ornately decorated bone
covered funerary bed have been recovered, some of which have traces of the gold
leaf decoration.
A key part of the project, working together with the Soprintendenza (under the
supervision of Dott.ssa Annalisa Capurso), is the conservation and restoration of the
funerary monument. Experts from the conservation department of the Museum of
Valencia, under the direction of the head conservator Dr Trinidad Pasies, have
worked to consolidate the plaster and decorated stucco of the monument.
The area immediately outside of Porta Nola (Nolan Gate) was first cleared in 19071908. Since then, soil has once again accumulated opposite the gate, re-buring an
unknown “schola” type tomb. The project has cleared the basalt block roads and
brought back to light the Augustan period tomb.
The third area the excavation has focused upon this year lies immediately alongside
the city walls where in the late 19th century excavations discovered 36 cremation
urns. Traditionally these tombs have been interpreted as graves of the “poor”.
The 2015 excavations have revealed a different picture with the discovery of a
further two urns and an inhumation burial, covered in fragments of amphora, of a
baby, aged between 3 and 6 months. The urns, as well as containing the ashes of
the deceased, also contain a coin, as well as funerary goods, usually a small
ceramic unguentarium. The project has been able to date these burials, through the
stratigraphic excavation to the late Republican – Early Imperial period.
A further part of the project is the study of the casts made of the victims of the AD 79
eruption discovered in the mid-1970s near the tomb of Obellius Firmus. The
analytical study of the casts, coordinated by the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni
Archeologici di Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia (Dr Stefano Vanacore and Dott.ssa
Annalisa Capurso), has allowed the determination of the age, sex, pathologies and
activities of the individuals. Furthermore, the anthropological data, together with
photogrammetry, x-ray analysis and 3D reconstruction allows the reconstruction of
the origibnal positions at the moment of death. The project is also reconstructing the
faces of some of the individuals.
The project will present the results of the research both through a series of
exhibitions and articles for the scientific community, the first of which will be in the
journal Prehistoria Levantina (APL) published by the Consiglio provinciale di
Valencia in 2016.
The two exhibitions aim to present to the public the various aspects of the research
project: the first will be a photographic exhibtion that will be held in Valencia (Spain)
in 2016 in which will be displayed archival photographs and contempoary
photographs relative to the excavation and study of the casts. The historical
photographs come from the archive of the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni
Archeologici di Pompei, Ercolano e Stabia whilst the others were made by a
professional team who have followed the 2015 excavations. At the end of the project
an international exhibition will be held about the archaeology of death, based on the
materail recovered from the 3 years of reasearch.