VIA CONSOLARE PROJECT

Where does it work? The Via Consolare is a street which starts outside the city, runs through the Herculaneum Gate, and ends near the Forum. The projects focuses on two areas:  The area around the Villa delle Colonne a Mosaico, a large villa just outside the city wall  Insula VII 6, a city block very close to the forum in the heart of the city.

The Google view

The professionally edited version showing where the VCP work!

What is the relationship with the Soprintendenza? The project, like every other project, had to get permission from the Italian authorities to set the project up. There are also at least two Italians from the Soprintendenza, who are members of the project team, who have particular responsibility for safety and architectural preservation.

Where does the money come from? The archaeologists basically have to pay for themselves. Most seek grants from foundations connected with the universities where they teach. Interns (trainee archaeologists) pay for themselves too…

One example is Stephanie Pearson, whose last 3 years in the project were funded by the Stahl Endowment Fund, set up to fund research for staff and students at Berkeley.

Dear Leon, Thanks for your and for your interest! I'm so pleased that your class found the VCP and I hope that you have found the information on the website useful! As to your question: funding is always difficult, and ideally we would be more funded than we are. The normal situation for archaeological projects is to be funded through a combination of money from their home institution, from national granting bodies (such as the National Endowment for the Humanities, or the National Science Foundation), and private individual donors. We have occasionally been funded by small grants from San Francisco State University (mainly for me) and also from Andante Travels (a company that awards small grants and covered our equipment costs one year). As you say, the situation currently is that all members, interns and 'staff' alike pay for their own costs, but this is unusual and hopefully temporary. Some projects run as field schools and charge a high fee that can pay for some or all of their costs, but we decided not to do that since we wanted to stay small and professional. Our costs are generated largely from several factors: accomodation, food, and travel, plus equipment (buckets, dustpans, brushes, pencils, drawing film, cameras, and surveying equipment, etc etc.) After the initial outlay for much of this equipment, much can be reused until it wears out, so living costs of staff (even in a campsite!) tend to be our greatest expenditure beyond the travel itself. I hope that some of that was useful, but please feel free to send along any other questions you or your students might have. Best wishes, Michael

Where do the brains and the workers come from? The Director and others come from San Francisco State university (in California) The University of California, Berkeley A lot of the archaeologists who are not Americans are British The geophysics guys are Italians…AND

Two Australians! Clare O’Bryen from the University of Queensland, whose special interest is the cross cultural influences of ancient religions… Robyn Veal from the University of Sydney, whose specialty is ancient charcoal!

What are the big questions they are trying to answer? How the city developed over time? What is the relationship between this important road and the community it served? “In VII.6 there were two large houses, shops, civic buildings, bars and even possibly a brothel, whilst the area of the Villa della Colonne a mosaico comprised a villa, metalworking and pottery workshops, civic buildings, bars, and tombs. The Project seeks to discover when this situation comes into being and how it relates to the role of the via Consolare itself.”

What methods are used? Modern stratigraphic excavation (This is always in areas which don’t disturb existing structures.) Geopysics Trench excavation

Recovery and analysis of artefact and ecofact data for every excavated deposit Sieving Drawing pottery

Digital mapping and 3-D topographic survey linked to a Geographical Information Systems (GIS) database

This is a type of 3D photogrammetry using a technique called “point cloud” on standing structures

Complete stratigraphic analysis of the standing remains including mortar by mortar comparison and visual analysis

Rectified digital photography of all standing remains

Sequencing of complete building history linked to stratigraphic analyses, excavated data and construction histories as revealed via analysis. Publishing of results. All this research and recording leads to an understanding what was built here, and when!

What are they trying to achieve? The area has been neglected! “Insula VII 6 and the area of the Villa delle Colonne a mosaico have suffered not only due to long exposure and bombing, but also from a scholarly neglect and a belief that little remains to be studied in these areas.”

But now…because of the VCP… The sequence of what was built here is being recovered by very careful excavation and recording and in the process the project is happy about the fact that they have developed at low cost, “a recently-released and revolutionary method of 3D data acquisition” which they believe, “will revolutionise modern scientific archaeological methodology”.

Anything to make the process of accurately recording information cheaper – has to be a good thing at Pompeii.

Reports for each season of the project is to be found on the project webpage…

the end