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Excavation

  • Nora, quartiere nord-occidentale
  • Nora
  • Nora
  • Italy
  • Sardinia
  • Province of Cagliari
  • Pula

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Credits

  • The Italian Database is the result of a collaboration between:

    MIBAC (Ministero per i Beni e le Attività Culturali - Direzione Generale per i Beni Archeologici),

    ICCD (Istituto Centrale per il Catalogo e la Documentazione) and

    AIAC (Associazione Internazionale di Archeologia Classica).

  • AIAC_logo logo

Summary (English)

  • The University of Genova, in collaboration with the Universities of Milano, Padova and Viterbo, has been excavating the site of the ancient town of Nora since 1990.

    From 1996, the excavations have concentrated on the north-western zone of the town, occupied and urbanised by the Carthaginians at the end of the 6th century B.C. Here, a craft-working quarter developed (Area C), which immediately gave the town a commercial role. This function, documented for the 4th-3rd century B.C. by a garum maker’s shop, continued until the area became residential (end of the 2nd-1st century B.C.). During the 2nd century A.D., the area underwent a first monumentalisation, the evidence for which is difficult to identify as it was heavily cut by the Severan intervention (partially excavated last century by G. Pesce). It was Pesce who uncovered a multipurpose commercial structure, the so-called macellum/hospitium, the Small baths, and a series of houses; although a part of the data relating to the later phases has been lost.

    From 2010, as restoration project began on the Small Baths, a series of excavations and test trenches have been undertaken both inside the baths and in the vicinity, in order to clarify their phasing and chronology. The Small Baths are built on top of earlier dwellings (quarter A-B), making use of their walls. In the Severan period, they had a simple layout made up of a frigidarium, two tepidaria, one calidarium. An apodyterium, a corridor and monumental entrance were added during the 4th century A.D. The baths went out of use and were partially reoccupied for residential purposes (?) and finally transformed into a craft-working area with kilns both in the frigidarium and tepidaria pools. In the area to the north a new residential quarter was created, which represented the final phase of the town’s life (7th-8th century A.D.).

    In 2012, the excavation concentrated on the road E-F crossing the quarter, parallel to another road (G-H), which borders the area on the coastal side. A stretch of paved road was exposed and two manholes for the sewers below were identified. In particular, the intervention concentrated on a structure (so-called room A), known from previous seasons (1992-93), relating to this final phase of Nora’s urbanisation. The excavation showed that, contrary to road G-H-, which remained in function, this road, perhaps the result of a Severan intervention, went out of use in the 5th century A.D. This event was attested by the presence of an almost uniform layer of soil and sand covering the paved surface. The walls from the houses along the sides of this road were also abandoned at the end of the 5th century A.D. and collapsed onto this natural surface. In the 7th century, the levelling of the abandonment layer and construction of room A attest the site’s reoccupation. This room was part of a larger house relating to the final phase of urbanisation, traces of which were also documented close to the Small Baths. The town’s end probably came at the time of the Arab invasion of Campidano (753 A.D.).

  • Bianca Maria Giannattasio - Università degli Studi di Genova 

Director

  • Marco Minoja - Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici per le province di Cagliari e Oristano
  • Maurizio Canepa - Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici per le province di Cagliari e Oristano

Team

  • V. De Marco - Università degli Studi di Padova
  • M. Grippo - Università degli Studi di Genova
  • A. Parodi - Università degli Studi di Genova
  • D. Carbone - Università di Genova

Research Body

  • Università degli Studi di Genova

Funding Body

  • Comune di Pula

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