Area II
The investigations in Area II, which completely occupied, from the late Neronian period onward, by a terrace on two levels, excavated stratigraphy dating to between the Hadrianic and modern periods. The first chronological horizon produced evidence of a major restoration of the sewer system, the construction of a number of opus mixtum walls to divide several of the Neronian-Flavian rooms, and the re-laying of the floors. About a century later, the building was consolidated by the construction of brick pillars to reinforce the roofing; new floors were again laid, including a high quality black and white mosaic with geometric motifs.

The basement rooms went out of use between the second half of the 3rd century and beginning of the 4th century, when a paving of basoli, and other reused stone, was created immediately east of room 4. In the 5th century, a short sector (Room 1) of the Hadrianic sewer coming from Area IV and crossing Area II in an east-west direction was restored.

Lastly, the excavation of the post-antique robbing was almost completed, with the removal of medieval trenches and cuniculi and the definitive elimination of the vast 17th century robbing which entirely occupied this sector of the excavation. (cf. 2011 report).

Area III
The excavation investigated the eastern side of Area III, facing the present day Piazza del Colosseo, where the removal of the late antique, mid imperial and Neronian stratigraphy revealed new evidence relating to the late Republican, Augustan, and Julio-Claudian phases of the Curiae veteres.

In the Area’s northern sector, the excavation examined the substructures underlying the room paved in opus signinum decorated with basalt crustae (defined as opus scutulatum in the 2011 report), datable to the beginning of the 1st century B.C. A small drain containing two fistulae stamped Ti. Cutius Ciltius, consul suffectus in 55/56 was uncovered. The intervention is to be linked to the Claudian and Neronian (pre 64 A.D.) building activities that are well-documented in the area of the Meta Sudans. The piping, coming from the south, probably fed the “exedra” situated downhill from this room, already identified in 2011, also datable to the Claudian or proto-Neronian period.

Two large foundations, dating respectively to the 1st century B.C. and the Claudian period, on a more or less east-west alignment, found beneath the robber trenches and post-64 A.D. Neronian levelling can be attributed to the Curiae.

Lastly, little remains of the structures of the Domus Aurea, disturbed, as in Area II, by the construction of the pillars, dividing walls and blockings that articulate the history of this side of the Palatine hill from the Flavian period until the 4th-5th century.

Area IV (so-called Baths of Helagabalus)
In the “Baths of Helagabalus” the excavations concentrated on the courtyard and western end of the Severan building, occupied at the beginning if the 4th century A.D. by a balneum and a hemicycle with stibadium and lacus in front.

The marble floors were robbed from all of the rooms in the medieval period, but in some cases it is possible to reconstruct the design thanks to the traces preserved in the mortar make up. The courtyard of the Severan complex was restructured in the same phase with a paving made up of large marble tesserae, pools, and fountains. Almost the entire late antique layout has been brought to light.

The emptying of numerous medieval and modern ditches revealed parts of the structures that preceded the construction of the Severan horreum , adding to knowledge of the plan of the late Republican and Hadrianic insulae.

Lastly, excavation of the early Iron Age (Latial phases IIA-IIB1) hut investigated during previous campaigns was completed. Underlying the occupation levels was a substantial group of natural deposits of eroded material, in direct contact with the geological substratum.