The Porta Nocera study programme aims to investigate the creation and development of a Roman urban necropolis that grew up on either side of a road, an essential element in the expression of death in the Roman world. The necropolis at Porta Nocera, excavated between 1952 and 1958 and in 1983, certainly offers an optimum case study for such an objective. Indeed, the funerary monuments and enclosures lining the road towards Norcia, present well-preserved structures (tombs, cremation areas) and in situ inscriptions, making it possible to investigate the funerary practices of a relatively short period, only 160 years, from the moment it is known the necropolis was created in 80 B.C when the Roman colony was founded. Therefore, it is thought that it was precisely the need to create a necropolis that determined the territorial organisation to the south-east of the city and the birth of a new landscape, undoubtedly an area with few manmade structures apart from the city walls.

The 2016 excavations concentrated on two zones: Zone A, around funerary enclosure 26a identified in 2014 (in the western part of the necropolis), and Zone B, along the road to Nocera (in the eastern part of the necropolis), where excavations took place in 1983.