Development and decline of the ancient harbor of Neapolis

Abstract

Archaeological excavations, undertaken since 2004 for the construction of the new Naples subway, have unearthed the harbor basin of the Greco–Roman town of Parthenope–Neapolis, furnishing scientists with the opportunity to recover abundant archaeological remains and a thick succession of diverse infill sediments. The latter underwent sedimentological, paleontological, and volcanological analyses. Compositional data analysis, applied to all three data sets, highlighted three main paleoenvironmental changes in the harbor basin from the Augustan Age up to the 6th century A.D. The beginning of harbor activity is recorded during the 3rd century B.C. when sedimentation was interrupted by intensive dredging of the sea‐bottom. The impact of the A.D. 79 Vesuvius eruption, recorded for the first time in the Neapolitan territory, led to a reduction in Posidonia meadows and to an ensuing phase of more restricted water circulation and pollution. At the beginning of the 5th century A.D., an open lagoon environment was established, attesting to coastal progradation. The final closure of this part of the bay occurred at the end of the 5th to the beginning of the 6th century A.D., due to increased alluvial input linked to both natural and anthropogenic causes.

Cellulose and Lignin Nano-Scale Consolidants for Waterlogged Archaeological Wood

“…The wood coming from Fiumicino belongs to the shipwreck named Isola Sacra 1 (sample P2550), an horeiatype vessel dated before the first half of the 3rd century AD and excavated in 2011 (Boetto et al, 2017). The wood from Naples pertains the shipwreck F (samples FTdis 4, Ftdis 9, and FTdis 48) (Di Donato et al, 2018), and a wooden pier (2514.28, 2514.30, and 2514.34) both dated to the roman age. The remains were recovered from the excavation area of Piazza Municipio in 2015 and 2018, respectively.…”

Holocene paleogeographic evolution of an ancient port city of the central Mediterranean area: Natural and anthropogenic modifications from Salerno city, southern Italy

“…Although the artificial AHP is still progradational, the low energy conditions result in an anomalous fining‐upward sequence. Well‐documented case‐studies of AHP include Punic Carthage (Gifford, Rapp, & Vitali, ), Roman Caesarea (Reinhardt & Raban, ), Kition‐Bamboula (Morhange et al, ), Hellenistic Alexandria (Goiran, ), Greek‐Roman Marseilles (Morhange et al, ), Sidon (Morhange, Espic, Doumet‐Serhal, Bourcier, & Carbonel, ), Tyre (Marriner, Morhange, Boudagher‐Fadel, Bourcier, & Carbonel, ; Marriner, Morhange, Doumet‐Serhal, & Carbonel, ), and Greek‐Roman Neapolis (Cinque et al, ; Di Donato et al, ). A typical AHP vertical succession comprises four components (Marriner & Mohrange, ): (a) The transgressive contact or maximum flooding surface (MFS), generally dated to ca.…”

Geomorphology of Naples and the Campi Flegrei: human and natural landscapes in a restless land

“…Three main stages (B1, B2 and B3) of landscape evolution have been reconstructed based on the re-elaboration of available literature (Cinque et al, 2011;Di Donato et al, 2018;Romano et al, 2013;Russo Ermolli et al, 2014).…”