Rome is an iconic city. From Grand Tour etchings to nocturnal portraits of the cityscape, Rome’s monuments have become familiar images. Yet the British School at Rome Archive casts the metropolis and its environs in a new light, allowing us to witness the changing face of the Eternal City, and Italy itself. Long-vanished ruins and [...]
Notes from Rome
For Sigmund Freud, the archaeology of the city of Rome was a metaphor for the unconscious mind – a place where no memories or influences are ever lost or forgotten. Recent excavations in the city have made a reality of the psychologist’s flight of fancy. The construction of a new metropolitan rail-line has brought discoveries [...]
The Director’s Diary
Every time I arrive at the British School at Rome, it is somehow different. Old buildings and strong institutions can be like that; they hold up a mirror to us so that whilst they persist, we see our own changes more clearly. The first time I visited I was at Oxford, writing my doctoral thesis [...]
On our Book shelves
Rome is a city of books. Perhaps the greatest concentration of leading libraries in the world exists here, though refurbishments and closures have made sad inroads into their availability: at present, the great German Archaeological Institute library has reopened part of its collection in new premises and the Vatican Library is due to reopen in [...]
The British School at Rome: 100 years
In 1911 a major international exhibition was held in Rome, and the British put up a particularly splendid pavilion designed by Edwin Lutyens and based on Christopher Wren’s designs for the west front of St Paul’s. The result is a triumph: it is difficult in Rome to produce a classical building that is both British [...]
Pompeii
July 3, 2010
Filed Under: Issue 42, Great Discoveries, Italy
We know more about Pompeii than any other Roman town. It is the benchmark, and yet we still have so much to learn…
Siracusa, Sicily
Beneath the glorious Sicilian coastal city of Siracusa lies a vast underground world, as Michael Metcalfe reveals.
Portus’ Pantheon
To the south west of Rome, at the mouth of the Tiber, archaeologists from Southampton University and the British School at Rome have been excavating at Portus, the huge Roman port (twice the size of Southampton’s modern harbour). It was through this port that Rome’s luxury goods and essential grain supplies were imported from all [...]
Baia, the Underworld
Just west of the entrance to the underworld, lies the site of Baia. Mike Cless takes us there, tells of a divine discovery, then ventures underground
Salento
Richard Hodges tours the Salento in South Italy; there he finds a clash of civilizations and some intriguing Medieval graffiti
Scanning Rome’s Catacombs
Digital mapping techniques used to fully document Rome’s 105 miles of subterranean tunnels
Herculaneum re-painted
Laser scanning techniques used to create detailed picture of statues found at Herculaneum
Pompeii, The Life of a Roman Town
With the decline of grammar schools in Britain, Classics seemed to be heading for a fall. Recently however, both in the UK and USA, the subject has achieved something of a renaissance. Popular culture, ironically, provides the impetus: Latin is the working language at Hogwarts; Gladiator and Troy are two of the most testosterone-fuelled films [...]
Roman Empire, The
Instead of plastic toys that will be broken before Christmas dinner, how about one of the British Museum pocket series as stocking-fillers this year? Pitched at older children/younger teenagers, two new titles in the series have just appeared. Sam Moorhead takes us on a whistle-stop tour of the Roman Empire, sampling Gaulish wine, visiting the [...]
Roman Amphitheatre in Britain, The
Tony Wilmott started with the re-excavation of one amphitheatre, that of Chester. He promptly went on to a re-examination of amphitheatres, sorts of amphitheatres (you need to read the book!), and theatres of Roman Britain to explain how they worked in practice. But this book is far more than a warm up for an excavation [...]
The Fall of Rome: And the End of Civilization
Why did the western half of the Roman Empire fall? Did it fall at all – or was it peacefully transformed into the similarly sophisticated civilization of Late Antiquity? The pendulum of historical interpretation has swung from one extreme to the other. Words like ‘decline’ and ‘crisis’ are now taboo, and the idea that major [...]
Rimini revealed
Nadia Durrani reports on the site of the newly-opened Surgeon’s House in Rimini, north-east Italy
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