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Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

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Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#41

Post by ezequiel-garzon »

Swizec wrote: post #25
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems similar in the UK. Development pauses for a week of archaeologists, then the skyscraper gets built anyway.

In my home town for one such project they came up with a really cool alternative. The basement of the building is encased in glass and you can go see the ruins. Little museum and everything. And the building, or underground parking lot I think, still got built.

That’s what Apple had to do with its main Puerta del Sol store in Madrid: https://www.theverge.com/2013/7/10/4512318/apple-store-spain...

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#42

Post by StanislavPetrov »

drb91 wrote: post #11
bvc35 wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What a damn shame.

What's the alternative--people stop developing Istanbul, Rome, etc entirely? I can't say I'm entirely unsympathetic to a population that wants development over marginally better understanding of places that already experience high levels of excavation and historical tourism.

>What's the alternative--people stop developing Istanbul, Rome, etc entirely?

An alternative to squeezing a few billion more people onto our already massively overpopulated planet? Madness! (and certainly unpopular among the HN crowd)

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#44

Post by Jaruzel »

iaskwhy wrote: post #34
Swizec wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In my home town for one such project they came up with a really cool alternative. The basement of the building is encased in glass and you can go see the ruins. Little museum and everything. And the building, or underground parking lot I think, still got built.

That's what happened with the new Bloomberg HQ in London. It's a nice museum underground.

It's been pretty amazing walking past that site everyday seeing the pictures of the artefacts on the hoardings. Now it's all done, I keep meaning to visit the museum.

For people who have NO idea what was under the new Bloomberg HQ in London, here's a link:

https://www.londonmithraeum.com/

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#46

Post by anacleto »

carlob wrote: post #16
azujus wrote: post #10

It’s weird how our great^5 grandchildren will only find treasures in our dumps, but the cities will still be full of ancient stuff.

It's also that the Romans thought they were going to be around forever so they built everything to last. If you look at the Colosseum, it looks the way it is because it was willfully destroyed and used for construction material over centuries: when Rome became the seat of the Papacy, the Colosseum was remembered as a place where the early martyrs were slaughtered by wild beasts, not as a nice building to be preserved…

Curious fact on the Pantheon: pope julius ii had to tore away the bronze ceiling to pay Michelangelo for his frescos in the Sistine Chapel ceiling.

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#47

Post by zaarn »

cm2187 wrote: post #36

Stupid question: how come so much stuff is buried? Tombs of course. But why do we keep finding other stuff under several meters of earth? It's not like if there are sand storms in Rome like there are in Egypt. And many of these areas have been inhabited continuously since ancient Rome.

Things are build on top of each other.

In my city, there are leftovers of the old castle walls from the middle ages, which in the core are build on top of the walls from the early medieval age and those in turn are built on top of roman walls. Or the social housing built after WW2 build on top of housing build in 1600s which in turn was build on top of social housing from 1516. Rubble over rubble over rubble for ages and ages.

If you go into the nearby forests and dig, you'll find in order WW2, WW1, medieval, post roman and roman layered on top of each other. There is no tombs, mostly either a battlefield or simply a city being build on top of itself.

A lot of European Cities tend to be like that and lots of places are like that. American cities by comparison are very very young (San Juan manages 400 years and some change, San Augustine comes second), our cities have grown organically over 3000 to 2000 years and through countless wars and catastrophes.

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#48

Post by baud147258 »

ff_ wrote: post #4

The really funny thing about doing any construction work in basically any Italian city is that you already know from the start that there is going to be several years of delay due to finding ancient stuff... But it's impossible to dig all of that out (reasons: too big, too disruptive, no funds, happens everywhere, etc). So what usually happens is: take pictures, save some artifact, cover with concrete and go on with…

I know of one construction where they found 11th century ruins/remants, but 'forgot' to tell the archeologists to avoid delay of a few years, they just covered everything in concrete and finished the construction.

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#49

Post by ionised »

carlob wrote: post #16
azujus wrote: post #10

It’s weird how our great^5 grandchildren will only find treasures in our dumps, but the cities will still be full of ancient stuff.

It's also that the Romans thought they were going to be around forever so they built everything to last. If you look at the Colosseum, it looks the way it is because it was willfully destroyed and used for construction material over centuries: when Rome became the seat of the Papacy, the Colosseum was remembered as a place where the early martyrs were slaughtered by wild beasts, not as a nice building to be preserved…

The Pantheon is great but I would have preferred to see it as it was before the Catholics came in, gutted it and turned it into another Church.

Re: Rome's Subway Expansion Reveals Artifacts From The Ancient Past

#50

Post by jhbadger »

Swizec wrote: post #25
NeedMoreTea wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems similar in the UK. Development pauses for a week of archaeologists, then the skyscraper gets built anyway.

In my home town for one such project they came up with a really cool alternative. The basement of the building is encased in glass and you can go see the ruins. Little museum and everything. And the building, or underground parking lot I think, still got built.

When I visited Bologna, I found that their main library is that way -- they have a glass floor over the excavations below.
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