Sorrina Project. Survey and topographical surveys in the Etruscan center and then the Roman municipium of Sorrina (Viterbo, loc. Riello)

Research manager:

Salvatore De Vincenzo

Start date: 2021

End date: Undefined

Brief description and research objectives:

Finds attesting to the existence of the Sorrina settlement consist of eleven epigraphs dated between the Augustan age and the second century CE and two fragments of Roman calendars. The texts provide little indication of the order of the center, which probably became municipium after the social war. The area of the Etruscan and Roman city, located on the Riello plateau, has not been systematically investigated to date.

Inscriptions document during the imperial age the existence of a macellum and thermal complexes. A bathhouse was built by one C. Cafatius during the early Augustan age. At this same stage another personage, L. Valerius Tullius Tuscianus, donated a macellum to the community. The inscription (CIL XI, 3014) commemorating this evergetic act was placed at the base of his statue, found not far from Santa Maria in Gradi.

Many and varied are the reasons behind the intervention at Sorrina (Authorization of the Soprintendenza Archeologica, Belle Arti e Paesaggio for the Area Metropolitana di Roma, the Province of Viterbo and Southern Etruria). These involve both the sphere of scientific research and that relating to the enhancement and protection of the area concerned.

The objective of these new investigations is primarily to attempt to define the topographical organization and some urbanistic aspects of the city through mainly surface analysis and geophysical prospecting. On the other hand, the reconnaissance and contextual analysis of the materials found should provide useful elements for understanding the diachronic development of Sorrina. This investigation will primarily involve photogrammetric and georeferenced documentation of all structures in the light. At the same time, extensive geophysical prospecting of the area will be carried out. The entire apparatus of collected and produced data, both textual and graphic and photographic, will be managed and processed within a GIS platform.