GNGTS 2015 - Atti del 34° Convegno Nazionale

GNGTS 2015 S essione 1.1 41 the rubbles mass which, in turn, was likely leveled between the late 1 st and the early 2 nd century. • Sotto San Nicola street. Here another dumping grave of both building and domestic rubble has been found. It contains vases and lamps datable within the first half of the 1 st century AD ( i.e., sigillata italica, pareti sottili ), being thus coeval with the Castle area fill. • Amendola square. In this place three different dumping graves, all overlaid by a restoration floor, contain pottery shards with pareti sottili (early 1 st century AD). Amongst these, the relic of a pot was found, with the skeleton of a dormouse still inside. At least one of the building facing the Decumanus was restored in the 2 nd century AD, when also a porticus with four pillars was added to the house. One of the pillar supported a Osco-Latin epigraph, likely recalling the restoration of a nearby vicum venerlum [sic] in the 2 nd century (G. Camodeca and A. La Regina, pers. comm.). We dated some charred materials belonging to the wooden structure of the porticus , which was finally buried by the whole collapse of this building in the Early-High Middle Age. The calibrated age (110-330 AD, 2σ cal.) fits the period of general restoration of the town, providing the ante quem term for the collapse. • Thermal baths. Between the 1 st and the 2 nd century AD, the thermal baths were restored, their orientation was changed, whereas the floors were completely remade with mosaics. • Macellum. In the same period, in the area of the macellum the two tholoi were dismantled, the macellum itself was abandoned, its remains were leveled and occupied by new workshops. • Salimbene house. During the archaeological excavation, the abrupt collapse of a 1 st century BC room ceiling has been found and removed. This has allowed to observe that the incannucciato ceiling collapse rest directly over the mortar floor, where it buries pottery shards of the 1 st century AD (Fig. 3, left panel). • Caesareum temple. Here, in the same period, an opus caementicium cistern was built for supporting the damaged retaining wall of the temple. Damages to this temple are testified also by an epigraph, as hereafter described. Fig. 2 – Map of Buccino showing the main archaeological sites attesting the 1st century AD earthquake. Upper panel is the photomosaic of the epigraph of Otacilius Gallus attesting the collapse of the Caesareum (photo by PG).