Papers by Francesco Sirano
Culti dell’antica Capua in età imperiale attraverso due casi di studio: il Mitreo e il tempio di via de Gasperi a Santa Maria Capua Vetere
The paper examined two religious buildings in central areas of the ancient Capua: the so-called s... more The paper examined two religious buildings in central areas of the ancient Capua: the so-called shrine of the " via de Gasperi " (discovered in 1980) and the Mithraeum (1922) linked by the chronology (full imperial age) and by spaces underground and darken with limited access and installations to attend the rites. The layout of either of two examples gave to the involved people the opportunity to follow a path, to stay in, to interact with structures and consacrated fornitures. In both cases the wall paintings were not a sheer decorum, but was specially designed to create a appropriated atmosphere for the rites. In both cases they provide two different register of representation: one formal and most noble, the second most popular was focused on the partecipation and the self identification of the audience (the faithfuls in the " Sacello di via A. de Gasperi " ; the initiates at the Mithraeum). In the first case it appear to be female rites, or however rites where the female element played a prominent role; in the second it is instead the masculine element that is set in evidence whereas the rare female images belong to the divine sphere or to symbolic personifications. Thus it seems to me that they was spaces designed to respond to specifics cultual end ritual needs of the big urban community of ancient Capua between the I and III century A.D.
Immagini di divinità da contesto domestico a Cos: la documentazione dagli scavi italiani
Mélanges de l'École française de Rome. Antiquité, 2004
... | Ayuda. Immagini di divinità da contesto domestico a Cos: la documentazione dagli scavi ital... more ... | Ayuda. Immagini di divinità da contesto domestico a Cos: la documentazione dagli scavi italiani. Autores: Francesco Sirano; Localización: Mélanges de l'Ecole française de Rome. Antiquité , ISSN 0223-5102, Vol. 116, Nº. 2, 2004 , pags. 953-981. ...
Capua tardoantica: nuovi dati dall'attività di tutela del patrimonio archeologico
This article discuss new archaeological discoveries on Capua in the Late Antique period. The alre... more This article discuss new archaeological discoveries on Capua in the Late Antique period. The already known data and some new contexts of exceptional importance open new perspectives of interpretation both of the material culture and of the process of transformation from the Roman city to the Medieval Capua.
Francesco Sirano, “Immagini di divinità da contesto domestico a Cos: la documentazione dagli scavi italiani”, MEFRA, 116, 2004, 953-981
Dans la Casa dei Bronzi, demeure situee dans le quartier central de la cite antique de Cos, furen... more Dans la Casa dei Bronzi, demeure situee dans le quartier central de la cite antique de Cos, furent decouvertes, lors de fouilles italiennes anciennes...
Die Gleichzeitigkeit des Ungleichzeitigen : gli scavi borbonici del 1700 come stratigrafia del Parco Archeologico di Ercolano
The Bourbon tunnels are a valuable evidence of the excavation methods in the eighteenth century. ... more The Bourbon tunnels are a valuable evidence of the excavation methods in the eighteenth century. Although a precise line of evolution of the techniques cannot be identified, in the modes of management, and documentation they reflect the personality and the talent of the in- dividual officers in charge for the management. By analyzing the excavation diaries of those officials in charge (Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre, Francesco Rorro, Pierre Bardet de Villeneuve, Karl Weber, Francesco and Pietro La Vega), and other archival documents published in the last forty years, we can today formulate a less negative judgment about their work. Moreover, we need to adopt a historical perspective, and we need to consider their efforts as the first step in the elaboration of archaeology as we conceive it today. The excavations of Amedeo Maiuri, set on a large scale, intercepted the Bourbon tunnels, reclaimed them and, progressively, marginalized them. The tunnels were left visible at the excavation fronts only. The Archaeological Park of Herculaneum is engaged in an action of re- valuation of these evidences as an integral part of the chronological stratification of the Site, also of the cultural contents that it can and must offer to the visitors.Although a precise line of evolution of the techniques cannot be identified, in the modes of management, and documentation they reflect the personality and the talent of the individual officers in charge for the management. By analyzing the excavation diaries of those officials in charge (Rocque Joaquin de Alcubierre, Francesco Rorro, Pierre Bardet de Villeneuve, Karl Weber, Francesco and Pietro La Vega), and other archival documents published in the last forty years, we can today formulate a less negative judgment about their work. Moreover, we need to adopt a historical perspective, and we need to consider their efforts as the first step in the elaboration of archaeology as we conceive it today. The excavations of Amedeo Maiuri, set on a large scale, intercepted the Bourbon tunnels, reclaimed them and, progressively, marginalized them. The tunnels were left visible at the excavation fronts only. The Archaeological Park of Herculaneum is engaged in an action of re-valuation of these evidences as an integral part of the chronological stratification of the Site, also of the cultural contents that it can and must offer to the visitors.
La Decorazione Del Fastigio Frontonale Nei Modelli Fittili DI Tempio Da Teanum Sidicinum
Osservazioni sulle offerte alimentari nelle necropoli di Capua tra IV e III secolo a.C
Manger, boire, se parfumer pour l'éternité, 2021
Science Advances, 2021
The remains of those who perished at Herculaneum in 79 CE offer a unique opportunity to examine l... more The remains of those who perished at Herculaneum in 79 CE offer a unique opportunity to examine lifeways across an ancient community who lived and died together. Historical sources often allude to differential access to foodstuffs across Roman society but provide no direct or quantitative information. By determining the stable isotope values of amino acids from bone collagen and deploying Bayesian models that incorporate knowledge of protein synthesis, we were able to reconstruct the diets of 17 adults from Herculaneum with unprecedented resolution. Significant differences in the proportions of marine and terrestrial foods consumed were observed between males and females, implying that access to food was differentiated according to gender. The approach also provided dietary data of sufficient precision for comparison with assessments of food supply to modern populations, opening up the possibility of benchmarking ancient diets against contemporary settings where the consequences for...
New England Journal of Medicine, 2020
C o r r e s p o n d e n c e Heat-Induced Brain Vitrification from the Vesuvius Eruption in c.e. 7... more C o r r e s p o n d e n c e Heat-Induced Brain Vitrification from the Vesuvius Eruption in c.e. 79 To the Editor: Cerebral tissues in human remains are rare archaeological discoveries. 1 These tissues are typically saponified, meaning that their triglycerides have been converted to glycerol and fatty acid salts, or soap. In c.e. 79, a volcanic hot ash avalanche rapidly killed the inhabitants of Pompeii and Herculaneum. 2 In the 1960s, at the Collegium Augustalium in Herculaneum, a human victim of the avalanche was found lying on a wooden bed, buried by volcanic ash (Fig. S1 in the Supplementary Appendix, available with the full text of this letter at NEJM.org). In this victim's skull, we discovered apparent brain remains that were vitrified instead of saponified (Fig. 1 and Fig. S2). Vitrification refers to tissue that has been burned at high heat and turned into glass or a glaze. In this victim, these vitrified remains also encrusted the surface of the skull (Fig. S3). Glassy material was undetectable elsewhere in the skeleton or in the adjacent volcanic ash, and it was not found in other locations at the archaeological site. Intracranial mineral residues from victims who died from the eruption at the seashore, presumably at a site of different environmental conditions, showed high iron oxide contents from thermal degradation of heme proteins (indicating the vaporization of body fluids), 3 but no putative brain remains were found. A solidified spongy mass entrapped the chest bones in the victim at the Collegium (Fig. S4); this feature in victims of the Vesuvius eruption was unique among those at other archaeological sites, but it can be compared with features of victims of more contemporary events such as the firestorms in Dresden and Hamburg, Germany, during World War II. 4 Proteomic investigation of the glassy material inside the skull identified several proteins that
PloS one, 2018
In AD 79 the town of Herculaneum was suddenly hit and overwhelmed by volcanic ash-avalanches that... more In AD 79 the town of Herculaneum was suddenly hit and overwhelmed by volcanic ash-avalanches that killed all its remaining residents, as also occurred in Pompeii and other settlements as far as 20 kilometers from Vesuvius. New investigations on the victims' skeletons unearthed from the ash deposit filling 12 waterfront chambers have now revealed widespread preservation of atypical red and black mineral residues encrusting the bones, which also impregnate the ash filling the intracranial cavity and the ash-bed encasing the skeletons. Here we show the unique detection of large amounts of iron and iron oxides from such residues, as revealed by inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometry and Raman microspectroscopy, thought to be the final products of heme iron upon thermal decomposition. The extraordinarily rare preservation of significant putative evidence of hemoprotein thermal degradation from the eruption victims strongly suggests the rapid vaporization of body fluids and soft...
La "scaenae frons" del teatro di Teanum Sidicinum: decorazione e arredro scultoreo
La Scaenae Frons En La Arquitectura Teatral Romana Actas Symposium Internacional Celebrado En Cartagena Marzo De 2009 En El Museo Del Teatro Romano 2010 Isbn 978 84 8371 995 4 Pags 101 117, 2010
Il sostegno bronzeo della tomba 104 del fondo Artiaco di Cuma e il" problema" dell'origine dell'holmos
Studi sulla Campania preromana, 1995
Presenzano-Rufrae. Nuovi dati per la storia del Popolamento nella Campania Settentrionale tra Eta Arcaica e Classica sullo sfondo delle dinamiche di …
BAR INTERNATIONAL SERIES, 2005
Pitture di eta' imperiale da Cos. Attraverso gli scavi italiani
Atti Del X Congresso Internazionale Dell Aipma Napoli 17 21 Settembre 2007 2010 Isbn 978 88 95044 81 1 Pags 547 564, 2010
la Parola del Passato, 2018
Through a careful examination of the data from recent archaeological interventions in the suburba... more Through a careful examination of the data from recent archaeological interventions in the suburban and outlying areas of Capua, correlated appropriately with the nineteenth-and twentieth-century findings, the paper proposes some reflections on religious aspects, and places of worship, in the middle and late Republican through the Imperial periods. The inevitable transformations of the cultural sphere determined by the close relationship with Rome (as, for example, the evergetism activities of the magistri Campani in the period after the conquest of 211 BC), are accompanied by the survival of an archaic past. This is especially visible in the sanctuary of Diana Tifatina and, at the two ends of the city, in the sanctuary of the Patturelli Fund, and in the one along the Via Campana in San Leucio. These sanctuaries were characterized by rites and elements of singular coherence, that have their roots in an ancient nucleus of Etruscan festivities, and that constituted the real unifying force of the territory and, ultimately, the cultural survival of a people, as evidenced in a memorable paper by Mauro Cristofani.
Keywords: Capua, sanctuary, Rome, Diana Tifatina, Patturelli Fund, magistri Campani
Conservació- restauració del moble i la fusta. L'experiència dels experts, pp. 75-84 Conservació-restauració del moble i la fusta. L'experiència dels experts, 2020
Wood, a material much studied in archaeology on the basis of the rich iconographical record as
we... more Wood, a material much studied in archaeology on the basis of the rich iconographical record as
well as ancient literature, rarely survives in archaeological contexts. Herculaneum is, from this perspective, of exceptional historical importance. Indeed the way in which the site was buried has ensured the preservation of not only of entire housing buildings but also organic material. In most cases the wood that survives has been carbonized, but, with the presence of high levels of humidity, it has maintained its original appearance and the colors of its decorations. The documentation of excavations at Herculaneum, principally those carried out by A. Maiuri, provide evidence of window and door frames, partition walls, mezzanines, tools, boats, and, of course, furniture, including particularly bed frames, furniture with ritual uses, and furniture connected with dining.
Keywords: Herculaneum, wood, carbonized, Maiuri, furniture
CRONACHE ERCOLANESI 50, pp. 311-325, 2020
Perhaps more than in other culturally important sites, the research at the Archaeological Park of... more Perhaps more than in other culturally important sites, the research at the Archaeological Park of Ercolano is essential to preparing conservation interventions and to giving enhancement projects a solid foundation. The present contribution is a synthesis of recent results and new lines of research in the Park, which derive numerous data from the archaeological investigations that accompany the ordinary and extraordinary maintenance activities on the site. Important information, useful for reconstructing the social and manufacturing contexts of the ancient city, comes from analysis of many finds, conducted with the aim of identifying the best conservation strategies. Finally, the studies by national and international institutes, focused on specific themes or particular sectors of the archaeological area, make Herculaneum a rich source of new knowledge about ancient cities, despite the fact that regular management of the site absorbs many resources.
Keywords: Conservation, Restoration, Archaeological investigations, Diagnostic investigations, Bioarchaeological analyzes
Cronache Ercolanesi, pp. 259-272, 2020
Due to its particular characteristics and conditions of discovery, Herculaneum has been an experi... more Due to its particular characteristics and conditions of discovery, Herculaneum has been an experimental laboratory over the last three centuries for new technologies and new ways of presenting the elements of ancient daily life and civilization in the Vesuvian area. Since the eighteenth-century, from technical and scientific speculations for the development of the papyri, to the conservation problems of the wooden elements of the roof of the House of Argos faced by Bonucci (1828), to the daring excavation experiments, consolidation, and restoration carried out by Maiuri (1927-1961), the Roman city has been the driving force behind new approaches to long-term problems such as conservation and restoration. Now, the long collaboration between Heritage Authority and Packard Foundation has set the conditions for a new method of managing of the site, based on study, documentation, and multidisciplinary scientific skills, not to mention numerous national and international collaborations, all of which create new perspectives for developing and strengthening research.
Keywords: Experimental, New technologies, Conservation, Restoration, Multidisciplinarity
Bound for Disaster Pompei & Herculaneum, a cura di P. Asingh, A. & J. Damm, pp. 75-89, 2020
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Papers by Francesco Sirano
Keywords: Capua, sanctuary, Rome, Diana Tifatina, Patturelli Fund, magistri Campani
well as ancient literature, rarely survives in archaeological contexts. Herculaneum is, from this perspective, of exceptional historical importance. Indeed the way in which the site was buried has ensured the preservation of not only of entire housing buildings but also organic material. In most cases the wood that survives has been carbonized, but, with the presence of high levels of humidity, it has maintained its original appearance and the colors of its decorations. The documentation of excavations at Herculaneum, principally those carried out by A. Maiuri, provide evidence of window and door frames, partition walls, mezzanines, tools, boats, and, of course, furniture, including particularly bed frames, furniture with ritual uses, and furniture connected with dining.
Keywords: Herculaneum, wood, carbonized, Maiuri, furniture
Keywords: Conservation, Restoration, Archaeological investigations, Diagnostic investigations, Bioarchaeological analyzes
Keywords: Experimental, New technologies, Conservation, Restoration, Multidisciplinarity