In November 392, the Roman emperor Theodosius I signed a law banning every pagan rite, including those performed in private. Against that date, the claim now coming from Bulgaria’s National Museum of History sounds startling: that people went on honoring the old gods until around the middle of the fifth century, in a temple built […]

Roman Spain had a network of official roadside stops for officials, soldiers and couriers, yet archaeologists know very few of them for certain. A new study may have added one. The building lies on the edge of Mellaria, a Roman town in the south of the country, on the road between the provincial capitals of […]

In the early 5th century, a woman of high rank was buried beside an old Roman posting station on the Via Augusta, in what is now the province of Castellón. Her grave held a glass cup and two gold pins in a style from the Danube region. Her brother died in Mérida, the Roman city […]

Some 1,900 years ago, a man named Thrasymedes gave a thin sheet of gold to a god who was neither Greek nor Roman. The deity came from the borderlands of what is now southeastern Turkey. The offering was left inside a Roman army fort on the eastern shore of the Black Sea, in modern Georgia, […]

At the narrowest point of the Karmsundet, the channel that separates the island of Karmøy from the mainland on Norway’s west coast, five stones stand upright on a hillside. Some are more than five metres (16 ft) tall. They were raised inside a cairn, a mound of piled stones, laid out in the shape of […]

Thirty-five thousand spectators. That is the capacity the authors of a new study attribute to the Roman amphitheatre of Itálica, in Santiponce, near Seville in southern Spain. It is roughly the crowd of a mid-sized modern football stadium, and there was not a single loudspeaker in those stands. Whatever happened on the sand had to […]

Anyone who wants to build a house on the waterfront at Meria, at the northern tip of Corsica, has to let archaeologists look underneath first. The rule comes from the island’s regional archaeology service (the DRAC of Corsica). It has just paid off. Working on the plot, a team from Inrap, France’s national institute for […]

The empire’s 300,000-kilometer road network was stranger and less Rome-centered than legend suggests.

All roads lead to Rome. It’s one of the oldest sayings in the Western world, and according to a new study in Nature Communications, it isn’t quite true. Led by Adam Pažout, a researcher at the Autonomous University of Barcelona, the team found that cities like Antioch, Ancyra (modern Ankara), Byzantium (modern Istanbul), and Corinth […]

In a quiet corner of Hadrian’s Villa, wedged between the so-called Amphitheater and a low bench of volcanic tufa rock, sits a marble slab measuring roughly 40 by 35 centimeters (about 16 by 14 inches). It has not moved in some 1,900 years. Two lines of carved capital letters explain why archaeologists are excited: FVLGVR […]

Archaeologists conducting a new series of excavations at the ancient Turkish city of Smyrna have uncovered three previously hidden rooms and a 1500-year-old Late Antiquity theater that earlier efforts had missed.

The new excavations, which took place in Izmir’s historic center, also uncovered a series of ancient paintings that had remained hidden for over a millennium, along with a Roman-era water channel that, unlike similar structures, seems to stop before reaching any nearby natural springs.

1,500-Year-Old Hidden Rooms, Ancient Paintings, and a Lost Theater

According to a statement from the Izmir Metropolitan Municipality, the work, which was  “conducted on behalf of Izmir Katip Celebi University with permission from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism,” expanded on previous excavations at the same site. However, the new excavation effort uncovered several previously unknown finds.

First, the archaeology team came across three new hidden rooms, or “spaces,” in an area where previous efforts had uncovered an ancient mosaic floor. According to the excavation team, two of the new spaces also contained mosaic floors. However, the third newly discovered space featured a marble floor.

Second, the research team uncovered what they described as a “theater area.” Researchers had not identified the theater during previous excavations.

Third, the Izmir authorities described a series of ancient wall paintings as the most visually striking component. According to the Metropolitan Ministry’s statement, the previously undiscovered wall paintings were placed around the Agora and the theater.

“This is the first time we have found wall paintings in these spaces,” explained Prof. Dr. Akin Ersoy, faculty member of the Turkish-Islamic Archaeology Department at Izmir Katip Celebi University and the head of the latest excavations.

“We Had Never Come Across Anything Like This in the Agora of Smyrna”

When dating the site, Prof. Dr. Ersoy said cities in the region underwent significant structural changes after the division of the Roman Empire at the end of the 4^th century A.D. These changes allowed the excavation team to date the site to sometime between the fifth and sixth centuries A.D. This ancient date makes the site over 1,500 years old, placing it in the period historians call Late Antiquity.

When discussing the architectural style of the new excavations, the team leader said they share some features with the Terrace Houses found at the ancient city of Ephesus. The research said the similarities suggest that the newly discovered structures may have served a public function. Still, he noted, these discoveries were unexpected.

“Until now, we had never come across anything like this in the Agora of Smyrna or around the theater.”

Given the likely historical period of the site’s construction and use, the research team also noted that the newly uncovered hidden room spaces and ancient paintings will offer previously unavailable insights into Smyrna’s transformation away from Roman influence.

150 Yards of Roman-Era Water Channel Also Unearthed

During the excavations, the team also traced a section of an ancient Roman-era water channel. The researchers suggested that the ancient channel carried water for roughly 2,000 years.

Although Roman-era water channels were typically connected to natural springs, Ersoy said the team has traced roughly 150 yards of channel and has yet to find its source. The team leader suggested a spring may lie just south of the site, near the Namazgah Bath and Kursunlu Mosque.

Future excavations are hoped to uncover more evidence of the ancient spring and perhaps even more hidden rooms and artworks left behind in the 1500-year-old city. 

Christopher Plain has spent the last six years as Associate News Editor and Head Science Reporter at The Debrief. Follow and connect with him on X, learn about his novels at plainfiction.com, or email him at christopher@thedebrief.org.

When we think about Roman society, the image that usually comes to mind is that of a world dominated by men: senators, magistrates, generals, and emperors. According to the traditional narrative, women occupied a secondary place, confined to the domestic sphere and excluded from public life. However, a recent study based on the analysis of […]

Archaeologists reidentify a room once thought to be a shrine as a rare Roman library.

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The post Three Roman Desert Camps May Reveal a Hidden Campaign Against Nabataea appeared first on Curiosmos.

The history of the Roman Empire is often told through the exploits of emperors and generals, but the mechanisms of daily administration and, especially, the relationships between central power and the provinces, constitute an equally revealing field of study to understand the dynamics of that civilization. In this context, the discovery and subsequent analysis of […]

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