Urban area, north-east quadrant
Excavations by Edoardo Brizio 1890-92
Edoardo Brizio, as Royal Commissioner for Antiquities (the analogue of our Superintendent), carried out the first important exploration campaign of the archaeological site of Claterna, which was already known at the time but still lacking scientific studies. A large area to the north of the Via Emilia was chosen, where previous accidental discoveries predicted a good outcome of the research; the excavations, reports and excellent drawings made by Edoardo Brizio’s collaborators are still of great documentary importance today.
The forum square and numerous remains of walls and floors were identified, some of which could be interpreted as parts of public buildings, others as private residential complexes.
Of these domus, later covered over and not currently visible, the documentation of the period provides some of the wall structures and floors, but it is not possible to define the complete plan or the evolution over the centuries, except by advancing working hypotheses to be verified with new excavation campaigns. Among the various problems left open, there is also the impossibility of precisely locating the plans of the investigations carried out in the 19th century on today’s topographical maps.
Nevertheless, some data can still be used today for the scientific study of the city.
These include the presence of domus with atria and impluvia (= tanks for collecting rainwater), the result of a construction method directly imported from Rome and central Italy, which was evidently a point of reference for the high-ranking families of Claterna.
The atrium was one of the most important rooms in the domus: it gave access to the building, organised a series of rooms facing onto it and had an opening in the roof (= compluvium) through which natural light and rainwater entered, then collected in the impluvium located in the floor.
In addition to the atria, excavations in the 19th century led to the discovery of a series of highly decorative pavements. Among these is a floor in ‘cocciopesto’ (a clay beaten stone with a clay base), richly decorated with inserts of polychrome marble flakes and with black and white mosaic bands, including a panel decorated with a chessboard of triangles and a central rose, probably belonging to the same domus with a marble impluvium. Interpreted as a triclinium (= banqueting and reception room), it probably overlooked a hortus (= garden) or a peristylium (= porticoed garden), in which the fragments of a terracotta statuette of a winged cherub of exquisite workmanship were found.
The statuette was kept for many years in the Museo Civico Archeologico in Bologna and is now on display in the Museum of the Roman City of Claterna.