The Roman villa of Aiano

The archaeological site of Aiano, located in Val d'Elsa (Tuscany, IT), was discovered at the beginning of the 20th century. Nevertheless, in the 1960s, structural remains of an ancient building were brought back to light thanks to Associazione Archeologica Sangimignanse and Soprintendenza Archeologica della Toscana.

Since 2005, an Italian-Belgian mission, coordinated by the UCLouvain as part of the international project VII Regio, is carrying out archaeological investigations on the so-called Villa of Aiano.

The Roman villa, dated between the end of the 3rd and the 7th century, is characterised by a monumental architecture and decorations.

The so-called “trefoil hall” represents the most important part of the ancient Roman residential complex. This sector was built between the end of the 4th and the beginning of the 5th century, as a result of a monumental rearrangement of the villa. During the 6th century the hall changed its destination and became centre of several handcraft activities, until it was abandoned in the 7th century.

Since the villa presents many critical issues, due to its state of conservation and its particular architecture, EM was employed to map any available information and manage the whole virtual reconstructive process of the late antique shape of the hall.

Graphical documentation, based on proxies and obtained using EM representation features, was also produced to realize illustrative images to be used as graphical content for better disseminations and scientific purposes.