The ancient route into the Venetian lagoon confirms the presence of the early Romans

Even today, archaeologists still debate the Roman presence in Venice, several centuries before immersed the site and the Founding of the city. leftovers archaeological Scatter and engulfment seem to confirm this hypothesis, but some authors have asserted that Roman remains It came from the buildings on the surrounding continent.

a A team of Italian researchers publishes in Scientific Reports The results of the Treporti channel bottom analysis in order to choose between these two hypotheses. They used sonar to map the bottom of the lake and found 16 remains of Roman architecture there, at a depth of between 3.6 and 11.4 metres.

The ruins of an old paved road

It has an area of ​​more than 1140 meters in the northeast direction, the longest is 134.8 meters and an area of ​​706.6 square meters. Some of these remains can be identified as having been part of an ancient paved road, which would have existed on a sandy ledge before immersion The lake is by the water.

The authors performed a hypothetical reconstruction of the now submerged Roman road in the Treporte Aqueduct. © Madricardo et al., 2021

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These findings allow the study’s authors to suggest that the Romans did indeed permanently settle in what is now Lake Venice. The road in the Triporti Canal was probably part of the huge network of roads that the Romans built to connect Chioggia to the north of the Venetian lagoon. Sailors and travelers certainly used it because some of the buildings identified by the research team could have been part of the port complex.