PSA: AIRC
An unlocked RL entry because I want as many people as possible to see this and NOT attend anything ever run by the AIRC (American Institute for Roman Culture). The cut-tag stuff is my summer report for the department, and as such is necessarily drained of a lot of the vitriol that I still feel about the dig and about how Darius ruined an amazing site. He ruined the possibility of knowing about the 17th century excavations, the 6th century Gothic habitation, and so much more. There is 1800 years' worth of knowledge sitting in a spoil heap in the Park of the Aqueducts (Parco degli' Acquedotti), now lost, all the contexts, finds, and strata mixed up beyond repair. The AIRC is run by a pair of sleazy, disgusting men who, as far as I can tell, started up an organization to rival the Centro (in their dreams) because they wanted to be in charge of a flashy organization. They aren't interested in teaching or in students (Darius told the students that he would not write them letters of recommendation after the dig) or in "preserving the cultural heritage of Rome," and if they are, it's a very superficial interest that's not backed by actions. Their promotional material is extremely arrogant and yet very superficial - it's full of bravado and jargon, but nothing underneath to substantiate it. Don't give them money. Don't attend any of their programs. Don't send anyone to any of their programs.
This summer, I participated in an excavation run by the American Institute for Roman Culture.
The AIRC excavation was the first season of a projected five-year excavation of Villa delle Vignacce. It began on July 3, 2006, and ended on August 7, 2006. The dig was directed by Darius Arya and Dora Cirone and there were twenty-five participants, primarily from the United States. Villa delle Vignacce is an imperial villa dating to the Hadrianic period, and it is located in Parco degli' Acquedotti, near the Aqua Marcia and Aqua Claudia. In antiquity, the villa was close to the fourth milestone on Via Latina. During the 17th century, excavations removed statuary from the site, including the colossal head of Julia Domina, now in the Vatican Museums. During the 21st century, the site was covered by dirt and debris from the construction of nearby apartment complexes. Although the area of excavation was originally considered a garden, after significant amounts of dirt were removed, it was revealed to be a small bath complex, with evidence of sixth century occupation by barbarians.
The supposed aims of the excavation, as stated by the AIRC, were “stratigraphic excavation, analysis of the finds, analysis of the finds from previous excavations in the area of the villa, archival and antiquarian research, drawing and technical analysis of the structures.” Students were to “have the possibility to participate in all phases of work ... in order to learn and acquire confidence regarding the relative methodologies of research and practice.” Toward these ends, there were scheduled weekly lectures and visits to other archaeological sites. My aims in participating in the excavation were to gain an understanding of archaeological methodology: how archaeologists choose sites, how they formulate their objectives and questions about sites, how they analyse what is found, and stratigraphic excavation.
In actuality, very few of the stated goals were met. The site directors provided very little instruction to the students regarding stratigraphy, context sheets, analysis of the structures they were uncovering, finds analysis, and drawing, and none regarding methodology. The weekly lectures were of low quality and covered very basic information (e.g. Roman baths, the different types of wall construction). During the entire excavation, there was only one site tour, which was given by the trench supervisors. The site directors did not often interact with the students or the trenches and did not appear to be interested in the excavation. The trench A supervisor, Katja Schork, neither taught her students nor directed the excavation of her trench, with the result that the students in trench A regularly had to decide which area of the trench to work in and what to do.* Since very few of the students had had prior experience with archaeology, the excavation of trench A was haphazard. The finds supervisor organized the finds by typology rather than by context or even by trench, so it was nearly impossible to examine the finds from a given context after they had been washed and sorted.** The trench B supervisor was the only supervisor on the excavation who competently did her job. She directed a stratigraphic excavation of trench B and lectured her students on methodology and every aspect of the work that they did.
The excavation was not done stratigraphically, aside from trench B. During the third week of the excavation, a backhoe was brought into trench A and it removed dirt to a depth of 2.5 meters in an area of approximately 37 square meters, a minimum of 92.5 cubic meters, or approximately 1800 years' worth, of dirt. After the students began questioning the wisdom of excavating intact strata with a mini-excavator, Darius claimed that he had examined the dirt in section and that the entire 2.5 meters of earth comprised one stratum. I believe that this claim is false, as there were multiple strata visible at the depths in question in other areas of trench A as well as trench B. Additionally, multiple strata were visible above the 2.5 m of dirt and below the 2.5 m of dirt.
The excavation was poorly organized materially as well as methodologically. The trench supervisors were given very little notice that they would be supervisors; the trench A supervisor was informed four days prior to the start of the excavation, and the trench B supervisor was informed when she arrived on site. There were rarely enough supplies at any stage of the excavation: shovels, wheelbarrows, plumb bobs, scale rulers, tape measures, buckets, etc.*** The directors never chose a benchmark for the site and there was not an optical level on the site until the very last days of the excavation.
Despite everything, I learned a number of things on the dig, such as how to correctly wield a shovel and a pickaxe, how to draw a plan and a section, how to assess the phasing of structures relative to one another, how to fill out context sheets for structures and deposits, how to take levels, and, in theory, how to do a Harris matrix. I had to learn these skills by fumbling through trials and errors and by asking the trench B supervisor, so it is unlikely that I will ever forget them. The site itself was very intriguing, as it bore structural evidence of robbery and occupation over different periods: a sixth-century Gothic wall and a robber trench cut through the frigidarium, and large slabs of marble appear to have been stripped from the caldarium. The original bath complex was adapted to the changing needs of its inhabitants, and there are many passageways filled by later walls that were in turn cut or abutted by other walls. Many brick stamps, mosaic fragments, marbles from all over the empire, amphorae fragments, other ceramics, and fresco fragments (some still attached to the walls) were found on site. Although I did not learn what I had come to the dig to learn, working on an excavation was interesting and I think that I may want to do it again with a different group.
I do not recommend that anyone ever attend anything run by the AIRC, from the remaining seasons of the Villa delle Vignacce excavation to the study abroad program in Rome.
*Katia frequently handed off her responsibilities as trench supervisor to her students, such as correcting and handing back context sheets. She also yelled at her students and at one point, when frustrated with the low quality of the context sheets - which she had never thoroughly taught her students how to do - said that the students were deliberately filling out context sheets badly because they had a subconscious desire to see trench A fail.
**Which destroys the purpose of saving finds, since they're often necessary for dating contexts and, as such, need to be easily accessible and with all the other finds from that context. Mixing them up and sorting them by type instead of by trench and context is pointless; we might as well have filled out our context sheets with "many inclusions of Cipolino found in context 44" and then tossed the finds directly into the spoil heap.
***When it became evident that there were not enough scale rulers or plumb bobs, none of the staff took responsibility for the situation or going out to purchase more, and the finds supervisors accused the students of stealing the tape measures and plumb bobs.