The location of Emperor Traiano's villa (Altopiani di Arcinazzo - Roma) using high-resolution GPR surveys

The villa of the Roman Emperor Marco Ulpio Traiano (A.D. 98-117) was built in Arcinazzo (Italy), approximately 55 km northeast of Rome. Today, the only remains left standing at the site are the public building entrances comprising a small portion of the entire site. Over 5 hectares, adjacent to the entrance remains, were unsurveyed. As part of an ongoing study to rescue this national archaeological treasure, an extensive grid system was laid out at the site and high-resolution GPR surveys using a sub-meter profile spacings were conducted. Amplitude time slice analysis indicates that many structural foundations of the villa are still well preserved below the ground surface. Time slices below 1.5.m in one area indicate several large mushroom shaped structures enclosed within a large building over 100 meters in length. These structures are believed to be dipping pools within a larger structure believed to be the bathhouse to the villa. At a location west of the bathhouse, a large oval shaped anomaly 45 meters along its major axis was discovered. This subsurface structure is believed to be an oval garden pond or a swimming pool. Several other remnants of rectangular buildings coincident with the oval structure but much deeper were also imaged.