Abstract
The “Hypogeum of the Garlands” is a sepulchral site, recently found in Grottaferrata (Lazio, Italy), dating back to the first-second century AD. Two sarcophagi were discovered inside, hosting the human remains of Aebutia Quarta, a rich Roman woman, and her son Carvilius Gemellus. While the body of Carvilius is exceptionally well-preserved, following its embalming and perfect sealing of the sarcophagus, in the case of Aebutia only the bones were preserved because of the sarcophagus’s seal breaking down, although she was covered with perfectly preserved flower garlands. Embalming of the body was a rare ritual in the Imperial Roman times when corpses were more often cremated. The remains of Aebutia showed possible traces of heating. Burned bones from a third individual were discovered on the chamber’s floor and preliminary anthropological survey showed that this individual was a male of 40–50 years old. Here, a combination of spectroscopic techniques, including non-destructive inelastic neutron scattering and Raman spectroscopy, and minimally destructive Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, were applied to the analysis of these bone samples to give information about ancient Roman funerary practices. The temperature and burning conditions were thus determined, showing that Aebutia Quarta was exposed to mild temperatures (200 °C) only in the upper part of the body, while the third individual was likely cremated as its bones were exposed to temperatures up to 900 °C in quasi-anaerobic conditions.
Highlights
The “Hypogeum of the Garlands” is an ancient Roman sepulchral chamber from the Roman Period that has been dated to the first-second century AD1–4
In order to address these unsolved questions, we investigated the physical–chemical properties of the bone samples found in this hypogeum
The inelastic neutron scattering (INS) profiles of rib[1], tibia and carpal do not show the characteristic bands of hydroxyapatite (HAp)—OH librational mode at ca. 660 cm−1 and OH stretching at ca. 3600 cm−1—while they clearly evidence the presence of organic constituents: lipids—CH2 deformations at ca. 1370–1450 cm−1 and CH2 stretching modes at ca. 2980 cm−1—and traces of collagen—Amide I and II bands at 1650 and 1550 cm−1 and the methyl torsion at ca. 250 cm−1
Summary
The “Hypogeum of the Garlands” is an ancient Roman sepulchral chamber from the Roman Period that has been dated to the first-second century AD1–4. A combination of spectroscopic techniques, including non-invasive inelastic neutron scattering (INS) and Raman spectroscopy, and minimally destructive Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR-ATR), have previously been successfully used for the determination of the temperatures and burning conditions of human bones[12–14] These are complementary vibrational spectroscopy techniques which deliver unique information on the samples under analysis in a virtually completely non-invasive and non-destructive way, enabling chemical and structural changes in bone to be determined with very high accuracy and sensitivity. This provides new scientific evidence for the interpretation of ancient Roman funerary practices throughout the “Hypogeum of the Garlands” archaeological site.
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