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Simon Keay

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Roman ships at Portus

In response to queries from learners I thought I would provide some additional information about evidence for the Roman ships at Portus. We can expect the basins and canals at Portus to have been crowded with hundreds of commercial ships and boats; one recent estimate, for example, suggests that c. 1800 sea-going ships may have anchored in the Trajanic basin each year. Continue reading →

Portus in National Geographic Espana

Computer Graphic Reconstruction of Portus (BBC/ Portus Project) It was very heartening to see that the National Geographic Espana, which is celebrating its 125th Anniversary, voted the results of our 2013 Portus Field School excavations, which were presented at a public lecture at Rome in November, as one of the ten principal archaeological finds of 2013. This is a great tribute to all the staff and students who were involved in the project. Continue reading →

Portus and its Hinterland

Portus and the Mediterranean As we enter a new year of research and education focused on Portus I thought I would flag up some wider activities from last year relating to the site, its hinterland and wider networks. The first of these is our new ERC funded project. In October 2013 the European Research Council announced that a bid that I had submitted to the Advanced Grant scheme for a project to the value of €2.49 million (£2.1 million) had been successful. Continue reading →

Job Advert: Research Fellow in Roman Mediterranean Port Studies

We are looking for a specialist in Roman and/or Maritime archaeology of the Roman Mediterranean at the post-doctoral level to form part of the ERC funded Roman Mediterranean Ports project team for a period of four years from February 2014. You will be researching, recovering and integrating a range of published and unpublished data to compile a web-based port resource. Continue reading →

What’s your ambition? Archaeology?

Today and tomorrow will see about 24,000 people come to the University of Southampton open days. If you are one of those people we look forward to welcoming you at the archaeology department. As William Davies noted yesterday in his blog post a "range of artefacts and publications by staff will be available for guests to look at, together with a selection of student dissertations, so that people can get an idea of the high quality work our undergraduate students produce. Continue reading →

A new year at Portus

The New Year has begun auspiciously for all those of us involved with the Portus Project and related work. At one level, we are pushing ahead steadily with completion of the post-excavation work that will form the basis of the final reports on the project. In January, we held the first of three planned Workshops at the British School at Rome (BSR). This was organized by Christina Triantafillou and myself and was very well attended. Continue reading →

Plans for resuming joint excavation

I have just been down to Portus today to discuss plans for resuming our joint excavation at the Palazzo Imperiale with the Soprintendenza Speciale per i Beni Archeologici di Roma (Ostia Antica) in January. I hope that the results from this coupled with the screening of the BBC1 programme Rome’s Lost Empire on Sunday will remind people of the importance and richness of this unique site. Continue reading →