Three-dimensional geophysical data integration at Portus, Italy

Abstract

Geophysical surveys that utilise more than one technique are becoming commonplace in geophysical fieldwork strategies in order to acquire more information about the subsurface. Integration techniques, however, are seldom utilised in particular with three-dimensional geophysics data. There are a number of geophysical techniques that collect three-dimensional data for instance ground penetrating radar (GPR), electrical resistance tomography (ERT) and electromagnetic induction (EMI). Three-dimensional data enables the estimation of the volume of archaeological features and allows for stratigraphic relationships to be identified. Integration provides methods of analysing the composite information from the individual datasets simultaneously, thus providing enhanced understanding of the subsurface. Furthermore, utilising these methods with three-dimensional data will provide a significant advancement in the understanding of the subsurface that is currently possible with data from individual geophysical techniques alone.

While demonstrable advances in the visualisation of archaeological features using integration have been presented in the last 10 years (Piro, et al. 2011), this has mainly focused on two-dimensional datasets. When data has been available from three-dimensional techniques, such as ground penetrating radar, much of the data is left redundant with only individual depth slices being utilised. This project examines recent studies into the integration of geophysical datasets and investigates their suitability and efficacy for use with three-dimensional datasets. The potential of integration techniques to improve the understanding of the subsurface through their use on three-dimensional datasets is a key strand of this research. The primary data source used has been Portus, the maritime port of ancient Rome which, together with the neighbouring river port of Ostia (c. 3 km south of Portus), was the focus of a network of ports across the Mediterranean serving Imperial Rome between the mid-1st and the 6th century AD. A substantial amount of geophysical data has been recorded at Portus and thus, this site provides a unique opportunity to push the boundaries of geophysical analysis on a challenging marine/fluvial site, which contains monumental archaeological remains both above and below ground.

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