The Blera Archaeological Project

Back to the Petrolo Plateau! The 2026 fieldwork campaign has officially started, bringing together an international and interdisciplinary team of researchers to continue the investigation of the ancient city of Blera and its surrounding landscape.

This year’s team brings together researchers from the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome, Lund University, including the Digital Archaeology Laboratory (DARKLab) and the Humanities Lab, as well as CNR-ISPC and Istanbul University–Cerrahpaşa. Their combined expertise in archaeology, digital methods, geophysics, and spatial analysis provides the foundation for a multidisciplinary investigation of the ancient settlement.

The new campaign aims to expand the areas investigated during previous seasons by combining different approaches to archaeological data collection. A particular focus will be placed on Ground Penetrating Radar (GPR), which will be deployed across several land parcels that have never previously been explored using this technique. GPR allows us to investigate the subsurface without disturbing the archaeological remains, providing valuable information about what may still be preserved beneath the surface.

The results of the previous campaign were particularly promising, revealing a significant number of subsurface anomalies that may be associated with buried architectural structures. Some of these features could potentially belong to different chronological phases of the ancient settlement, offering new clues about the development and transformation of the city over time.

The 2026 campaign will build directly on these earlier results, expanding the areas surveyed and combining GPR data with other forms of archaeological and spatial information. By integrating these different datasets, the team aims to gain a better understanding of the organisation of the ancient urban landscape and to identify new areas for future archaeological investigation.

The fieldwork has only just begun, but there is already plenty to look forward to. Stay tuned for updates from the Petrolo Plateau!

28 September 2026

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Our colleagues from the Italian National Research Council performed an extensive data acquisition campaign, where ground penetrating radar (GPR) was deployed to detect traces of past human activities in the plateau of Petrolo, where the ancient city of Blera was probably located. A significant portion of the area has been now investigated and results of the geophysical prospections are currently examinade for further archaeological interpretations.

During the campaign 2025, more field surveys were conducted by the team in order to detect archaeological traces visible on the ground. Here is an example of a portion of a stone and mortar assemblage, to be possibly interpeted as a built structure (wall?) from the Roman period.

6 October 2025

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A team of researchers from the Swedish Institute of Classical Studies in Rome, Lund University and the Italian National Research Council has started a new field campaign in the archaeological area of Blera, in a location colled ‘Petrolo’, a tuff plateu where the Etrusco-Roman city of Blera was once located. Purposed of this season’s campaign is to expand the investigation of the area by using gephysical prospections, ground-penetarting radar in particular.

29 September 2025

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Last week our collaborative team of researchers from ISVROMA, Lund University (DARKLab & Humanities Lab), CNR-ISPC and Istanbul University-Cerrahpaşa went back to the Petrolo plateu in Blera to carry on some prospections with GPR (georadar) and 3D data acquisition by using image-based modelling techniques.

A selection of land parcels was chosen to perform GPR prospections in order to detect possible ground anomalies to be eventually interpreted as archaeological features.

Despite part of the data processing was started already during the time of the field campaign, we do not have the results of the data interpretations available yet. Nonetheless, according to our colleagues responsible for the GPR data acquisition, the prospections went pretty well and they expect to obtain very interesting material in support to the archaeological interpretation.

As a part of this year fieldwork, a public presentation of the project was held in the town of Blera on Tuesday October 1st. Interestingly, a significant number of people came to attend the event and get to know what is currently going on in their home town and interact with all the team members.

6 October 2024

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On Monday 3 June we went to the Petrolo plateau to make a field inspection and see which areas will be investigated during the upcoming field campaign. Dr. Salvatore Piro from the Italian Research Council (CNR-ISPC) joined us and gave us advice on the suitability of the different geophysical techniques that can be applied in this context. Drawing upon last year experience, a combination of magnetometer and georadar sensing techniques will be deployed to detect any ground anomaly that can be possibly interpreted as an archaeological feature.

4 June 2024

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GPR-derived raster slices show us the presence of ground anomalies that can be interpreted as archaeological features. Each slice represents the distribution of GPR signal intensity in a given x,y area at a given z depth under the ground surface where the acquisition has been performed. By overlapping the different slices it is therefore possible to have a three-dimensional representation of the ground anomaly detected by the instrument. In GIS, each slice can be digitized in order to show the boundaries of what has been interpreted as part of the ground anomaly. Such digitization process allow us to obtain a polygon representation of the archaeological features detected by the GPR at the different sampling intervals. All these polygon can eventually be extruded to a height corresponding to the sampling interval represented by the raster slice they refer to. As a result, we obtain a 3D model of the volume that is the sum of all the ground anomalies detected and reported by the single raster slices.

2 April 2024

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During the last weekend, between Friday 15 and Sunday 17 March our project partners from the Italian National Research Council (ISPC – CNR) carried out a data acquisition with a LiDAR sensor-equipped drone to 3D scan the land surface of the Petrolo plateau. The advantage of using drone-based LiDAR is the possibility of penetrating tree canopy and obtaining a much clearer representation of surfaces in the woodland areas. In addition, having the LiDAR attached to a drone allows us to have a very high-resolution representation of the terrain increasing the chances to detect ground anomalies to be eventually identified as archaeological features.

The DJI Zenmuse L1 drone employed to perform the acquisition over the Petrolo plateau.

the drone is set up to automatically fly over the plateau following a trajectory enabling the full coverage of the study area.

18 March 2024

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This blog is managed and updated by an international team of researchers working in the archaeological area of Blera (Central Italy). It provides visitors with constant updates over the field research conducted both on-site and remotely.

18 December 2023

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