Recherche par auteur > Hidalgo Rafael

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Since 2003, the Archaeology Department of the Pablo de Olavide University of Seville has been developing an archaeological research project at Hadrian's Villa.Initially, between 2003 and 2012, a project was carried out in the Teatro Greco. Once the excavation and study of the Teatro Greco had been completed, a new project began in 2013 and is still ongoing, with the aim of excavating and studying the Palazzo. 

The Palazzo area is a very interesting part of Hadrian's Villa for several reasons. Firstly, it is the emperor's first residential complex in his Tiburtine villa. Secondly, it is an area of architectural experimentation, where architectural models were tested thatwere later developed on a large scale in other parts of the villa. Finally, the overlapping of this complex with the pre-existing villa, known as the Republican Villa, makes this area of particular interest due to the adaptation and incorporation of elements from the previous villa into Hadrian's construction. 

In this presentation, we propose to analyze various aspects of the construction of the Palazzo of Hadrian's Villa.

On one hand, the transformations of the project during the construction phase, currently under study by G. Romero in the entirety of Hadrian's Villa, constitute a particularly interesting aspect. These transformations are also evident in the case of Palazzo. In conjunction with revisions and small modifications to the initial architectural project, we have documented, thanks to archaeological excavation, significant changes in the conception of the courtyards that make up Palazzo, especially the one located furthest to the east. Among the corrections and adjustments, it is notable the high number of occasions in which the opening and closing of openings, whether through the installation of new doors and windows or the blocking off pre-existing ones, take place. These adjustments are often carried out during the construction process itself, resulting in a change in the conception of spaces. Occasionally, this change is completed by constructing walls of lower quality, dividing some areas. As a result, it is common to document certain spaces with structures of different phases and techniques.

The adaptation and reuse of elements from the Republican villa is another aspect of particular interest in this sector of the villa, which is also the subject of our study. A large part of the division of the Palazzo into four large courtyards corresponds to this earlier villa. On the other hand, some important elements of the earlier villa have been preserved in the new imperial villa. For this reason, this part of the Hadrian's Villa retains an archaic appearance. For this reason, this sector of Hadrian's Villa maintains, in some respects, an archaic appearance, which has nothing to do with what happens in the rest of the villa.

All this has given rise to a wide range of different construction techniques, which have not always been analyzed in depth by research, so we propose here an update of the documentation and a study of the different construction techniques used in the construction of the Palazzo.