TY - JOUR
T1 - Coseismic Damage at an Archaeological Site in Sicily, Italy: Evidence of Roman Age Earthquake Surface Faulting
AU - Capizzi, Patrizia
AU - Martorana, Raffaele
AU - Martorana, Raffaele
AU - Scudero, Salvatore
AU - Cavallaro, Danilo
AU - Pisciotta, Antonio
AU - D’Alessandro, Antonino
AU - D’Alessandro, null
AU - D’Alessandro, null
AU - D’Alessandro, null
AU - D’Alessandro, null
AU - Lodato, Luigi
AU - Coltelli, null
AU - Bottari, null
PY - 2018
Y1 - 2018
N2 - Archaeoseismology can provide a useful chronological tool for constraining earthquakes and documenting significant evidence that would otherwise be lost. In this paper, we report a case of surface faulting on ancient man-made structures belonging to the archaeological site of Santa Venera al Pozzo situated along the eastern flank of Mt. Etna volcano in eastern Sicily (southern Italy), which is affected by well-developed tectonic faults. Geological surveys highlight a set of fractures affecting the archaeological ruins, suggesting the occurrence of a capable fault zone across the area. An integrated geophysical survey was carried out in order to identify the main subsurface tectonic discontinuity ascribable to the fault zone. The information derived from different geophysical techniques, such as electrical resistivity tomography, seismic refraction tomography, ground-penetrating radar, and magnetic surveys allowed us to infer that the fractures observed at the surface could have been produced by coseismic rupture. They are conceivably linked to a strong earthquake that probably occurred in the Roman period, around mid-end of the third-century AD; time constraints are inferred through the dating of buildings of the archaeological site.
AB - Archaeoseismology can provide a useful chronological tool for constraining earthquakes and documenting significant evidence that would otherwise be lost. In this paper, we report a case of surface faulting on ancient man-made structures belonging to the archaeological site of Santa Venera al Pozzo situated along the eastern flank of Mt. Etna volcano in eastern Sicily (southern Italy), which is affected by well-developed tectonic faults. Geological surveys highlight a set of fractures affecting the archaeological ruins, suggesting the occurrence of a capable fault zone across the area. An integrated geophysical survey was carried out in order to identify the main subsurface tectonic discontinuity ascribable to the fault zone. The information derived from different geophysical techniques, such as electrical resistivity tomography, seismic refraction tomography, ground-penetrating radar, and magnetic surveys allowed us to infer that the fractures observed at the surface could have been produced by coseismic rupture. They are conceivably linked to a strong earthquake that probably occurred in the Roman period, around mid-end of the third-century AD; time constraints are inferred through the dating of buildings of the archaeological site.
UR - http://hdl.handle.net/10447/292363
UR - https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10712-018-9482-2
M3 - Article
VL - 39
SP - 1263
EP - 1284
JO - Surveys in Geophysics
JF - Surveys in Geophysics
SN - 0169-3298
ER -