Building techniques and architectural skills in ancient Adulis

In antiquity, the town of Adulis, 50 km ca. south of Massawa (Eritrea), was one of the most important harbours of the Red Sea and the main hub of long-distance maritime routes and African caravan itineraries of the Horn, within the net of cultural and trade contacts between the Mediterranean, the Orient and Africa. Ancient literary sources frequently refer to Adulis, destroyed and abandoned in the VIII century, rediscovered at the beginning of the XIX. Episodic excavations along the late XIX and the XX century, provided fragments of a history of flourishing culture which developed over a span of several centuries and gave rise to a thriving urban settlement, rich of stone buildings and monumental complexes, most of them still buried. The archaeological research started in 2011, thanks to the collaboration between the Eritrean Commission for Culture and Sports and several Italian Universities, coordinated by the Research Centre on Eastern Desert (Ce.R.D.O.), aims at providing a broader understanding of Adulis, both in time and space, in relation to the debated theme of the development of urbanisation in the region. The region where Adulis is located offers evidence of a rich environment, exploited since prehistory by human groups, and likely inhabited since. The time span object of the research also includes the communities currently living in the area, who deal with the management of this immense heritage and whose culture has been refining strategies to address environmental challenges. Besides the current results of the research, the aim is to outline the method delineated along ten years of fieldworks and investigations, in optimizing excavations, in sharing with local communities the targets and the outcomes and to set up a truly transdisciplinary and multiscale approach to the archaeological site, involving archaeologists, architects, geologists, hydraulic and civil engineers and the local stakeholders.