Pons Aelius Wikipedia Article

[Komet]

When one is in the business of doing reconstruction models, wether computer generated or sculpted, words like 'possibly, probably, likely and safe to assume' must by neccessity come into play. The reason for this is not hard to imagine - picture a computer reconstruction model, almost movie quality, complete with marching Roman auxillia, wild animals and even weather. The effect would be spoiled somewhat if a wall abruptly ended and the paranthetic 'wall course - uncertain' was written in red across the screen! So, us reconstructors must listen to the assumptions and suggestions of archaeologists and take our pick from the conjecture, otherwise we would not build anything at all! That some may disagree with our analysis or conjecture is part of the deal.

Definitely. The best anyone can do is analyze all the evidence for reconstruction scenarios and choose the features that would have been the most likely. The beauty of computer models is that you can fairly easily employ alternate reconstructions. My current project is the reconstruction of the House of the Drinking Contest in Seleucia Pieria. An excavation plan exists from the 1930s, but the walls are practically all gone except for at most a third of a meter of rubble. Circles exist on the plan that indicate columns at 0.9 meters in diameter, and using our knowledge of classical orders, we can make plausible assumptions of the height of the columns based on the diameter on the plan. For example, Corinthian columns have a 10:1 height-diameter ratio, Ionic, 9:1. Given the size of the house, these orders of columns would have been too tall to be in proportion with the other dimensions of the house. Therefore, I went with a fairly average height Doric column at 5.5:1. That allows me to establish the height of the surrounding walls, and thus the height of the house. It's conjectural, but plausible, and would stand up against scrutiny from other architectural historians.