Archeological areaof via San Cosimo

In via San Cosimo 3, in the basement located under the courtyard of the Sisters of Jesus Institute, one of the most evocative archaeological palimpsests of the city, still largely unknown, is preserved.

The area preserves important testimonies of defensive system of Verona from the municipal age to the early Middle Ages and part of a rich domus of the imperial age built immediately behind the wall.

Discovered in 1971 following some service work, the ancient structures were excavated and made safe by the then Superintendency of Antiquities of Venice which wanted to create what was one of the first archaeological areas of the city. The site is now usable thanks to recent renovation works, conducted by the ABAP Superintendence with ministerial funds.

The base of one is also visible on the site defensive tower (dimensions: front 5.50 x 3.50 in length) built in a later period along the ancient wall, reusing stripped blocks, mainly coming from funerary contexts, bound with earthy mortar. Over time, the tower was also equipped with one triangular spur, to further defend the external front of the curtain.

Leaning against the internal façade of the walls, the remains of one remain 1st century domus d. C., with various mosaic environments, testifying to an intensive exploitation of urban space. Of the domus, whose layout is perfectly oriented with the ancient road network, two rooms separated by corridors, passages and hallways have been identified. The two rooms retain the extraordinary flooring: in one case it is a black and white geometric honeycomb tessellation, while in the other of a opus sectile made using rectangular white marble slabs striped with black (white marble and African black marble), on a bed of mortar.

To the north of these two environments, a stretch of hallway characterized by a fine cement floor, with inserts of polychrome marble slabs and black and white tiles.

The latest and, perhaps, most appreciable testimony of the archaeological area is finally represented by wonderful wall elevation belonging to second city defensive wall, built in the Theodoric era (488 AD) at a distance of 8 meters from the late republican one. This is the internal front (here preserved for over 10 m in height) of the wall that King Theodoric the Great had built to protect Verona, mainly reusing recycled architectural material, mostly made up of funerary monuments and squared limestone blocks deriving from from the dismantling of the external ring of the amphitheater.