A Staggering Excavation Has Rewritten the Fall of the Roman Empire (popularmechanics.com)

Met behulp van de juiste technieken kwamen de archeologen erachter dat het dorp dat ze onderzochten veel langer een levendige stad wist te blijven dan voorheen gedacht. Mogelijk was Interamna Lirenas niet uniek in dit opzicht en gold hetzelfde voor veel meer Romeinse dorpen en steden:

"“There was nothing on the surface, no visible evidence of buildings, just bits of broken pottery,” Launaro said. “But what we discovered wasn’t a backwater, far from it. We found a thriving town adapting to every challenge thrown at it for 900 years.”

The team of archaeologists used magnetic and ground-penetrating radar to survey roughly 60 acres of mostly open fields. They then launched a series of targeted excavations to unearth the history. “We’re not saying that this town was special, it’s far more exciting than that,” Launaro sadi. “We think many other average Roman towns in Italy were just as resilient. It’s just that archaeologists have only recently begun to apply the right techniques and approaches to see this.”"