KİNET HÖYÜK

THE ROMAN ROAD

During the ‘Kinet 2000’ excavation season, Italian geophysicist Dr. Sandro Veronese carried out a magnetometry survey at four different locations around the höyük.
 

One of his areas, “Area C ”, located on the north-east side of the mound and measuring 120 x 70 meters, showed an interesting feature . The system of magnetometry is based on measu-ring the difference of intensities between the Earth’s magnetic field above ground level and that below the surface. The mag-netometer survey shows on the west side of this field a so-called ‘magnetic anomaly’: these anomalies are variations in the measurements of the magnetic field’s intensity. These variations can be caused by for example under-ground archeolo-gical structures.

In Area C, a more or less straight line of 62 meters long is visible running from 30 meters on the X-axis to 55 meters on the Y-axis. The middle part is however not clear due to a large anomaly (A), [see figure 2]. Next to the clear and different colored line, on the east side appears a ‘shadow’ anomaly.

Dr. Tim Beach with his three students opened, over the presumed location of this, line a long trench in east–west direction. Soon, at a shallow depth, a feature that looked like a 3.55-meter wide stone ‘foundation’ was found.

Fig. 1 Map of the major Roman roads in the coastal area of the Middle East.

This construction is only one large boulder / river-stone thick and has an irregular surface. The western outline is made of more-or-less even, large stones; the western half is slightly higher than the eastern part.
 

In the middle a few tile fragments were set into the stonework.

It was soon obvious that this was an ancient road. Road constructions are known from the Roman and Byzantine periods and a lucky coincidence was the find of 3 Roman coins in the deposits next to the road. One of these coins could be identified as minted for the emperor Gratian who reigned was between 367 – 383 AD.

Excavation continued on the west side of the road and soon a second surface was found. This ‘older / lower’ road was partly covered by the ‘younger / higher’ road. Between the two was a thick layer of clayish sediments. The higher road covers the east half of the lower road.

To the north and south, two more trenches were opened and the two roads were found there where they were expected. To measure the direction we used the line of boulders in the center of the road. To speak about the center of the road we have to know the construction technique: the centerline, the spine or the middle of the road is laid out with large boulders. At a fixed distance to the outer sides (about 1.50 meter or 5 feet) the two outer-lines of the road are created with boulders of a somewhat rounded shape. The space between these lines is filled-in with irregular-shaped stones or rocks and fragments of large, round ceramic, tiles, their original diameter near 60 cm.

Fig. 2 Map of area C with anomalies between A’ and K; the Roman Roads. Dr Sandro Veronesse

The ‘road’ had then a very rough and uneven surface on which traveling must have been very difficult and unpleasant. It was therefore never intended to be the surface; what is now left is only the base, the hard core of the road construction. The general practice known of Roman roads is that they were built up of multiple layers often starting with a sand body capped with mortar, followed by stones and slabs, concrete of crushed stone and shells, and a stone or gravel surface on which man and horse could travel comfortably.

The Lower Road has dense pebbles between the surface stones, that might show that the road had multiple layers or a pebble surface. The stone surface of this Lower Road is in general more flat and better usable without cover. The Higher Road has a very irregular stone surface. A ten-centimeter thick layer lies over and between the stones. This layer consists of a very hard soil with pebbles and gravel and is light grey in color. Of both roads only the heavy stones of the lowest construction elements remain, with fragments of this mortar-like layer.
Along both sides of Roman roads usually were ditches, and the middle was slightly elevated to deflect rainwater from the surface. The sections over both roads near Kinet Höyük did not show any traces of side ditches.

One has to realize that the ground in this part of Turkey is, in every season except the dry summer, almost inaccessible; the surface soils are clayish and extremely sticky, and make movement very tiring.

The roads’ slight elevation above the surrounding landscape, that sometimes can be soft and wet, might have been expected, but this could not be proven during the excavation.
 

Fig. 3 The Higher Road in T2 during excavation.           

The 3 test trenches show that the distance between these two roads (north trench 65 cm. middle trench 53 cm. and south trench 43 cm.), as well horizontally as vertically, gets quickly less towards the south and that the roads in general are rising closer to the present day’s surface.

Consequently, towards the north they dive deeper in the ground and there is more distance between them. This shows that the lower road runs through a depression, which was at some point inundated, filled in with sediments and finally leveled out with the surroundings, so that the higher road runs over a more horizontal surface.

The thickness of the deposits might suggest that we have here a major natural event: if this settling of deposits took place over a longer period, the road constructors would have found different solutions for their missing road stretch.
        

Fig. 4 The Higher Road in T4: the western edge and the spine.

It is now to Dr. Tim Beach to find out from which direction
this event came; from the sea or the mountains/river?
The roads seem to head towards a Roman bridge about a km away to the south, as would a coastal road coming from the turning of the Bay of Iskenderun between Çeyhan and Osmaniye, to head in the general direction of Iskenderun. It is recognized as the main highroad between Constantinople and Antioch . It passes Kinet Höyük on the landside (east side) just below the foot of the mound. There are so far no indications of any Roman building activity on the Höyük, but there might have been some occupation between the road and its base. If so, this area was bulldozed during the construction of the Delta Petrol Plant and nothing was recorded.

The Roman bridge once spanned what is today called the Deliçay, a seasonal river that might be identified as the classical Pinarus.
The bridge is located in the middle of a field next to the plant with Aygaz tanks, with no water in its vicinity. The river ‘Deliçay’ or Mad Stream, has changed its course a few hundred m to the south, and in the process may have destroyed the southern half of the bridge.
 

Fig. 5 Trench 4: the two roads with the sediments between them.

Fig. 6  The bridge seen from the west, on the right end was the central arch.

What can be seen now is only the northern half of the bridge, with 3 arches still standing.

Before the central arch, there were on this side originally 4 arches, but one of them has been destroyed by a recent building that was cut into the bridge construction.

The central arch and the complete southern slope of the bridge are missing. Although some masonry can be seen near the building, it doesn’t line up with the general direction of the bridge. The east side of the bridge still shows remnants of breakwaters: the triangular shaped stone points that make the water flow easily around the piers of the bridge. The northern access is still intact; a massive stone slope goes up to the top of the first arch. The distance from the beginning of the access to the spring of the central arch is about 46 m. If we calculate 8 m for the span of this central arch then the total bridge would have a length of circa 100 m. The three middle arches are the highest and the widest; these stood in the river while the smaller 3 arches on each side had the

function to reduce the water pressure of the bridge’s body during high water in winter and spring.

The surface on top of the bridge is about 3.60 meter wide. It is made of stone blocks and a fill of mortar and river stones. No traces of the balustrades remain today. But if they where there the width of the road would be reduced to about 3 m / 10 feet.

Fig. 7   The remnant of a breakwater.

In the coming season attempts will be made to link the road and the bridge and to start research in the area just north of the bridge in order to see if there was occupation, civil or military, on this crucial communication point in Roman and probably Medieval times

Text  &  photos: B Claasz Coockson

1 Report: Dr. Sandro Veronese of ARCHAEOSURVEY on the Kinet Höyük Magnetrometry Survey July 2000.

 2 After: Roman Bridges, Colin O' Connor 1993.

3 ‘Land Transport and Road-building’ Studies In Ancient Technology, R.J. Forbes 1955

4 Roman Bridges, Colin O' Connor 1993

Newsletter No. 2 - 2003, Pg.  5

<  >