ABSTRACT The chapter consists of five sections. The first one provides an introduction to the collaboration between Walter Alvarez and the author in the interdisciplinary study of the Capitoline Hill in the early 1990s. The second section turns to how we first met in Rome in 1970 and our parallel pathways over the next two decades that saw each of us take the lead in developing a big new idea based on innovative interdisciplinary research. The third section gives the earth scientist essential background on the study of early Rome: such things as the seven kings of Rome, the original topography of the early city, and the syndrome of the eternal Rome. The fourth section develops an overview on the work that we conducted on the Capitoline Hill and the new results obtained. In the fifth section, we step back and consider the contribution of Walter Alvarez to our subsequent research and publications on early Rome and the emergence of the field of geoarchaeology in the study of ancient Rome.

ABSTRACT Travertine deposits preserved within ancient aqueduct channels record information about the hydrology, temperature, and chemistry of the flowing water from which they precipitated. However, travertine is also chemically reactive and susceptible to freshwater diagenesis, which can alter its original composition and impact reconstructions of aqueduct operation, maintenance, and climate. Hydraulic reconstructions, in combination with a suite of high-resolution optical, laser, electron, and X-ray microscopy analyses, have been used to determine the original crystalline structure and diagenetic alteration of travertine deposited in the Anio Novus aqueduct built in A.D. 38–52 at Roma Vecchia. Age-equivalent travertine deposits, precipitated directly on the mortar-covered floor at upstream and downstream sites along a 140-m-long continuous section of the Anio Novus channel, exhibit consistent crystalline textures and stratigraphic layering. This includes aggrading, prograding, and retrograding sets of travertine linguoid, sinuous, and hummocky crystal growth ripples, as well as sand lags with coated siliciclastic grains deposited on the lee slope of ripple crests. The original aqueduct travertine, which is similar to travertine formed in analogous natural environments, is composed of shrub-like, dendritically branching aggregates of 1–3-μm-diameter euhedral calcite crystals. Dark brown organic matter-rich laminae, formed by microbial biofilms and plant debris, create stratigraphic sequences of high-frequency, dark–light layering. This hydraulic and petrographic evidence suggests that large, radiaxial calcites diagenetically replaced the original aqueduct travertine shrubs, forming upward-branching replacement crystals that crosscut the biofilm laminae. While this diagenetic process destroyed the original crystalline fabric of the calcite shrubs, the entombed biofilm laminae were mimetically preserved. These integrated approaches create the type of depositional and diagenetic framework required for future chemostratigraphic analyses of travertine deposited in the Anio Novus and other ancient water conveyance and storage systems around the world, from which ancient human activity and climatic change can be more accurately reconstructed.

ABSTRACT This paper investigates the role played by Italian naturalist, Filippo Buonanni (1638–1723), in the reorganization of the Kircher Museum. Specifically, it considers Buonanni’s unique philosophy of nature, which can be gleaned from his public debates about spontaneous generation and fossil formation. This paper argues that Buonanni rejected a conformity of causes in nature, which in turn informed his approach to natural history. His unique approach helped to transform Kircher’s collection from a cabinet of wonders to one of the earliest examples of the modern museum.

During the Neogene and Quaternary, potassic and ultrapotassic magmas erupted in association with shoshonitic and calc-alkalic magmas across much of the Italian peninsula. On the basis of the temporal and spatial distribution of this volcanism, and its mineralogical and compositional characteristics, three different magmatic provinces have been defined. The northwesternmost province, the Tuscan Magmatic Province, is domi nated by leucite-free ultrapotassic rocks (lamproite), shoshonite, and minor calc-alkalic rocks. The Roman Magmatic Province is dominated by leucite-bearing rocks with variable degrees of silica saturation, from undersaturated (leucitites and plagio-leucitites) to strongly undersaturated (kamafugites), but minor amounts of shoshonitic to high-potassium calc-alkalic rocks are still present. The Lucanian Magmatic Province, located at the southeasternmost edge of the volcanic belt, is dominated by foiditic (haüynites and leucitites) and kamafugitic (melilitites) members, all strongly under-saturated in silica. In spite of these petrologic differences, the Neogene Italian potassic and ultrapotassic rocks display similar trace-element patterns. Depletion in high field strength elements with respect to large ion lithophile elements is a common feature. Sr, Nd, and Pb isotopic compositions of mafic high-MgO rocks range widely, relating mainly to geographic location of eruption and to enrichment in alkalies. The Os isotopic composition of these samples, however, does not clearly correlate with eruption location, but is dependent on the amount of “continental crust component” added to the magmas. Some of the studied samples are compatible with crustal contamination en route to the surface. In most cases, however, there are several lines of evidence suggesting the possibility that crustal components were added directly to the mantle source prior to partial melting. Large amounts (many tens of weight percent) of “crustal component” must be added to the peridotitic mantle in order to obtain the 187 Os/ 188 Os of the lamproites in Tuscany. These large amounts of crustal components have been recycled into the mantle in the form of either melts or fluids. The recycling can be reconciled with a veined mantle in which the crustal component is concentrated. Partial melting of veins would then produce the high-silica and high-magnesium lamproitic magmas from Tuscany. Dilution of the crustal components by increasing partial melting of surrounding mantle peridotite, or alternatively, a reduction of metasomatic veins, could then produce shoshonitic and high-K calc-alkalic mafic magmas. Southeastward geochemical and isotopic variations are reconciled with decreasing direct contributions from crustal components introduced into the mantle by sub-duction, but an increasing role of subducted fluids from dehydration of CO 2 -rich sediments. The coupled isotopic and chemical characteristics of Italian magmas cannot be reconciled with an ocean-island basalt (OIB)–like primary magma composition due to the substantial overprinting by crustal- and or subduction-related components.