Dr. Alba Frascarelli has been program coordinator for the study abroad program of the University of Arizona in Orvieto, Italy, and we've been colleagues and archeologists together for more than 20 years now. Dr. Frascarelli is taking part in an extraordinary excavation of the Etruscan homeland in the center of Etruscan civilization, actually, at a place which we call now Campo de la Fierra. It's the place where all the Etruscans, all the city states seem to have come together. To worship a God named Voltumnus and to have meetings and festivities, festivals annually. Dr. Pasquale has been excavating this with the University of Perugia for quite a long time, the University of Matzarata. It's been under the direction of simonetta Stopponi of the University of Perugia now, and the results have been amazing. >> I'm and I'm the program manager for the Arizona and Italy study and program. The ecological research [FOREIGN] began in year 2000. So it's been 16 years that the University of Matzarata and the University of Perugia have been working on this side. Under the direction of Professor. And that has been an extraordinary adventure for us, and for the hundreds of students that from Italian and American universities have been working with us. I think that the most important result that we had in these years, is that we now finally can see that what we've been uncovering is the fanum voltumnae. That is the legendary veteran sanctuary for the Etruscan confederation. That side had been searched for centuries, even in the renaissance, they were asking themselves where the fanum voltumnae was to be located. And at this point the number and the importance of the finds that we have makes us think that this is what we have. We started finding two big large Etruscan and then Roman paved roads which of course were necessary in a century like that, that had to host hundreds and hundreds of people from all the different Etruscan cities joining for the annual festivals at the Fanum and then we discovered at least three Etruscan temples. One of them in particular is the smallest one but has the longest life, so to say. Because it was renovated in the third century B.C. after Orvieto the Etruscan Vietnam was conquered by the Romans. And then even Augustus himself restored the temple, the floor of the temple. And we know that in that area, there was a cult during the Roman times, because we were lucky enough to find, next to an Etruscan altar, a Roman [FOREIGN]. That is, a container for coins that were given to the temple. There were still over 220 Roman silver and bronze coins in the [INAUDIBLE] and they date from the second century B.C till seven B.C, so it covers the late republic and the early Augustan times. And that is pretty unusual, because usually Etruscan sanctuaries were abandoned in Roman times. So this is one of the pieces of evidence that makes us think that this was an extraordinary important side for the Etruscans and, and the Romans decided to keep it alive. A couple years ago, I was thinking very close to this altar, where the was found. Actually, under it, because we had to lift it to restore it. And, we took advantage of this to dig underneath. And after just a few hours digging under the altar, I started finding some curls, part of a head. It ended up being a perfectly preserved bust of Etruscan God, we believe, in that was set on a bolded base that the moldings of this base recall exactly the same moldings that we have on a monument nearby, also found in the area. We believe that the head, this male head that has a very complex hairstyle. He's a bearded figure might well be self. It doesn't look like a worshipper. It's most probably the image of a god. And he looks a little bit like the that is represented in an Etruscan mirror from Tuscania. We know that Voltumnia that for the Etruscans was Veltomin was called the princeps of the Etruscan gods during the Roman time. So he was to be considered the most important, the most relevant of the Etruscan gods. It is a pretty puzzling figure because the descriptions that we have from the land resources tell us about an ever changing figure, so even the iconography is a little hard to define. But, he was probably Tied to Tinia, meaning that it could be one of the aspects of Tinia that was the Etruscan version, so to say, of Zeus. Well, this summer for example, we were digging there. It was over 100 degrees. We were dying because of the heat, but still, there was no other place in the world I wanted to be. I mean, I feel perfectly happy to be there, and I'm so concentrated what I'm doing. It's the fact that you're digging up that dirt. You're able to reconstruct what happened over 25, maybe 25 centuries ago. It's a big responsibility, of course. So that's why I'm always feeling so concentrated, and I'm completely absorbed by it. But it's also such a rewarding experience. And it's not only what you find. Of course, if you find a perfectly preserved bust It's nice, it's exciting. But the process in itself, it's what is most rewarding, and so even the days in which we're not finding anything too exciting but the process, the technique, the research that we're doing is what is what we really love, what I really love. If someone wants to go and try participating into an archeological dig, he or she should be ready for some really hard physical work. Sometimes it's really challenging to be under the sun working. You don't have to imagine an archaeologist being with a brush on his hand. It's a lot of picking, shoveling, wheelbarrow. So you have to try it, and then you might either love it or hate it. Most often it's either love or hate. If you love it be aware that it might be something that you will never heal from. [MUSIC]
