An ancient Roman city that was the predecessor of Venice has been rediscovered beneath croplands near the Venetian lagoon using sophisticated aerial imagery and some clever analysis. Researchers say they've found the harbor city of Altinum, which was once
one of the richest cities of the Roman empire. But terrified by the impending invasion of the fearsome Germanic Emperor Attila the Hun, its inhabitants cut their losses and fled in AD452, leaving behind a ghost town of theatres, temples and basilicas [Times Online].
Many of the city's ancient buildings were dismantled and the stones were carted away in the Middle Ages. The remaining foundations sunk back into the marsh, which was drained and turned into agricultural land in the 19th century. The new study, published in Science, is a result of aerial images taken in unusually dry summer of 2007, when the crops were suffering from drought. When the visible ...
