Articles by Andrea Zerboni

This paper presents the first integrated palaeoenvironmental reconstruction of the Malafede Pool, a temporary freshwater wetland located within the Presidential Estate of Castelporziano (Rome, central Italy), based on the interdisciplinary analysis of sedimentary, geomorphological, chronological and palynological data from sediment core CPZ2. Temporary pools represent highly sensitive environmental archives, where hydrological variability, sedimentary processes and vegetation dynamics interact at local and landscape scales, yet their long-term evolution remains poorly documented in Mediterranean coastal contexts. The stratigraphic sequence records the transition from high-energy Pleistocene alluvial deposits to fine-grained Holocene sediments deposited under persistently hydromorphic conditions. Five AMS radiocarbon dates, three of which were retained, constrain the analysed portion of the core between ca. 5004 BC and 1554 AD, indicating substantial depositional continuity throughout the Middle and Late Holocene. The age-depth model further reveals variable sedimentation rates along the profile, with slower accumulation in certain intervals, reflecting fluctuations in local depositional dynamics. Palynological analyses, including pollen and fern spores, reveal high floristic richness and variable pollen concentrations across four pollen zones, reflecting changing environments and hydrological regimes. Overall, the results highlight the value of temporary pools as coherent and sensitive palaeoenvironmental archives and provide a robust framework for future comparisons with archaeological evidence and additional cores from the Castelporziano estate, contributing to a more integrated understanding of long-term landscape transformations in the Roman coastal plain.

Digital documenting of archaeological evidence represents a crucial tool in the study, preservation, management, and promotion of archaeological sites in remote regions and in fragile landscapes. In fact, in marginal environment, the knowledge related to archaeological heritage can quickly disappear, especially when policies to protect cultural heritage are unreliable or lacking. In the last few decades, archaeological fieldwork has seen the increasing use of Structure-from-Motion (SfM) photogrammetric technique as a tool for mapping and recording archaeological evidence. This technique allows the creation of highly detailed 3D models of archaeological sites, monuments, and artefacts from sets of simple but accurately taken pictures, thus preserving the data for further research or (digital) cultural valorisation. Nowadays, low-cost/commercial off-the-shelf sensors (professional and semi-professional digital cameras and smartphones as well) are widely available and accessible by most of the users operating in cultural heritage documentation. This has made the acquisition of field pictures in archaeological research much more flexible and cost-effective. 3D models obtained from these pictures through photogrammetric commercial software can be scaled with a known-measure providing highly detailed models for archaeological purposes. This enhances the ability of archaeologists to record archaeological features during field surveys and rapidly obtain 3D models. This is especially useful in the case of archaeological surveys carried out in remote and barely accessible areas. In this paper, we present the results of the application of the above-mentioned methods during archaeological surveys in the Sultanate of Oman, where several archaeological features have been recorded through SfM photogrammetry using commercial devices and portable scale-bars. We demonstrate that this is a highly-flexible and fast process to record archaeological heritage in low-accessible or fragile contexts, where a 3D model (with centimetric precision) represents a valuable dataset for further in-lab analysis and cultural dissemination.