Saimir Shpuza
Research project
Apollonia’s Nymphaion and bitumen in the central and western Mediterranean
Project summary
This project focuses on the analysis of all the facts concerning the bitumen deposits located in Illyria, which are often mentioned in ancient sources but are archaeologically unknown. The research project presented here combines historical, archaeological, geological, physical (fluids and gases), geographical and environmental approaches. The chronological scope is very broad, stretching from antiquity to the present day. Bitumen is still being mined today, and this exploitation is certainly causing environmental problems, and probably health problems too. The project is therefore wide-ranging, but has a certain unity of place and thematic coherence: the aim is to understand how bitumen was mined in this region of the ancient world, and why its extraction was linked to the religious dimension via an oracular sanctuary, the remains of which have yet to be discovered.
