The potential of the Geographic Information Techniques for the analysis of the morphology and settlement patterns of the Roman military sites of early imperial era in Iberia

Resumo

Despite the progress made in the last decades, Roman military archaeology in Hispania still lacks studies characterised by an overall perspective. The scarcity and heterogeneity of the archaeological data available had limited the development of morphological and locational analyses until now. However, the growth of low-cost specific methodologies based on the combination of remote sensing techniques, GIS and archaeological field survey has provided new information on the Roman military presence in recent times. On the basis of the rules and suggestions recorded on the old treatises on metatio castrorum (castrametation technique), we will discuss in this paper how the Geographic Information Techniques can help us in opening new research perspectives for the study of Roman military sites in Iberia.