Ferento romana. Integrazioni topografiche da immagini aeree

Ferento (Viterbo), like many other Roman cities, has had a limited number of archaeological excavations, some of which have remained unpublished, with a very partial cognitive picture. In Ferento, aerial photography has proved to be a particularly important tool both for documenting the change in the landscape and for identifying cropmarks that are useful for reconstructing structures and roads buried in the urban area. A very significant moment in this sense was recorded about ten years ago, when an image on Google Earth revealed numerous clearly perceptible crop-marks for about four hectares, allowing to propose the reconstruction of a large portion of the ancient urban area. In this context, starting from 2018 a monitoring activity was carried out with the use of drones. This activity has made it possible to increase the state of knowledge, thanks to a series of cropmarks that cover a further five hectares. In this paper, in addition to exposing the novelties acquired, we will try to reiterate some general reflections on the methods and purposes of aerial photography in archaeology.