Our latest blog post was written by Kaitlyn Solberg, one of UBC’s Classical Archaeology MA students. Enjoy!

To the untrained eye, dirty stones scattered throughout a square-shaped pit can look no different from the stacks of stones nearby which just happen to run in an almost-straight line. As I was squinting at such a mess of tan-coloured stones in the distance, Professor David George of St. Anselm College was proudly gesturing at a stack less than a foot high hidden behind some olive trees. “If you look at this wall here, it’s a Roman retaining wall which they put in to keep all the water uphill. As you can tell, it is still working today.”

Thirty pairs of (untrained) eyes glanced at the trench he gestured at uphill and, sure enough, there is at least a foot of groundwater resting at the bottom of it. Some of the students look…