Archaeological excavations of three sections of the inner areas of the fort of Apsaros were conducted by the Gonio-Apsaros archaeological expedition of the Cultural Heritage Preservation Agency of Adjara in 2014. Remains of several buildings were unearthed in the Roman cultural levels. Artifacts from these layers reflect a Roman presence in the area from the second half of the 1st to the end of the 3rd century AD....
The Roman fort of Apsaros in Gonio (Adjara, Georgia) still holds answers to many issues connected with the Roman military presence on the Chorokhi river in ancient Colchis. In 2014, a Polish team joined the Georgian expedition to carry out excavation in two sectors directly east of the centrally located principia. The sites were chosen based on a study of the results of geophysical prospection carried out in 2012. Two phases, dated to the early and late Roman periods respectively, were recorded. The early Roman architecture was interpreted as part of the installations and structures of a large bathhouse (
balneae
), including a mosaic floor in one of the rooms. The building was destroyed at least twice, most likely in a catastrophic fire. The article discusses the stratigraphy and the dating of the early Roman
balneae
based on glass artifacts and coins....
Karasiewicz-Szczypiorski, Radosław; Mamuladze, Shota; Aslanischvili, Lasha; Daszkiewicz, Małgorzata(Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean, 2018)
The article collects the modest information on the use (and
possible production) of ceramic building material by the Roman army in
Colchis, using it as a backdrop for presenting the exceptional richness, in
quantity as much as diversity, of finds from Gonio/Apsaros. They are made
even more exceptional by the signatures found on these products. The article
presents documented examples of stamps on bricks, roof tiles and ceramic
pipes from the fort and links them with construction project of specific Roman
army units in the Cappadocia province. The results of laboratory tests
conducted on samples of ceramic products and raw clay from Gonio,
presented in Part 2, are an important element of the presented analysis.
Based on these results, it has been possible to distinguish two reference
groups for the production of which clay from near the fort was used.
However, it has not been possible to indicate the specific deposits of such
raw material used by the Roman army....