Locri

The researches

An agreement with the Archaeological Local Authorities of Reggio Calabria, entered into in the mid 1990s, led Centro Scavi Torino to take an interest in the Marasà Sanctuary in Locri Epizephyrii and, in particular, in the Ionic temple that dates back to the second quarter of the 5th century BCE. According to a project prepared at the end of 1993, Centro Scavi Torino applied new “digital sculpture” technologies to recompose the capitals of the columns in the peristasis and to create a scale model (1:50) of the temple as it was originally.

The analysis of fragments from some of the capitals in the Marasà Ionic temple made it possible to reconstruct the original model. A patient survey of the fragments enabled the researchers to recuperate the design created by the original Greek artist. The study brought to light the exact dimensions of the various architectural elements, providing the researchers with the necessary data to recreate the appearance of the monument as it was in ancient times. The discovery of some columns in the Ionian Sea, 40 kilometers from Locri, led to a new reading and interpretation of the temple’s pronaos which, in the place of the pair of columns theorized by Paolo Orsi at the beginning of the last century, seems to have housed six columns of a smaller diameter. In fact, there is a direct proportion between the decorative elements of the columns in the temple (CAD reconstructions) and those of the recovered columns (which could have been transported by sea, subsequently to the collapse of the temple, towards a destination which was never reached).