K. Palágyi Sylvia szerk.: Balácai Közlemények 2005/9. (Veszprém, 2005)
T. LÁNG, ORSOLYA: Control Excavations in the Territory of the Civil Town of Aquincum: the so-called „Testvérhegy-villa"
parallel to the north-south fencing wall of the ancient villa and exploited debris and the uppermost stonerow from the wall. The Diagonal Road and Graves The excavation of the eastern part of the plot yielded remains of the main, northwestsoutheast running road, with its seven layers „slipped" one above the other 11 . Wheelruts were observed on the surfaces, which were dated by coins and other finds. The roadlayers were separated by thick layers of soil from erosion. The earliest road-pavement was constructed of large limestone blocks 12 on which an early coin of Hadrianus was found (Fig. 15). Two pairs of wheel ruts, 140 cm apart from each other could be seen on the surface. This distance corresponds well to one of the usual Roman wheel-gauges. 13 The next pavement was also made of larger stones, while the one above was composed of small pebbles. Another, though later, coin of Hadrianus 14 was found on this surface. Two subsequent layers above were constructed from smaller stones and probably still represent Roman renovation activity. The later pavements all date to the Middle Ages: on the topmost layer fragments of iron-horseshoes and 15 th-16 th c. coins were collected. Channels ran parallel to the multi-layered road in the different periods. The direction of the long-used main road follows more or less, the direction, already hypothesized by S. Garády, although the fact that it turns more to the east than expected was discovered during the present excavation campaign. The Medieval and Roman roads running „side by side" 15 were no more than layers from different phases and different directions. The main road was lined by a group of graves, discovered in the northern part of the plot, close to the entrance-unit of the villa-estate. There were eight of them, dug into the subsequent layers. The burial appeared very „high" up in the sequence, some 20-50 cm below the modem surface. It seems probable, that the Roman ground surface was higher, but had been scraped off in modem times. Seven graves lay parallel to the road, while only one had an east-west orientation. Only one cremation burial was documented with others inhumations: five were probably buried in wooden coffins, one was a stoneslab grave, while a closed sarcophagus burial was also excavated. The latter was dated to the first third of the AD. 3 rd c, based on the characteristics of the depictions on it. According to the clearly executed carving of the inscription, Aurelia Cariana had his husband, the Campanian C. Iulius Sabinus from Capua buried here. He was legionary in the legio 11 adiutrix (Fig. 16). The inscription was framed by a baroque double- S motif, with a depiction of the deceased wearing military gear and his wife with a hairstyle characteristic of the Severan period. Its lid was formed like the roof of a house, though probably this originally may have belonged to another sarcophagus. The lid was partly damaged in modem times because of a pipeline, but fortunatelly the grave itself was not disturbed. Two badly disturbed and fragmentary skeletons were found inside the sarcophagus, without any grave goods. Based on the grave goods and coins found in the other inhumation graves, they can be
