ANDILLY-EN-BASSIGNY
Haute-Marne, France.
Large Gallo-Roman settlement about 20 km NE of
Langres, in S Champagne. The site lies near Mont Mercure, which divides the waters flowing to the Mediterranean (the Saône), the North Sea (Meuse) and the English Channel (Marne), and close to the point where
the road from Langres to the Rhine crosses that from
Chaumont to Bourbonne-les-Bains.
A huge complex has been uncovered, over 140 m long,
arranged around a long rectangular courtyard. To the N
are some living quarters, to the W several large halls
and some rooms used as workshops, and to the S some
very complete baths with well-preserved hypocausts; the
rooms include frigidarium, tepidarium, caldarium, laconicum, apodyteriuin, latrine, and others. Digging has begun
on some living areas 50 m to the W, at the foot of a
hill immediately over the site. Finds have been abundant:
tools and various metal objects (an anvil, brick-making
instruments, a prisoner's shackle with a double lock), as
well as mirrors, lamps, terra sigillata and common ware,
coins, and some sculptures. The finds point to continuous
occupation until at least the 3d c. A.D. and to further
activity, perhaps after some interruption, under Constantine. Abandoned thereafter, the site was taken over by
a Merovingian necropolis (6th-7th c.) in which were
found weapons, shields and shield-disks, fibulas, and necklace elements.
A certain luxury in construction and decoration is
shown by architectural blocks (particularly a large sandstone capital), some multicolored marble facings, many
cubes of mosaic, and fragments of wall paintings. No
agricultural buildings have yet been found, and the proximity of connecting roads may suggest a road mutatio.
Some historians have proposed (without presenting decisive arguments) that the site should be identified with
Andesina in the
Peutinger Table. Perhaps, however, it is
simply the residential section of a large villa; although
no farm buildings have been uncovered so far, there
could be traces in some unexplored parts of the site.
The finds are housed in the Chaumont Museum and
especially in a small antiquarium on the site.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
V. Multier,
Bull. Soc. Hist. et Arch. de
Langres 4 (1896) 86ff; P. Ballet,
Cahiers Haut-Marnais
74 (1963) 108ff; 76 (1964) 1ff; 78 (1964) 97; 82-83
(1965) 110ff; 87 (1966) 133ff; 92 (1968) 1ff; 100 (1970)
27ff; id.,
Le site gallo-romain d'Andilly-en-Bassigny
(1970)
PI; R. Martin,
Gallia 22 (1964) 320f; E. Frézouls,
ibid. 25 (1967) 287
PI; 27 (1969) 304f; 29 (1971)
299ff
PI; 31 (1973) 414.
E. FRÉZOULS
