LIFFOL-LE-GRAND
Vosges, France.
A small
Gallo-Roman center on the route of a diverticulum linking Grand to the great Roman road from Langres to
Trier. In 1830 public works at the locality called La
Rupt-de-Villet led to the discovery, amid ancient foundations and other debris, of a small square mosaic (1.7 m
on each side), half of which is preserved today in the
Epinal Museum. New excavations undertaken at the same
place in 1966 revealed the existence of a large rural
villa. It is surrounded by a rectangular colonnaded portico with a perimeter of ca. 540 m. Near the NE corner
of this enclosure several living rooms were studied. One
of these was in the shape of a T with three arms of equal
length. It was paved with a mosaic with a square emblema of geometric type whose design could be reconstructed. Another room was also adorned with a mosaic,
with a central opus sectile motif, of which only the edge
and scattered pieces of various marbles remain.
Near the ancient diverticulum, at the top of a hillside
dominating the site, a building apparently used for farming was discovered. It had a large central room, flanked
at the NE and SE corners by two identical small rooms.
The artifacts collected, as well as the pottery and coins,
belong to two distinct periods: the end of the 1st c. and
the 3d and 4th c.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
M. Toussaint,
Répertoire archéologique
Vosges (1948) 130-31; R. Billoret in
Gallia 24 (1966);
26 (1968); 28 (1970).
R. BILLORET
