Empire strikes back

Press, 7 April 1982, Page 17

Empire strikes back

The people of Tarragona pride themselves on having Spain’s best climate and most varied countryside. They live in a neighbourly, fairly prosperous society; and their food and wine are good. They ought to be happy. But they have a problem that goes back to Roman times.

Tarragona has Roman remains. Its cathedral was built on the site of a mosque which was a former church that began life as a Roman temple. Which image is sacred and which pagan is anyone’s. guess: it’s a common Mediterranean problem. But in Tarragona houses and , factories, too, have been erected on Roman ruins.

It is difficult to dig foundations, lay a drain, or plant a row of potatoes without coming into conflict with the Roman Empire. One district specialises in potted Romans: it was built over an immense necropolis and its subsoil is as packed as a charter flight with cramped figures, usually in earthenware. pots.

Under the Franco regime, archaeological discoveries

were not always protected. A site north of Tarragona was stripped by handymen who specialised in making genuine Roman-mosaic coffeetables. Administrative corruption was such that a builder might easily persuade officialdom to look the other way while his excavators ploughed through, say, a Roman bath and his workmen cemented over the tra ces. Some landowners are still inclined to reach for their guns when they hear the words “Roman culture.” But democracy has made vandalism more difficult. Teachers and students of archaeology and history at Tarragona University keep watch on building sites and press for municipal action to halt work when interesting remains are uncovered. The Left-wing city council is generally sympathetic to the conservationists: the mayor has written a book on Romman Tarragona, but funds and storage-space are inadequate; and a split has developed between Latin-lovers and dendrophiles. A few weeks ago, the municipality decided that Tarragona’s 100-year-old

rambla (avenue) of plane trees must be replanted. Some trees were ailing, and it was feared that they had been poisoned by polluted soil. Many of the trees were uprooted and beneath them, of course, were found Roman walls, pavements, drains, ceramics, and a mosaic.

Huge trenches have been dug along the rambla, but the authorities are uncertain what to do next. Carry on excavating and convert the rambla — an important artery and meeting place — into a desert? Re-plan the' rambla, at great expense, as a permanent archaeological show-place? Fill in the trenches and hurriedly plant new trees before the planting season ends?

The green lobby is as cross as the archaeologists are jubilant: the roots of the old plane trees turned out to be healthy, and the soii unpolluted, despite all those Roman drains. Green extremists suspect a proRoman plot. When the spring spray-painting season opens, Tarragona may see the slogan: “Romans go home.”—“Economist,” London.