In July 2018, Charlotte Sabaux attended a practical course on the archaeological study of death based in Pompeii.
"I had the chance to participate for two weeks in an intensive training course on cremations in Pompeii" says Charlotte. "The project 'Investigating the archaeology of death' is a partnership between the Ilustre Colegio de Doctores and Licenciados in Letras y Ciencias de Valencia-Castellón and the Parco Archeologico di Pompei. This year the team focused on the excavating of a new necropolis : the necropolis of Porta Sarno. I spent most of my time in the laboratory to study the cremations recovered during previous excavations. The training was provided by Dr. Llorenç Alapont, an anthropologist at the University of Valencia, who has combined theoretical courses on anthropology, palaeopathology, funerary contexts ... and a concrete anthropological study of Roman funerary urns (micro-excavation, identification of bone fragments, weighing, encoding of results in the database and photographs of each fragment). This internship allowed me to discover the process of studying an urn (which is a long and painstaking process) and develop my knowledge of human osteology, as well as the recognition of burned bones (the most difficult part of the study but essential in the context of my doctorate and the CRUMBEL project)".
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