Trans-Portus Project

A harbour is like an (urban) organism, constantly evolving and changing, with a life made up of additions, restorations, adjustments and developments. The Trans-Portus project proposes to develop a novel approach based on a conceptual change in the harbour model. Traditionally, a harbour is defined as a combination of two components, the container (interface harbour structures) and the content (volume of sediment, water, sea level), as well as the facilities for loading/unloading, storage and management. The originality of this project lies in its attempt to transpicere (i.e. to see through) the harbour object, by recreating the conceptual link between its two components before reintegrating them into their geographical context (material supply area, coastal landscapes, etc.). To achieve this, Trans-Portus relies on a transdisciplinary consortium and on a study at nested scales, which will make it possible to answer outstanding questions concerning their technical, architectural and environmental history. The geohistorical approach will enable us to reconstruct the spatiality of ancient harbours in relation to their landscape (retail trade logic, environmental potential/constraints, etc.) and the environmental trajectories of landscapes after development. The historical approach is based on a re-reading of archaeological data and ancient texts. The geoarchaeological approach is based on deep sediment archives cored in both structures and basin infilled studied at very high chronostratigraphic resolution. In order to overcome methodological obstacles, new transfers of knowledge between the human sciences and the geosciences will be devised and implemented. The overarching objectives of Trans-Portus are to: (1) restore the particular logistical constraints imposed on builders and (2) the temporal variability of these archaeological objects in all their complexity (4D modeling).