StrataHistory underfoot

The library of ground

Every place Strata has dug, assembled from its sources and filed by locality and era. A place is reviewed again whenever the ground beneath it is dug afresh.

230 places · 98 localities · last reviewed 21 September 2026
Portugal LisbonLisbon carries its layers close together: a hilltop besieged in 1147, a royal square rebuilt after the 1755 earthquake, a secret police headquarters that fired its last shots in 1974, and industrial waterfront turned into a World's Fair in 1998. Moors, kings, dictators and engineers each left their mark on the same short walks. 9 digs
108 records
The city that starved for a king it never chose Igreja de Santa Luzia · 6379 BC–2013 The knight who blocked a closing gate with his body Painel de Azulejos "Conquista de Lisboa" · 6400 BC–2012 The king who wouldn't sit for his own portrait Praça do Comércio · 200 BC–1965 Where Lisbon's secret police kept its files and its cells Edifício no Largo Corpo Santo, n. 19 - 22 · 1506–1974
Portugal SintraSintra, Portugal, gathers its history around a royal palace where kings were born, confined and died, and around the villages and burial grounds spread through its hills. Moorish, medieval and modern layers sit close together, held by the crown, by the Church, and later by exiles and dictators-in-waiting. 9 digs
64 records
The exile who came here to die 50 Alameda da Fonte Velha · 800 BC–1974 The king who was born and died on the same hill Câmara Municipal de Sintra · 9222 BC–2018
Portugal CascaisCascais grew from scattered Roman farm estates into a chartered fishing town in 1364, then into King Luís I's chosen summer court from the 1870s, and finally into a coast of forts, shipwrecks and exiled royalty, its ground still carrying Visigothic graves, quarried walls and a fort disarmed within a year of its rebuilding. 13 digs
151 records
The invasion that never came Fort of Cresmina · 100–now Rebuilt for a king, disarmed within a year Cascais · 4000 BC–now A graveyard came before the villas Alcabideche · 100 BC–2008 Villas first, then a wall of forts Cascais · 100 BC–1966 A hillside outside Cascais with nothing pinned to it yet Alcabideche · 500–1896
Switzerland BulleBulle, first named in the 9th century, grew around a fortress the bishops of Lausanne raised between 1291 and 1331. Built to a Savoy-style plan in a town that never belonged to Savoy, the castle passed to Fribourg's rule in 1536 when the bishop fled the invading Bernese army. 2 digs
22 records
Built like Savoy, held against it 19 Chemin de Bouleyres · 100 BC–1917
Italy RomeRome's ground holds an amphitheatre, a bathing complex turned piazza, a chasm in the Forum, and the spot where Julius Caesar fell. Emperors, senators and Gothic besiegers each left their mark, and what they built or broke still shapes the streets walked today. 5 digs
62 records
Sixty senators cornered Rome's dictator here Fortuna Huiusce Diei, Aedes · 1219 BC–1929 The rider who filled the hole with himself Rostra ad Divi Iulii · 1000 BC–608 The nymphs Rome tried not to look at Ninfa dei Laghi · 378 BC–2018 Rome's largest baths left their footprint on a modern square Baths of Diocletian · 378 BC–1762 Public death was staged for spectacle on this ground Colosseum · 64–2007
United States Salt Lake CitySalt Lake City spans a valley once called Sivogah, trapped by ambush in 1824, settled by Mormon pioneers under Brigham Young, and reshaped since by mining fortunes, a stalled billionaire's development, farming villages absorbed into suburbs, and a temple that reordered a whole hillside in 2009. 14 digs
129 records
Seven students grew into a school that never stopped moving Sandy · 100 BC–2015
France BezannesBezannes, near Reims, is a place where champagne trade and the wider world have repeatedly met. It gave its name to the Charles Heidsieck house, founded here in 1851, and later to a TGV station opened in 2007 that put the commune on the national rail map. 1 dig
26 records France ParisParis gathers a walled Roman island, a royal fortress rebuilt into a museum palace, boulevards laid out under Napoleon III, and streets marked by revolution, occupation and liberation. Kings, engineers, resistants and anarchists have each left their trace on its ground, layer over layer. 30 digs
319 records
An island of courts, sieges and public spectacle Siege of Paris · 500–1972 A police officer was shot dead beside Notre-Dame in 1944 Siege of Paris · 700–2019 An island fought over since the Vikings sailed up the Seine Siege of Paris · 250 BC–1995 A chapel built for a crown of thorns still stands Siege of Paris · 250 BC–2014 Vikings besieged this island fortress until paid to leave Siege of Paris · 250 BC–1995 Egyptian coffins rest beneath a fortress that became a palace Louvre Castle · 100 BC–1794
Spain ValenciaValencia's ground carries Roman foundations, a royal conquest in 1238, and a papal request in 1246 that finally became a classroom seven centuries later. Kings, friars and floods have each left their mark, from the buried city of Valentia to the archive begun in 1419. 1 dig
14 records United Kingdom North LeighNorth Leigh holds a Roman villa uncovered and stripped within a week in 1813, a Saxon burial ground, a vanished medieval village, and Eynsham Hall — a 1770s house rebuilt as an Edwardian mansion that sheltered wartime mothers and airmen before becoming a hotel. 5 digs
71 records
A house built to keep out the world Eynsham Hall · 800 BC–1981 A mansion that became a maternity ward Estelle Manor · 4000 BC–2025 A widow who buried two sons built a chapel to save them Eynsham Hall, Terrace Walls To Rear · 800 BC–now The mansion built to replace itself Eynsham Hall, Terrace Walls To Rear · 800 BC–1981 A mosaic survived fifteen centuries, then a week Eynsham Hall, Terrace Walls To Rear · 800 BC–1981
United Kingdom SilverstoneSilverstone, Northamptonshire, has held an Iron Age hillfort, a medieval moated farm and a Roman cremation cemetery, before a wartime bomber airfield gave way in 1948 to the racing circuit that has staged the British Grand Prix, and its share of triumph and death, ever since. 3 digs
43 records
A crowd swallowed the racetrack to reach one man 2007 British Grand Prix · 800 BC–2009 The day the crowd wouldn't let him leave 2007 British Grand Prix · 800 BC–now The championship that crashed itself 2007 British Grand Prix · 800 BC–now
Italy MonzaMonza grew from Pliocene clay into a Lombard royal seat, a Habsburg villa town, and a name known worldwide for speed. Queen Theodelinda died here in 627; King Umberto I was shot dead here in 1900; and its medieval Arengario, Visconti castle ruins and racetrack still mark the ground. 8 digs
81 records
The third attempt was the one that worked Via Dante Alighieri · 100 BC–1927 The king who did not see it coming church of San Biagio · 100 BC–1965 A king was shot near this medieval council chamber Albergo diurno Monza · 1200–1901
United Kingdom Lillingstone Dayrell with Luffield AbbeyLillingstone Dayrell with Luffield Abbey carries a Benedictine priory cleared in the fifteenth century, a deserted village, an Iron Age hillfort, and a wartime airfield reborn as Silverstone Circuit, birthplace of the World Championship of Drivers. 1 dig
12 records United Kingdom WoodstockWoodstock, Oxfordshire, grew around a royal hunting seat where Henry II kept Fair Rosamund and Elizabeth I was later held under guard. That old manor gave way to Blenheim Palace, built in the early 1700s and, in 1874, the birthplace of Winston Churchill. 1 dig
13 records United Kingdom LondonLondon's ground holds a workhouse on Poland Street, a Roman bathhouse beneath Shadwell's docks, a Saxon knights' grant at Aldgate, and the Tower of London's siege, executions and plague burials — each site changed by outbreak, riot or rebuilding across nearly two thousand years. 5 digs
70 records
The garrison that fired on London and paid for it Waterloo Block · 41 BC–1974 The Father who walked into the cholera ward Roman Bath House, Shadwell · 1508 BC–1983
United Kingdom BicesterBicester grew around a saint's relics and a Norman priory, on ground already old with Roman roads and early Christian burial. A highwayman's ambush in 1818 and a designer outlet opened in 1995 mark how the same streets kept changing hands and purpose. 1 dig
12 records Portugal Salvaterra de MagosSalvaterra de Magos grew around a royal hunting lodge built in the 1500s, favored by the Portuguese crown into the 1700s, where a marriage contract had already been signed in 1383. Fires in 1817 and 1828, then an 1858 earthquake, brought the palace down, leaving only its chapel and falconry standing. 1 dig
9 records Italy Santo StefanoSanto Stefano gathers a long ground in Bologna: the site of two Christian executions in 305 AD, a buried temple to Isis, an early medieval cemetery, and, nearby, the palace prison where a defeated king died in 1272. Ownership and use shifted repeatedly across centuries of destruction and rebuilding. 1 dig
15 records Bulgaria SofiaBeneath modern Sofia lies Serdica, the fortified Roman and medieval city besieged by Bulgarian forces in 809 and taken by the Ottomans in 1382. Its buried streets and a sunken church now sit beneath a shopping mall and the Serdika Metro Station, marking the old city's core. 1 dig
11 records Serbia Opstina Nis-MedijanaOpstina Niš-Medijana holds ground fought over across centuries: besieged by crusader knights in 1096, taken by Bulgarian troops in 1915 as Serbia's wartime capital, and struck by NATO cluster bombs in 1999. Emperors, priests and armies all left their mark here. 1 dig
7 records Italy Venezia-Murano-BuranoVenice was built as a city without roads, entered only by water until the nineteenth century, when a rail causeway and later a road bridge tied it to the mainland. The Ponte della Libertà, completed in 1933, remains its sole land approach, bombed during the Second World War for that very reason. 3 digs
44 records
A clock tower was built for sailors, not for time Siege of Venice · 300–1912
Italy FlorenceFlorence gathers around Piazza della Signoria and its cathedral: seat of a medieval republic, site of a friar's execution, ground where Medici dukes raised bronze monuments, and a Duomo built directly over the city's first cathedral. Republic gave way to Medici rule, and each layer left its mark. 3 digs
23 records
A cathedral was built directly over Florence's first one Siege of Florence · 300–1530 A friar's ashes were thrown into the Arno here Girolamo Savonarola · 1–1594
Italy VeronaVerona's record here gathers around Piazza Bra: a small plaque to the city's sons who fell fighting in Libya in 1911, set near the spot where Garibaldi once vowed "Rome or death," alongside older markers of the square's long civic and military past. 1 dig
3 records Italy Porto - SaragozzaVia Giacomo Venezian, in Bologna's Porto - Saragozza district, runs close to Piazza del Nettuno, where Palazzo Re Enzo held Enzo of Sardinia, son of Emperor Frederick II, prisoner from 1249 until his death in 1272 — twenty-three years within a building still standing. 1 dig
12 records Italy PisaPisa's Via Santa Maria runs near the Piazza del Duomo, where the cathedral was consecrated in 1118 on soft ground that later tipped its bell tower. Around it rose a memorial church after 1316 and, centuries on, a fountain of 1765. 1 dig
10 records Italy PaduaPadua's former ghetto neighbourhood, near the synagogue built in 1548 and the ancient university, holds a record of arrest and deportation. Sixteen stumbling stones set into its pavement mark families and students taken between December 1943 and May 1944. 1 dig
3 records Vatican City RomeBeneath the high altar of St. Peter's Basilica lies a second-century funeral monument amid a Roman necropolis of roughly a thousand graves. Tradition and a 1968 papal declaration name it Peter's tomb, though the excavation's own lead archaeologist doubted that identification throughout his life. 1 dig
12 records Austria Innere StadtInnere Stadt is Vienna's old core, ground first held by the Roman camp of Vindobona and since layered with medieval churches, Habsburg burial, sieges, a Baroque palais, a synagogue and a wartime Gestapo headquarters — each holding its place beneath the streets. 1 dig
18 records Italy CremonaCremona rests on Pliocene clay within the Cenozoic fill of the Padana basin, a colony fought over in 200 BC and besieged in AD 69, later marked by a Romanesque baptistery, the towering Torrazzo, a rebuilt opera house and a small square that was once a plague cemetery. 1 dig
24 records
A record of ground, not a magazine.

Nothing here was commissioned. Each place is assembled from its own sources, published at the resolution of the ground rather than the point, and reviewed again when the record changes. No page reports a person.