Past and present excavations of a multi-period site

Abstract

The remains of the Żejtun Roman Villa lie on the highest point of a long, somewhat flat ridge that stretches for about 1 km roughly in an east-west direction (Fig. 1). This point is located close to the east end of the ridge. Beyond Dun Lawrenz Degabriele Street that borders the Girls Secondary School grounds on the east side, this ridge

starts dipping rather rapidly towards Tas- Silġ and Delimara, along the road leading

to those destinations. The ridge dips slightly less rapidly to the north, beyond Luqa Briffa Street, even less rapidly to the south, beyond the Żejtun Bypass (Anton Buttigieg Street) while it maintains more or less the same altitude to the west up to Bir id-Deheb from where the ground starts rising again towards Gudja and the parish church of Ħal Għaxaq. The ground level of the Villa remains, therefore, is a couple of metres higher than that of the old parish church of Santa Katerina (the present St Gregory’s church) and considerably higher than that of the present Żejtun parish church