Archaeoseismology and Palaeoseismology in the Alpine ... - Tierra

Preface
During the 15 th INQUA Congress (1999), the former Subcommission on Paleoseismicity of the INQUA promoted
the compilation of a new scale of macroseismic intensity based on environmental effects only (ESI). A work group
including geologists, seismologists and engineers compiled a first version of the scale that was presented at the
16 th INQUA Congress, and modified one year later at the 32nd International Geological Congress in Florence. To
this end, the INQUA TERPRO (Commission on Terrestrial Processes) approved a specific project (INQUA Scale
Project, 2004 ‐ 2007). As an outcome, the revised version of the ESI was ratified during the 17 th INQUA Congress
in 2007. Here, a Workshop on Earthquake Archaeology and Palaeoseimology in the ancient Roman city of Baelo
Claudia (Spain) was proposed.
The initiative of the IGCP‐567 Project on Earthquake Archaeology was successfully launched in 2008. The Baelo
Claudia workshop was officially included in the program of scientific activities of this project. Nowadays in 2009,
this joint meeting between the INQUA Focus Area on Paleoseismology and the IGCP‐567 on Earthquake
Archaeology wants to share objectives for a better knowledge of the seismic history of tectonically active settings.
Besides the classical catalogues on historical seismicity, these two innovative lines of research try to unmask the
ancient seismic behaviour of active zones and faults from the available geological, geomorphological and
archaeological records. This effort implies the combination of very different kind of evidence coming from quite
diverse scientific approaches, some times in very singular ways. Example of this is the variety of original research
presented in this volume of abstracts composed of more than 40 contributions from people of more than 20
different countries, mainly focused on the European, Middle East and Asiatic, Alpine‐Himalayan Collision zone.
Finally, we want to draw your attention to a recently published Special Volume of the Geological Society of
London, No. 316 (2009), Palaeoseismology: historical and prehistorical records of earthquake ground effects for
seismic hazard assessment, edited by Klaus Reicherter, Alessandro M. Michetti and Pablo G. Silva Barroso, in
which results of of two meetings held in 2006 (European Geosciences Union General Assembly 2006, Session
TS4.4, ‘3000 years of earthquake ground effects in Europe: geological analysis of active faults and benefits for
hazard assessment’, Vienna, Austria, April 2006; and the ICTP/IAEA workshop on ‘The conduct of seismic hazard
analyses for critical facilities’, Trieste, Italy, May 2006) are summarized.
Lastly, we wish all participants a successful and fruitful conference and workshop in the Roman Baelo Claudia,
and we hope that everybody can enjoy southern Spain, the Costa de la Luz, and the marvelous landscape in the
Straits of Gibraltar.
The Organizers of the 1 st INQUA‐IGCP567 Workshop
Pablo G. Silva Klaus Reicherter
Universidad de Salamanca, SPAIN RWTH Aachen University, GERMANY
The Organizers of the workshop are grateful to the responsible persons of Conjunto Arqueológico Romano de Baelo Claudia
(Junta de Andalucía) for assisting our initiative by giving us access to different facilities of the Museum of Baelo Claudia, as
well as all the institutions involved in the organization, and all the people of the Bolonia Bay (Cádiz) around the conference.