Multi-Parametric Imaging of Etruscan Chamber Tombs: Grotte Di Castro Case Study (Italy)

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper presents an attempt to apply a multi-parametric approach, based on electrical resistivity tomography, capacitive resistivity, GPR, and Radon in soil measurements, to trace ancient cavities. In the specific case, Etruscan tombs. 

As far as the technique - or better the multi-parametric approach - is concerned, I am not a specialist, but I am an archaeologist who could take advantage of its application. The approach seems to me soundly explained and it is clear that it could be particularly useful especially in areas, such as the so-called South Etruria, because of the volcanic origin of the soils.

I fully understand that the paper is dedicated to the analysis of the technique, but, considering that also in the title it is clearly stated the fact that it was used to detect Etruscan tombs, and of a specific phase (the so-called “Orientalizing” period), it would have been maybe useful for the reader to clarify the reasons why the Authors opt for such a chronology. As a matter of fact, the term “Orientalizing” and/or the related chronology (considering the chamber tomb, 7th c. - beginning of the 6th BC) is quoted only in the title of the paper.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

thank you for reviewing our paper. We are glad that you appreciated our work.

Please, find below our replay in bold to your comment:

I fully understand that the paper is dedicated to the analysis of the technique, but, considering that also in the title it is clearly stated the fact that it was used to detect Etruscan tombs, and of a specific phase (the so-called “Orientalizing” period), it would have been maybe useful for the reader to clarify the reasons why the Authors opt for such a chronology. As a matter of fact, the term “Orientalizing” and/or the related chronology (considering the chamber tomb, 7th c. - beginning of the 6th BC) is quoted only in the title of the paper.

We appreciate this comment, in fact it has rightfully underlined how we were not explicit as to why the specific tomb tipe was chosen for our study. The reason was the expected strong geophysical and geochemical signature given by the contrast of the rock-cut structures and the empty (or, at most, soil-filled) chambers. The choice of the target was therefore mainly typological rather than chronological. We clarified it at the end of paragraph 2 of the revised manuscript (from line 163 to 168).

Furthermore, it must be observed that, while the tomb type was mainly used in the area during the so-called Orientalizing period, these particular tombs have not been precisely dated so that they might fluctuate between the Orientalizing and the very early Archaic period.

For the above mentioned reasons, we acknowledge that it is more appropriate to stress the typology (“chamber tombs”) than the chronology (“orientalizing burials”) in the title of our paper.

Therefore, we would propose a new title: Multi-parametric imaging of Etruscan chamber tombs: the Grotte di Castro case study (Italy)

Author Response File: Author Response.docx

Reviewer 2 Report

Dear authors, thank you for considering my comments.

The manuscript has been improved but, in my opinion, some further efforts are necessary to consider the manuscript for publication.

I find very interesting this paper since the combination of techniques with electrical methods creates and reports significant information. Moreover, geophysical methods provide significant data fast and at an affordable price.

General comments

-           In general, the paper is well structured and presented. However, the references need to be updated.

-           Dear authors, there is not a single criterion, in terms of the use of decimal points and comma for marking units. Please revise the entire text and use the standard English rules.

-           The acronym CCR is not explained in line 60.

-           There are some typos in the text, please revise the text fully. For example, lines 64, 66

-           Resistivity units have to be unified. In line 168 you used “Ωm” while in the figures “Ohm.m”. Please use the same units for the entire text.

-           Pay attention to the units of the entire text, line 248.

-           In the text, you present some units of Rn in this format “219-Rn” while in other parts, the format changes “222Rn”. Is there any reason for that? If not please use only one criterion for the units as well.

-           Figure 4. Figures must be clear, and they have to present the most quantity of information. Please, include the names of the CCR1-3 and so forth in the figure with this the reader will identify rapidly the data in the same figure and not going back to the former figure.

Author Response

Dear reviewer,

thank you for reviewing our manuscript and for your comments\reccomandations.

We addressed all points reported in the review report both in the text and in the figures of the manuscript according to the reviewer's comments.

As for the references, we believe that the cited papers match with the topic of the manuscript. Some of them, mainly for Rn geochemistry, are dated since this method  has been in use for geological and volcanological applications for many years. Rare or only few cases in the recent literature are present for Radon method applied to archaeology. Same thing is for the capacitive-coupled methods. This method has a limited number of papers in the licterature and almost all of them have been cited in the paper. As for the references related to geophysical data integration case studies, i've updated the cited papers with more recent publications related to the covered topic. 

Please, see below a point-by-point response. Our responses to the reviewer's comments are reported in bold.

In general, the paper is well structured and presented. However, the references need to be updated.

We replaced some fairly dated references concernaing the use of integrated geophysical methods in archaeological studies with as many more recent ones in the bibliography paragraph of the revised manuscript.

Dear authors, there is not a single criterion, in terms of the use of decimal points and comma for marking units. Please revise the entire text and use the standard English rules.

We modified it over the entire text following standard English rules for marking units.

The acronym CCR is not explained in line 60.

We addressed it and we checked for similar errors all over the text.

There are some typos in the text, please revise the text fully. For example, lines 64, 66.

We addressed it and we checked for additional typos all over the text. We hope to  fix  all of them.

Resistivity units have to be unified. In line 168 you used “Ωm” while in the figures “Ohm.m”. Please use the same units for the entire text

We decided to use Ohm.m instead of Ωm according also to the unit adopted for the figure's colour scale. We replaced it all over the text.

Pay attention to the units of the entire text, line 248.

We checked for unit errors all over the text

In the text, you present some units of Rn in this format “219-Rn” while in other parts, the format changes “222Rn”. Is there any reason for that? If not please use only one criterion for the units as well.

222-Rn is the standard chemical description for the radon (Rn is the acronym) isotope in its stable condition, in which the number 222 is the atomic weight. 220-Rn is the standard chemical description for the Thoron isotope (Th) while 219-Rn for the Attinon isotope (An).

We changed 222Rn to 222-Rn and we did it all over the text. To simplify, we decided to use the acronym Rn and Th in the entire text.

Figure 4. Figures must be clear, and they have to present the most quantity of information. Please, include the names of the CCR1-3 and so forth in the figure with this the reader will identify rapidly the data in the same figure and not going back to the former figure.

We modified Fig 4, 6, and 10 according to the reviewer's comment. We added the CCR and the GPR profiles' name to the sections displayed in the figure.

Author Response File: Author Response.docx