Interpretation of funerary spaces in Roman times: insights from a nucleus of Braga, NW Iberian Peninsula

The funerary/cult archeological nucleus of Rua do Raio (Braga, in the northwest of the Iberian Peninsula) was discovered between 2007 and 2009, under the excavation works of a necropolis of Bracara Augusta. This building exhibits a set of particularities that confirms its archeological importance. It is a construction dating from the middle of the 1st century AD, subject to two reforms, one in the second half of the 1st century AD and another in the 2nd century AD, with a trapezoidal shape and comprising ten rectangular tanks rendered with opus signinum mortars. It shows a unique architectural configuration in the city, as well as in the Portuguese territory, and the space is under musealization, together with a set of graves identified in the same archeological intervention. The present investigation contextualizes the funerary and religious architecture of the city. Its description is presented, highlighting its relevance, and an interpretative possibility is formulated.This research was supported by the Landscape, Heritage and Territory Laboratory (Lab2PT), Ref. UIDB/04509/2020, financed by national funds (PIDDAC) through the FCT/MCTES, and the GeoBioSciences, GeoTechnologies and GeoEngineering Research Centre (GeoBioTec), Ref. UIDB/04035/ 2020, funded by FCT and FEDER funds through the Operational Program Competitiveness Factors COMPETE and by national funds (OE), through FCT in the scope of the framework contract foreseen in the numbers 4, 5 and 6 of the article 23, of the Decree-Law 57/2016, of August 29, changed by Law 57/2017, of July 19