The setting up of the “Alburnus Maior” National Research Programme in 2001 has offered the opportunity for a global approach to the archaeological issues specific of the Alburnus Maior site.
The seven cremation necropolises excavated to the present moment at Roşia Montană have a specific character due to the economic context in which the communities that are archaeologically attested here in the Roman period are part of, a context directly linked to the exploitation of the silver and gold mine of this area. It goes without saying that some of the funeral rites and rituals aspects of these communities are influenced by the ethno-cultural as well as the economic conditioning induced by the specific character of the site.
The results of the archaeological campaigns of the preceding years (2000–2001) had highlighted the archaeological potential of the region adjacent to the “Cetate” Site and, naturally, that of the zone which surrounds and neighbours the traces of the ancient mining exploitation that have been studied at the “Găuri” Site. The image of a unitary structure has slowly emerged, containing elements which indicate specific forms of habitat, a cremation necropolis, a sacred area, a system of communication tracks between the various points of interest, all of these connected with the extraction sites and, probably, the processing–points of the gold ore exploitation on the South slope of the Cetate Massif.
It is certain that we deal with one of the locations concentrating the civil dwelling at Alburnus Maior. The place of the cremation cemetery in the close vicinity only confirms this assertion.
According to the existent analogies and epigraphic materials, this entire area (Găuri, Hop Botar and Habad) seems to be a unitary habitat structure (Kastellum Ansium).