On Stage in Antiquity, On Screen in the Digital Age: Two Thousand Years of urban presence and integration of the Theatre in Priene

Abstract

The theatre of Priene, among the best-preserved in Asia Minor, represents an exemplary case study for testing integrated methods of digital surveying, procedural modeling, and virtual reality applied to archaeology. The work begins with the documentation of Wiegand and Schrader and with Armin von Gerkans hypotheses, adopted as the reference for reconstructing the stage and compared with a photogrammetric survey carried out through ground and drone imagery. The model was decomposed into typological parts and organized through objects and instances described by XML metadata interoperable across Rhinoceros, Blender, and Unity. Post-production introduced sculpting, procedural materials, and morphological variants, placing the final result within an explorable VR environment. The final model explicitly distinguishes between the existing state, confirmed reconstruction, and hypothesis, restoring clarity to a fragmented monument and offering an operational tool for research, education, and dissemination.