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The Punta Scifo A Shipwreck and Its Early Discoverers: Local Fishermen and
Paolo Orsi’s Reports (1908-1921)
A century ago, in 1908, the Italian archaeologist Paolo Orsi received information
concerning a cargo of marble artifacts located off the beach of Punta Scifo. On August
21 of the same year a local fisherman named Antonio Tricoli had recovered a large
marble basin, with an internal diameter of 2.10 m, which was promptly confiscated by
the Coast Guard and sent to the National Museum of Tarentum at the recommendation
of Prof. Q. Quagliati. 64 The following year Mr. Tricoli’s brothers continued the search
for marble artifacts in the sea around Punta Scifo, and located, close to the original find
spot, two additional basins (known as labra, plural of the Latin labrum, meaning “basin,
tank, pond”) and three column shafts. The brothers were able to raise them to the surface
and, having “overcome unthinkable difficulties” they carried the artifacts to the harbor of
Croton, where the three column shafts were unloaded and abandoned. 65 Figure 16 shows
the two largest basins (LAB 2-3) as they were seen in December 2005 flanking the
entrance of Croton’s Archaeological Museum. Their size is remarkable: the upper
external diameters are 2.25 and 2.36 m wide, while their heights reach 1.04 and 1.05 m.
Antonio Tricoli’s name appears once more in Croton’s chronicles in 1966, when,
as “an old seaman,” he claimed to have seen 15 m from the beach of Capo Colonna and
64 Valente 1973, 50 n. 31. According to G. Valente the internal diameter of this basin is 2.11 m, while in
Paolo Orsi’s 1911 article the same artifact appears to have a diameter of only 2.00 m, and a height of 0.85
m (Orsi 1911, 119). Patrizio Pensabene in 1978 reanalyzed some of the marble items from Punta Scifo,
and found that the basin in Tarentum has a maximum upper diameter of 2.10 m, internal upper diameter of
1.70 m, and height of 0.90 m (Pensabene 1978a, 114). It is evident that Paolo Orsi’s measurements were
taken quite hastily and ought to be used with caution.
65 Valente 1973, 50 n. 31. When G. Valente published his book he was still able to see the three column
shafts near the Stazione Torpediniere of the Old Harbor. No one moved them from 1909 until at least
1973.
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