Bova Marina Archaeological Project - Department of Archaeology

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sites were surveyed less systematically, but we attempted for the sake of comparability to use systematic methods for all areas in 1999. The 1999 survey was conducted from 29 August to 17 September. This included 2 days of fieldwalking with two crews, 5 days of fieldwalking with one crew, 0.5 days of fieldwalking with a double-size crew, and 3.5 days of intensive surface collection with a large crew at Mazza. In all this represents 73 person-days of work, of which 45.5 were used for fieldwalking and 27.5 for intensive collection at Mazza. The fieldwalking survey in 1999 covered a total of 102.0 ha, of which 5.8 ha had been surveyed in previous years and 96.2 ha were new. In all, excluding repeat visits to the same area, we have surveyed a total of 274.5 ha in the three years of the project so far. We defined 53 new survey areas in 1999, numbered 102 through 154. Some of these (Areas 102, 103, 130, 131, 133, and 134) may overlap to some degree with areas from previous years. All new areas were surveyed using systematic transect walking except Areas 150 through 154, which were areas at Mazza surveyed using a systematic grid of collection areas instead (see below). The survey work of the past three years has been concentrated in several locations. The two largest clusters are around Umbro (Figure 1, Figure 2) and in the lower part of the San Pasquale valley. In each of these places numerous survey areas make up almost a square kilometer of contiguous coverage. Most of this was done in 1997 and 1998, but a few areas were added at Umbro in 1999, especially to the northeast. A third cluster of survey areas is located in the middle part of the San Pasquale valley, but in this case it consists of several disconnected fragments, due to difficulties of access. A few of these areas were done in 1997 and 1998, but most were done in 1999. Several smaller clusters have been selected to represent particular types of location: Mazza (Figure 3) and Capo Crisafi for coastal hills (1997, plus the controlled collections in 1999), M. Rotonda and M. Vunemo for high inland hills (both newly done in 1999), and M. Silipone to compare the valley of the Torrente Sideroni with the San Pasquale valley (mostly done in 1998, plus two small areas in 1999). Several small isolated patches occur as well, mostly to investigate known sites or to survey small patches of accessible land near the modern town of Bova Marina; a few of these have been done each year. 10 Bova Marina Archaeological Project 1999 2.1.3. Ceramics and chronology One of the biggest problems for survey in the past was the lack of a well-defined local ceramic sequence which would be used to date sites found on survey. During 1999, considerable progress was made at identification of the pottery from the survey. We were able to work several days in the Museo Archeologico Nazionale in Reggio di Calabria before the field season, restudying some of our 1997 and 1998 collections and also comparing them to excavated materials from the Roman site at San Pasquale (Deri). We are grateful to Dssa. Emilia Andronico and the staff of the museum for their assistance with this work. Based on this research, a new provisional ceramic classification was set up before the field season (and modified slightly during the field season), which was used for classification of the 1999 survey finds. This system will require additional modification as our knowledge of the regional pottery improves, but it has improved our ability to recognize chronological information in our surface collections, by enabling us to associate the better-known wares with changes in the local productions. Of the remaining problems in this ceramic chronology, the most important is the prehistoric period. Prehistoric pottery can usually be distinguished from that of later periods, but that is often the limit of our resolution so far. The standard chronological types for prehistoric pottery in southern Italy, based on whole vessels from burials, make use of both form and decoration. For some periods, such as the Neolithic, surface decoration is often useful, but after the Neolithic, most vessels were probably undecorated and vessel form is the most distinctive criterion. Unfortunately, the small eroded fragments in our surface collections have little evidence for either, but especially for vessel form. Traces of impressed decoration sometimes survive, making the Neolithic period more visible than other portions of prehistory, while post- Neolithic periods are far less easy to identify. It is likely that some very broad divisions should be possible on the basis of fabric and surface treatment, although these are not likely to be as precise as the existing categories. Of our prehistoric sites, some have been dated by chance survival of a diagnostic element or two, some have a suggested date based on a subjective assessment of similarity to the excavated assemblage from Umbro, and some remain undated. The chronology of the Greek period is founded on the black-gloss finewares which, although mostly of regional manufacture, reflect stylistic trends common throughout the Greek world. These are associated with reddish brown
sandy coarseware, beige plainwares, large and coarse storage jars, and sandy beige transport amphoras of Greek-derived form. Roof tile appears for the first time in the Greek period as well, predominantly in a sandy, light-colored fabric and taking the form of flat tile (tegula) with wide flanges and cover tile (imbrex) with a flat top and angular sides. The assemblages of the Hellenistic/Republican and early Imperial periods remain ill-defined, because very few imports of well-dated types have been found to confirm dates in this range. The assemblages of local commonwares seem to show a gradual changing mixture, however, of the sandy brown cooking ware and fine plainware of the Greek period and the gritty light-colored wares of the later Roman period. An orange variant of the Greek cooking ware is likely to belong to this period. The late Roman period is well defined by the presence of imports, including African Red Slip ware, plainwares, and amphoras from North Africa, as well as small quantities of Late Roman C ware and Late Roman amphoras from the eastern Mediterranean. The types and quantities found in Bova Marina suggest a peak of imports between the late 2nd or early 3rd and late 5th centuries AD. The associated local wares include light-colored coarseware and amphoras tempered with wellsorted grit (around 1 mm in size) and light-colored fine plainware. Roman roof tile, compared to Greek, tends to be in grittier fabrics and to have slightly different forms, with thinner flanges on the tegulae and a curved shape to the imbrices. Probably at the later end of the sequence of Roman coarsewares is a brown fabric tempered with abundant grit, mica, and sometimes chunks of schist. The precision of dates within the Roman period is limited so far, however, because the sites appear in most cases to have been occupied for quite long periods, several centuries in the case of Sites 9 and 22. There is a large, ill-defined gap between the end of the Roman period and the recent assemblage associated with farmhouses of the 19th and 20th centuries. It is not clear how much of this results from an actual scarcity of settlement and how much from poor recognition of the pottery of those periods. Judging from the few available reports, from the 9th to 11th centuries, ceramic assemblages in Calabria seem to consist of coarse cooking wares, semi-fine or finely sandy wares with red painted decoration, and Italian-Byzantine amphoras. All of these are continuations from Late Antiquity, although the details may vary. In addition, occasional lead-glazed pottery begins by the 9th century, either with a thick green glaze or 11 Bova Marina Archaeological Project 1999 with a sparse glaze overall but large patches and streaks of thick glaze. In the 11th century the first tin-glazed wares with green and brown decoration appear. Very little has been published on late medieval pottery in Calabria, but based on other parts of southern Italy one would expect tin-glazed protomaiolica decorated in various colors, sgraffito wares, lead-glazed cooking wares, and unglazed semi-fine wares with red painted decoration (narrower, finer painting than on the early medieval version). Until a better sense of the local productions can be obtained, it may be possible for early medieval pottery to be mistaken for late ancient, and for late medieval pottery to be mistaken for early modern. There is a clearly modern assemblage, often associated with abandoned farmhouses, including large beige water jars, red casseroles with a very thin green glaze, beige plates, bowls, and jars with a thin greenish or brownish glaze, earthenwares with decorated opaque glazes, and hard, well-fired, usually dark red curved roof tiles. This assemblage probably dates to the late 19th and 20th centuries. Some of our collections resemble this assemblage in some respects but also differ substantially. These collections may be associated with visible ruins, as at Site 10 (Torre Crisafi), but often are not. Characteristics include red casseroles decorated with white slip under a yellow glaze, jars in a hard, finely granular reddish fabric, and curved roof tile in a soft brown fabric containing large chunks of gneiss and schist. In some cases, such as Torre Crisafi, there is good reason to assign this material to the early modern period, but in most cases there is no evidence for an absolute date, and some of it may extend back to the late Middle Ages. Comparison with better-dated assemblages from elsewhere will therefore be important for establishing the chronological ranges of these types. 2.1.4. Results to date: sites found We assigned eight new site numbers in 1999, bringing the total to 37 (Figure 1). We recognize, however, that not all of these site numbers represent comparable entities. They range from a few scattered artifacts in a field all the way to a large and dense concentration of finds such as Mazza (Site 12). The issue is further complicated by the different levels of material culture typical of different periods: a thin scatter of artifacts which would define a full-fledged prehistoric site might be less than the general off-site “background” scatter of artifacts in areas of intensive Roman land use. As a first approximation toward a more useful classification, we have divided them into two categories: "sites", meaning locations where the
Page 1 and 2: Bova Marina Archaeological Project:
Page 3 and 4: RIASSUNTO ITALIANO 3 Bova Marina Ar
Page 5 and 6: 5 Bova Marina Archaeological Projec
Page 7 and 8: CONTENTS 7 Bova Marina Archaeologic
Page 9: 2.1. Field Survey (David Yoon) 2.1.
Page 13 and 14: preclude all possibility of finding
Page 15 and 16: quantity could be background scatte
Page 17 and 18: prehistoric assemblage may be of Ne
Page 19 and 20: overpass on the eastern side of the
Page 21 and 22: hard, potentially usable stones. It
Page 23 and 24: cultural behaviour. These might inc
Page 25 and 26: samples were photographed in situ a
Page 27 and 28: These dates are incompatible to som
Page 29 and 30: Castellana 1996). A radiocarbon sam
Page 31 and 32: edrock in a series of small pockets
Page 33 and 34: • a fragmentary stampino, approxi
Page 35 and 36: aw material are known (grey, brown,
Page 37 and 38: edge of the fragment is raised with
Page 39 and 40: from Stratum IV, Stratum V and a fe
Page 41 and 42: San Pasquale is a Neolithic site lo
Page 43 and 44: 6. CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE RESEARCH
Page 45 and 46: Ammerman, A. Bernabò Brea, L. 1987
Page 47 and 48: Figures 1. Map of areas surveyed an
Page 49 and 50: 1. Map of areas surveyed and sites
Page 51 and 52: 3. Map of areas surveyed in the Maz
Page 53 and 54: 5. GIS reconstruction of prehistori
Page 55 and 56: 55 Bova Marina Archaeological Proje
Page 57 and 58: 9. Trench 1 section. 57 Bova Marina
Page 59 and 60: 11. Trench 6 profile of road cut be
Page 61 and 62:
13. Trench 6 profile of excavations
Page 63 and 64:
15. Trench 6 general view of Bronze
Page 65 and 66:
17. Trench 7 plan. 65 Bova Marina A
Page 67 and 68:
19. Trench 7 general view. 67 Bova
Page 69 and 70:
21. Area 2 general view (1998 excav
Page 71 and 72:
23. Trench 4 general view (1998 exc
Page 73 and 74:
25. Umbro: Stentinello pottery. 73
Page 75 and 76:
27. Umbro: Other prehistoric potter
Page 77 and 78:
29. Umbro: miscellaneous tools: (a)
Page 79 and 80:
31. San Pasquale general view of lo
Page 81 and 82:
33. San Pasquale Trench 2 test pit.
Page 83 and 84:
Table 2. Summary of faunal assembla
Page 85 and 86:
Table 4. Summary of daub frequencie
Page 87:
Table 6. Radiocarbon dates. 87 Bova
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