The reference to recovery and resilience is not trivial: it is impossible not to focus on the reappraisal of an interrupted field program, after one year of desktop work and analyses.
The project targets the site of Cannatello (AG, Sicily), integrating excavation data and analysis inside the whole
Mediterranean Sea framework. The project started in 2017/18; excavations are planned until 2022/23, plus 2 years of final study.
Cannatello is one of the crucial Italian sites to study the "boom-and-crisis" phase of the Mediterranean Late Bronze Age (LBA: 14th-12th cent. BCE).
Site finds flow from Sardinia, inner Sicily, Malta, Crete, Greece and Cyprus, including the peculiar local production of pottery with distinctive Nuragic shapes.
The 2021-2023 campaigns will complete the 3 field research pillars:
i- Environment, i.e. geomorphological coastal and fluvial valleys evolution, as for climatic and anthropic influence;
ii- Stratigraphy, i.e. completion of 4 ongoing excavation trenches: new invaluable finds associations and site information are emerging; the systematic study and sampling of the finds from past excavations (1989-2001) is almost finished;
iii- Connections, i.e. the wider Mediterranean network of the "boom-and-crisis" years; social and political analysis of the period. This 3rd pillar is developed through archaeometry and study missions in Crete, Cyprus, Sardinia and Spain, with international cooperation.
The excavation results are groundbreaking as for the entanglements of the site in Sardinian and Aegean, Cypriot and Levantine connectivity: it is precisely embedded in the debate of the traditions on the "Sea Peoples", around 1200 BCE.
The improved knowledge of the site, in its precisely framed environmental and socio-cultural context, is contributing to
a renewed phase of debate about LBA processes in the Mediterranean.
The project has been granted financial support by the "Grandi Scavi" call (2017, 2018, 2019, 2020) and by INSTAP (2018, 2019, 2020).
The Cannatello project is perfectly fitting in the new developments of Mediterranean research on the Late Bronze Age, intensively debating the boom-and-crisis years around 1200 BCE: its innovation potential is thence enhanced, both at a national and international scale.
The joint scientific and didactic scope of the project has to be mentioned: a relevant number of students (15-20) is directly involved in advanced research. In Covid-free years, American students from the Hunter College (NY, ca. 5) fostered the internationalization of our Italian students. This will be hopefully resumed in 2022.
1. Environment and climate
The approach on coastal and particularly on dunary geomorphology is innovative for the area. Archaeological papers on later periods (Caminneci et al. 2014) and a modern geomorphological paper (Liguori et al. 2007-2008) partially tackled the problem of the local coastline advance/retreat. Our dating of dune paleosol formation has provided so far more recent evidence (after year 0), but the best and longer dunary sequence, NW of San Leone, is now planned for sampling.
The pollen and micropalaeontological sequence extracted in 2019 near river Naro mouth is older (ca. 2200 cal BCE), but it will be relevant in connection with the new retrodunary core sampling and with river Cannatello and river Naro valleys¿ sampling, planned in 2021. The resulting multi-environmental sequence will provide innovative results, joining coast, dunes, retrodunary basins and valley fills.
The composition of the research team is specifically built in order to pursue these important results, with the addition of A.Zerboni (UniMI).
2. Stratigraphy and cultural data
2a. Overview and stratigraphy of the site.
The detailed scientific knowledge of the site of Cannatello has still to be improved, and former research requires further publication.
After 1897-1907 research, the 1989-2003 excavations recovered important architectural remains, badly damaged by ploughing and destructive human building activity. Only since 1997 the multi-period stratigraphy of the site started to be acknowledged, as preliminarily published in De Miro 1999. The succession of 3 major building phases is still grossly valid (cf. figure above), but relevant details of internal sequence are emerging, providing further contextual information. The exact synchronization of the 2 encircling wall phases with the 3 phases of the inner buildings is likely coming to an innovative solution. Our limited stratigraphic knowledge of the most ancient building phase has been improved, and will be gained with future excavations in winter 2021-early 2023. The research is therefore innovative as for phasing.
2b. Archaeological finds
The thorough stratigraphic relocation and study of the finds from former excavations has now been strengthened by the results of the 2020-21 digital campaign: the find contexts of important finds, so far lost, has been recovered.
The publication of Hut nr.2 is in progress, pending laboratory work. Its impressive association with Nuragic pottery will represent a landmark in the archaeology of the LBA Mediterranean. The array of ongoing analyses (petrography, chemical composition, organic remains) and the connective implications of these materials are highly innovative.
3. Connections
The team capacity in petrographic and chemical analysis of pottery assures the innovative perspective, deepening our acquired knowledge through cooperation with leading specialist Peter Day. A further powerful tool is represented by the connections established with other research areas and teams, and the direct knowledge of the finds and sites, in Crete and Cyprus. Spain is a further area with cooperative research (prof. J.Martin de la Cruz). Cross-exchange of samples is allowing thorough analytical comparison. The LBA seaborne connections can be significantly explored from this Central Mediterranean perspective, as the margins can often explain in a more evident way processes ongoing in the core area. Our research axis crossing through Spain - Sardinia - Sicily - Malta - Crete - Cyprus integrates in an innovative way the evidence, projected on the background of the widely acquired knowledge of the LBA boom-and-crisis years.
Synthesis
Therefore, the innovation of the project resides in:
a) the updated, integrated knowledge of the site of Cannatello;
b) the quality of the interdisciplinary team;
c) the investment in the connective issues;
d) the perspective of the so-called "third science revolution" of archaeology.
The innovative products will be:
i. papers in peer-reviewed and impact factor journals on selected, both analytical and environmental/climatic issues, under preparation;
ii. the Hut nr. 2 monograph, to posit the site as a landmark in LBA Mediterranean archaeology;
iii. a dynamic "Sea Peoples" conference (postponed because of Covid-19), pointing at the wider LBA connections and the involvement of the Central Mediterranean.