MOTYA: A SAPIENZA LAB FOR INNOVATIVE MULTIDISCIPLINARY ARCHAEOLOGICAL RESEARCH
Archaeological investigations since 2002 by Sapienza inaugurated a new prolific period of research at Motya, a major Prehistoric settlement in the 2nd mill. BC and a flourishing Phoenician harbor-city in the 8th-4th cent BC. In 2018 Sicily allotted a special European fund to enhance tourist fruition and Sapienza was asked to improve its research commitment. This raised up to 10 the number of areas under archaeological investigation, offering new extraordinary opportunities to research. The earliest outcomes of this new efforts are the discovery of a favissa with animal sacrifices in the Temple of Cappiddazzu and of the inscribed Stela of Abdi-Melqart (Nigro 2019).
7 MAJOR RESEARCH LINES are pursued by an integrated and multidisciplinary team of scholars:
1. PREHISTORY and ENVIRONMENT: 2nd Mill. BC interconnections in Mediterranean (sea-routes, population, exchanges) and reconstruction of natural landscape
2. THE EARLIEST PHOENICIAN COLONY: features, components and chronology of Phoenician colonization as reflected by finds and urban layout
3. TEMPLES as PLACES of CULTURAL MEDIATION Phoenician and Indigenous features as visible in the Temples of Baal and Astarte by the Kothon & the Temple of Herakles/Melqart in the Cappiddazzu area
4. CITY-WALLS why and when Motya was given a monumental fortification line? Which are its main architectural and siege-craft features? What is its relationship with urbanism in Mediterranean
5. TOPHET: PE and LS approaches (ancient DNA) enlighten religious ideology and show how it contributed to the CREATION OF THE WEST-PHOENICIAN CULTURAL IDENTITY
6. CULTURAL & TECHNOLOGICAL INNOVATIONS and HYBRIDIZATIONS in materials and tools, traced by petrography, SEM, XRD, XRF, isotope and botanic analyses
7. DEMOGRAPHY AND SOCIAL ORGANIZATION reconstructed by means of an integrated study of archaeological data and territorial surveys on the site and its necropolises
BEYOND THE STATE OF ART
Excavations at Motya by Sapienza have radically changed our knowledge of this site, revealing its importance in prehistory , when the island hosted a fortified settlement in the Bronze Age and a landing place in the early Iron Age, as well as in the Hellenistic a Roman periods as industrial area of Lilybaeum. Stratigraphic soundings in Areas B, D, E, L on the Acropolis and in Area C (the Kothon) have shown both the prehistoric phases and the earliest Phoenician strata. New excavations all around the city-walls provide new insights both on the earliest stages of the city, with the discovery of the Stela of Abdi-Melqart, and on its industrial post-Dionysius' destruction revival in the 4th-3rd century BC.
A variety of data collected through PE and LS applications (Radiocarbon, TLC, Photosensors, SEM, XRF, XRD, isotopes analyses, metagenome, aDNA) allow to investigate the complex dynamics of cultural transformations within the site and across the Mediterranean.
INNOVATIVE APPROACHES
New data and previously collected data assessed through demographic model and statistics prompted a distinguished innovation of the scientific approach in various realms:
- Re-evaluating the contribution of local indigenous cultures of Sicily in respect of newcomers from the Aegean, Cyprus and the Levant, with a focus on the role of women in cultural and social integration
- Considering cultural encounters, exchanges and entanglements as a multi-directional process of reciprocity, overtaking the model of "Ex Oriente Lux", highlighting not only the East-West but also North-South and local circuits dynamics of cultural connectivity and mobility
- Give evidence of cultural integration mechanisms through the analysis of significant archaeo-facts: imports, symbols, precious materials;
- Focusing on inventions and on ideas sharing as tools for social interaction, and on the other hand, considering cultural integration as the medium for introducing inventions and innovations on local culture
- Tracing inventions/new customs by means of a suite of multidisciplinary archaeometric approaches (isotopes, biosensors, petrography, synchroton, SEM, XRD, XRF) able to validate and to trace inventions and new costumes of ancient peoples in Mediterranean
- Creating a Demographic Model for setting the scenario where the materiality of archaeological data is properly calibrated and interpreted
- Investigating ancient DNA to differentiate and understand the distribution of human groups in the Mediterranean on a longue-durée perspective
MULTIDISCIPLINARITY
To pursue its scientific goals, the Project arrays along with consolidated experts (12 professors) a number of young scholars (16) PhD, PostDoc and students of the School of Specialization in Archaeology, who are in charge each of node of research for the excavation, collection, record, documentation and proper study of all finds and pieces of evidence. They all belong to different Dept.s of Sapienza: Biology, Chemistry, Earth Sciences, Sciences of Antiquities, Oriental Studies. Cross-fertilization between different sciences and especially between social and human sciences (SH) to which archaeology belongs and exact (PE) and life (LS) sciences is in facts a specific goal of this project. The integration of already existing information with new procured data from fresh excavation and new technological applications further enhances the Project originality.
'HORIZON EUROPE 2021-2027'ENTANGLEMENT OF THE PROJECT
Archaeology at the turn of the decade has to face another challenge not to become an obsolete science. The chance is offered by the new Horizon Europe 2021-2027 program. This Project is arrayed with the Sibiu Recommendation of the European Commission for a "cutting edge research and innovation" aiming at "ecological, social and economic transition". One of the latest published papers by the Motya Sapienza Team focuses on environmental changes in the Marsala Lagoon in the future (Ravanelli et al., 'Sea level rise scenario for 2100 A.D. for the archaeological site of Motya' in Rendiconti Lincei. Scienze Fisiche e Naturali 30 (2019), pp. 747-757).
Most recent ERC Projects on related subjects focusing on the history and archaeology of ancient Mediterranean, mobility of peoples and ideas from the East to the West, provide further interconnected topics to link research activities promoted by Motya Great Excavations.
Some of the young scholars taking part into the project may in future apply for a Marie Sklodowska-Curie fellowship in order to investigate the origins of the Mediterranean Civilization in a longue-durée perspective thus keeping awake the Europeans' memory of Antiquity, and stimulate reciprocal respect towards different cultures, then as now ('Horizon Europe 2021-2027').