Ricerc@Sapienza

Grotta Romanelli has been considered a key site for prehistoric studies in Italy, since the beginning of XX century. The cave, located on the Adriatic coast of southern Apulia (Italy), was discovered in 1871, but only in 1900 P.E. Stasi realised the importance of the site as the first evidence of the Palaeolithic in Italy. In 1914, G.A. Blanc started a pioneering excavation campaign, during which the first systematic paleontological and stratigraphical study with scientific methods was performed. The cave and its deposits were object of extensive studies until the end of the seventies, when the site fell in a sort of oblivion.
The stratigraphic section of Grotta Romanelli lays on a marine terrace referred to the Tyrrhenian Stage (MIS 5), which constrains the whole sequence to the Late Pleistocene. The infilling deposits can be subdivided in two main parts: (1) the upper complex, the Terre Brune bearing Upper Paleolithic lithic tools and a cold vertebrate fauna including Pinguinus impennis; (2) the lower complex (including Terre Rosse) bearing a diversified vertebrate fauna and limestone artifacts.
Despite decades of researches many open issues need to be investigated and clarified, especially the contradictions between age and geomorphological evidences, the features of faunal assemblages and limestone artefacts from the lower complex.
In 2015, the opening of excavations broke the spell of inactivity in the field after 42 years. The multidisciplinary team had to face several conservation issues linked to natural processes and human activities. The main aim of the project is to get new archeological and paleontological data within a well-established stratigraphical framework, in order to clarify the context of human presence in the cave. The new data gathered within the past Grandi Scavi projects indicate a late Middle Pleistocene age for the lower complex, putting new lights into faunal assemblage, limestone artifacts and morphological features of the cave.