Ricerc@Sapienza

The Archaeological Mission in the Sahara will carry out field activities in the Chott el Jerid area, in southern Tunisia (Douz, Kebili), together with laboratory activities and publication of research carried out in previous years in Tunisia and Libya.

The research will pursue the prosecution of the analyses already started on Pleistocene and Holocene environmental and cultural processes of Northern Sahara: 1) late Middle/Late Pleistocene corridors travelled by early anatomically modern humans; 2) timing and ways of human migrations in North Africa around the Holocene threshold; 3) interregional variability and the archaeological signature of Neolithic societies; 4) genetic composition and ethno-history of sedentary and mobile southern Tunisian people.

In order to get a diachronic and territorial perspective on environmental and cultural changes in desert regions, we shall excavate: i) the middle/late Pleistocene Middle Stone Age site of Wadi Lazalim; ii) the early Holocene Epipaleolithic site of Tembaine; and iii) Neolithic stone funerary monuments in the Chott.

Given the climate conditions of desert environments, such our study area, the fieldwork will be carried out in autumn (September-October). More than 35 Tunisian and Italian scientists will compose the team: archaeologists, geologists, botanists and biologists. Part of the fieldwork will be focused on training activity of young Tunisian and Italian students.

A strict security protocol will be followed, according to the indications of local institutions and the Italian Embassy in Tunis. Laboratory study of archaeological materials will consider those derived from the missions conducted in 2015-2016 and on the materials from the 2017 campaign. Other laboratory analyses will also be conducted on biological or environmental materials (including those from SW Libya), especially skeletal material presently conserved at the Museum of Anthropology of Sapienza University of Rome (DNA, stable isotopes, C14).