Aegean and Aegean-type pottery from Ionian Apulia. New studies and provenance analyses

This paper concerns twenty-six Aegean or Aegean-type ceramic artefacts from two Bronze Age sites of Ionian Apulia. Eighteen pieces, almost unpublished, were found during the excavations carried out by F.G. Lo Porto in the long-lasting coastal settlement of Scalo di Furno (Porto Cesareo), the subject of a new study being edited by E. Matricardi. Another eight finds (only partially published) come from Caverna Dell’Erba (Avetrana), a natural cavity probably used for cult practices. The chrono-typological study of the artefacts has allowed us to date most of them to the Late Helladic IIIB and IIIC periods, corresponding to the Recent Bronze Age in Italian terms. Archaeometric analyses using the NAA method have made it possible to identify some specimens produced in different regions of Greece and others made in Apulia – either confirming or refining conclusions drawn from typological and macroscopic fabric analyses. With this approach it was possible, on the one hand, to expand our knowledge of exchange relationships with Aegean communities, and, on the other, to specify the typological range of so-called Italo-Mycenaean products as well as to better define the precise production regions of such ceramics in Apulia.