Books by Francesco Iacono
Dawson and Iacono (eds) 2021. Bridging Social and Geographical Space through Networks. Leiden: Sidestone Press. , 2021
Interaction and mobility have attracted much interest in research within scholarly fields as diff... more Interaction and mobility have attracted much interest in research within scholarly fields as different as archaeology, history, and more broadly the humanities. Critically assessing some of the most widespread views on interaction and its social impact, this book proposes an innovative perspective which combines radical social theory and currently burgeoning network methodologies.
Through an in-depth analysis of a wealth of data often difficult to access, and illustrated by many diagrams and maps, the book highlights connections and their social implications at different scales ranging from the individual settlement to the Mediterranean. The resulting diachronic narrative explores social and economic trajectories over some seven centuries and sheds new light on the broad historical trends affecting the life of people living around the Middle Sea.
The Bronze Age is the first period of intense interaction between early state societies of the Eastern Mediterranean and the small-scale communities to the west of Greece, with people and goods moving at a scale previously unprecedented. This encounter is explored from the vantage point of one of its main foci: Apulia, located in the southern Adriatic, at the junction between East and West and the entryway of one of the major routes for the resource-rich European continent.
Papers by Francesco Iacono
Archaeological and anthropological sciences, May 14, 2024
Through the second millennium BC, Bronze Age communities of Southern Italy have shown a remarkabl... more Through the second millennium BC, Bronze Age communities of Southern Italy have shown a remarkable degree of resilience in coping with changes in both macro-trends of cultural interaction and the landscape. In this paper, we will examine long-term processes of adaptation to shifting historical and environmental conditions from the vantage point of the impasto ware production at the site of Roca Vecchia (Melendugno-Lecce, IT), one of the main hubs of interaction for the Bronze Age of the Central Mediterranean. Sixty-eight ceramic individuals coming from the Middle to the Final Bronze Age levels and seven soil deposits from the site surroundings were analysed by petrography and fifteen were selected for SEM-EDX examination. We explore how changes in the complex history of the settlement and the surrounding landscape are matched in technological choices operated by the community of practice responsible for producing impasto pottery at Roca, in a moment when the long-range connection with the Aegean world was at its historical peak.
Cambridge Archaeological Journal, May 11, 2016
Roca e il mondo egeo tra il XVI e l'XI sec. a.C. : una messa a punto
Roca e il mondo egeo tra il XVI e l'XI sec. a.C. : una messa a punto, 2017
RIASSUNTO - ROCA E IL MONDO EGEO TRA IL XVI E L’XI SEC. A.C.: UNA MESSA A PUNTO – Il contributo c... more RIASSUNTO - ROCA E IL MONDO EGEO TRA IL XVI E L’XI SEC. A.C.: UNA MESSA A PUNTO – Il contributo contiene tre brevi note degli autori su temi attinenti ai rapporti con l’Egeo e oggetto di ricerche in corso. Nella prima si propone un aggiornamento e una breve sintesi sulla documentazione riguardante le fasi più antiche di occupazione. Nella seconda è esposto uno studio quantitativo dei materiali di tipo egeo dal SAS X per ricostruire le dinamiche diacroniche dei rapporti. Nella terza viene presentata un’analisi delle innovazioni architettoniche registrabili nella fase subappenninica delle mura di fortificazione. SUMMARY- ROCA AND THE AEGEAN WORLD FROM THE 16TH TO THE 11TH CENT. B.C.: AN APPRAISAL – The paper contains three brief notes from the authors on themes related to the relationship with the Aegean and object of researches still ongoing. In the first we offer a brief update on the record related to the oldest occupation phases. The second consists of a quantitative study of Aegean-type material from Area X, which allows to reconstruct the diachronic dynamics of relations. In the third part, instead, is offered an analysis of architectonic innovations identified in the subapennine phase of the fortification walls.
Before the Stream:: the social and economic role of exotica in the Central Mediterranean. The case of the ivories from Roca
The Ionian-Adriatic interface as a landscape of mobility
Archaeology of the Ionian Sea, 2022
The last few decades have marked a considerable increase in our level of knowledge of the souther... more The last few decades have marked a considerable increase in our level of knowledge of the southern Adriatic/ Ionian area during the Bronze Age. However, observing these developments from the vantage point of the main- land masses lying at the north-western boundary of the Ionian, namely Salento in southeastern Italy, the picture we have remains primarily based on the record of a very limited number of well explored sites, with very few data on landscape occupation. Yet, as we know from these limited snapshots, during the 2nd millennium BC Salento is a privileged hub of long-range mobility and interaction, involving actors with origins as different as the Aegean world (broadly understood, but with intense connections with the Ionian area and western Greece), as well as northern Italy and selected areas of the Balkans. How is this landscape of mobility manifested in the archaeological record? What are the traces left on the ground? This paper tries to answer such questions using data from a survey project recently undertaken in the territory around the site of Roca, one of the main loci of Bronze Age connectivity in the area
Exchange Networks and Local Transformations, 2013
Journal of Mediterranean Archaeology, 2019
Purple textiles were highly valued in the ancient Mediterranean as a symbol of prestige, social s... more Purple textiles were highly valued in the ancient Mediterranean as a symbol of prestige, social status and power. Despite the numerous publications focused on the production and spread of purple dye technologies, the discussion regarding this particular dye has often been compartmentalised regionally (eastern or western Mediterranean) and chronologically (second or first millennium bc). The aim of this paper is threefold: (1) to propose a full chaîne opératoire for the production of shellfish-purple-dyed textiles; (2) to synthesise the archaeological evidence on production and consumption of such textiles in the entire Mediterranean before the Romans; and (3) to discuss the social implications of the production and consumption of these textiles, to gain a better understanding of their economic and social significance. Open access: Attribution—Non Commercial—NoDerivs / CC BY-NC-ND
European Journal of Archaeology, 2014
This study examines some assumptions related to Late Bronze Age interaction between the Aegean wo... more This study examines some assumptions related to Late Bronze Age interaction between the Aegean world and central Mediterranean societies. It asserts that, contrary to what is often assumed, this relationship was extremely important and had considerable social consequences. It is argued that such an importance can be appreciated only by acknowledging that interaction is constituted by real-world social encounters. On the basis of this insight, the contextual evidence from the site of Roca in Apulia is analysed. It is proposed that archaeological remains here represent a series of public events—i.e. large feasts—possibly entailing the participation of people of different cultural backgrounds and in which a subtle strategy of representation of relative distance and closeness was adopted to promote interests within Roca's community. Such interests are interpreted with reference to the increasing connections between the eastern and western portions of the Mediterranean, substantiated...
Papers from the Institute of Archaeology, 2010
Before discussing Andrea Vianello's Late Bronze Age Mycenaean and Italic Products in the West Med... more Before discussing Andrea Vianello's Late Bronze Age Mycenaean and Italic Products in the West Mediterranean, I would like to offer my apologies to readers of PIA. A review coming about five years after the issue of a book cannot claim to fulfil one of the most important requirements as far as reviews are concerned, that is, being timely. Yet despite this shortcoming I would argue that Vianello's book has not so far received the attention it deserves and therefore this review might still be of some help.
Bulletin of the History of Archaeology, 2014
The post-war politics of Italy had an impact on its archaeology and archaeological community. Som... more The post-war politics of Italy had an impact on its archaeology and archaeological community. Some attempts at radicalisation were made via the journal Dialoghi di Archeologia, founded in 1967, with the aim of discussing problems and achieving changes within both academic and public archaeology. This paper traces the history of the journal and its legacy.
Journal of Archaeological Research, 2021
The Late Bronze Age (1700–900 BC) represents an extremely dynamic period for Mediterranean Europe... more The Late Bronze Age (1700–900 BC) represents an extremely dynamic period for Mediterranean Europe. Here, we provide a comparative survey of the archaeological record of over half a millennium within the entire northern littoral of the Mediterranean, from Greece to Iberia, incorporating archaeological, archaeometric, and bioarchaeological evidence. The picture that emerges, while certainly fragmented and not displaying a unique trajectory, reveals a number of broad trends in aspects as different as social organization, trade, transcultural phenomena, and human mobility. The contribution of such trends to the processes that caused the end of the Bronze Age is also examined. Taken together, they illustrate how networks of interaction, ranging from the short to the long range, became a defining aspect of the “Middle Sea” during this time, influencing the lives of the communities that inhabited its northern shore. They also highlight the importance of research that crosses modern boundar...
Rivista di Scienze Preistoriche, 2024
DROP ME A LINE IF YOU WANT THE FULL PAPER While mobility has always been a fundamental aspect of ... more DROP ME A LINE IF YOU WANT THE FULL PAPER While mobility has always been a fundamental aspect of the Mediterranean communities throughout history, the exploration of this topic has primarily relied on excavation data rather than evidence from landscape archaeology. The aim of this article is to examine the transformation of the landscape in one of the key centers for mobility and interaction during Italian protohistory, spanning from the Late Palaeolithic to the Bronze Age.
In order to explore such a theme, we have turned to Salento, an area that has
been at the centre of long-term mobility dynamics since the earliest moments of human occupation. The work of a team from the University of Bologna has focused, in particular, on the surface record of the landscape surrounding the site of Roca Vecchia. This settlement which has produced some of the most imponent bronze-age stone architecture in continental Italy, represents also one of the most important international mobility hubs in the protohistory of the Central Mediterranean, having yielded about half of all the Aegean-type pottery found outside of the Aegean world, inclusive of both direct import and (starting from the Middle Bronze Age) local imitations. Through methods which involved field walking and mapping of visibility through 20x20m units, we have managed to explore a large portion of the territory surrounding Roca Vecchia, recovering over 70.000 artefacts. For the earlier prehistory a potential area of frequentation datable to Upper paleolithic/Mesolithic has been located in proximity of the course of the seasonal river which fed the Tamari lagoon. For later protohistoric times, a dual trend emerges, with a deep hinterland showing very little in terms of early fre-
quentation and a coastal area showing a reversed trend, with abundant finds.
Although any attempt at precisely dating such trends is only tentative at present, it seems that during the peak period of expansion and intense contact at Roca Vecchia, signs of human presence can be identified in a much larger area than the one enclosed by the Bronze Age fortifications.
Journal of Archaeological Science Reports, 2025
Grotta della Lea, discovered in the 1970s, is located in the Municipality of Nardò (LE), southern... more Grotta della Lea, discovered in the 1970s, is located in the Municipality of Nardò (LE), southern Italy, and has been systematically investigated only in recent years. This cave remains an untouched environment, ideal for the application of modern analytical methodologies from the beginning of its excavation. Its unexplored status, combined with its proximity to other significant Palaeolithic sites such as Grotta del Cavallo and Grotta-Riparo di Uluzzo C, renders it a promising site for our understanding of the Palaeolithic in Italy.
Earliest results from the initial four years of investigations at Grotta della Lea brought to light both Upper Palaeolithic and Copper-Bronze Age human occupations. This paper is aimed at presenting Grotta della Lea for the first time, focusing on preliminary information about the site formation processes, the characteristics of the stratigraphic succession, and the establishment of both relative and absolute chronologies according to the initial results of a comprehensive AMS radiocarbon dating programme. Central to this research is also the analysis of pottery and lithic artefacts as well as the taphonomic and taxonomic assessment of macro mammal remains.
The study of the lithic industry from the Palaeolithic deposit highlighted the production of shouldered backed bladelets and points on high-quality chert, which are typologically and technologically indicative of an advanced phase of the Early Epigravettian. This attribution is corroborated by radiocarbon dating between 21,821–18,281 cal. BP, aligning with the timeline for the Early Epigravettian in Italy. In the Palaeolithic occupation, the large mammal association revealed an abundance of equids and large bovids, along with several carnivore, leporid, turtle and bird remains. Taphonomic analysis highlighted the occurrence of butchery marks, but also some carnivore activity.
World Archaeology, 2025
DO DROP A LINE IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO RECEIVE THE PAPER
Over the last few decades, Italy has been ... more DO DROP A LINE IF YOU WOULD LIKE TO RECEIVE THE PAPER
Over the last few decades, Italy has been at the forefront of mass migration flows. Starting from the late 1990s, facilities for the detention and expulsion of undocumented migrants have been established. In this paper, we analyse one of the earliest examples of such structures in the Mediterranean: the former temporary holding facility (or C.P.T. Centro di Permanenza Temporanea) ‘Regina Pacis’ located in south-eastern Italy. In 1997, the structure was repur- posed into one of the largest C.P.T in Italy until its closure in 2005. Through an approach that combines archaeology and ethnography, we aim to understand the role that material culture played in subjugating and controlling the life of the migrants, attempting to evaluate, at the same time, the impact that the facility had on its hosting community.
Archaeological and Anthropological Sciences, 2024
Full paper available at the link below.
Through the second millennium BC, Bronze Age communiti... more Full paper available at the link below.
Through the second millennium BC, Bronze Age communities of Southern Italy have shown a remarkable degree of resilience in coping with changes in both macro-trends of cultural interaction and the landscape. In this paper, we will examine long-term processes of adaptation to shifting historical and environmental conditions from the vantage point of the impasto ware production at the site of Roca Vecchia (Melendugno-Lecce, IT), one of the main hubs of interaction for the Bronze Age of the Central Mediterranean. Sixty-eight ceramic individuals coming from the Middle to the Final Bronze Age levels and seven soil deposits from the site surroundings were analysed by petrography and fifteen were selected for SEM-EDX examination. We explore how changes in the complex history of the settlement and the surrounding landscape are matched in technological choices operated by the community of practice responsible for producing impasto pottery at Roca, in a moment when the long-range connection with the Aegean world was at its historical peak.
Folder, 2023
The Torre dell'Alto archaeological project has undertaken in collaboration with the Museum of Pre... more The Torre dell'Alto archaeological project has undertaken in collaboration with the Museum of Prehistory and Protohistory of Nardò, the exploration of the most monumental to the Bronze Age in the Porto Selvaggion natural park. This is the dry-stone wall of Torre dell'Alto, a fortification dating back to the Bronze Age and measuring approximately 20 x 200 m, making it one of the largest in all of peninsular Italy. The Torre dell'Alto site, object of this research, is located close to a rocky outcrop bordered on three sides by dense vegetation and to the west by the sixteenth-century tower, built at a height of about 50 m above sea level. guarding the coast. The vast and compact pine forest, which characterizes today's landscape, is the result of an intensive redevelopment intervention, which took place during the fifties of the last century. The settlement of Torre dell'Alto was in a relationship of intervisibility with another settlement which at the moment would appear to be coeval. This is located at Punta dell'Aspide, a little further to the south. The site has produced material that can be dated to the entire chronological span ranging from the Middle Bronze Age to the Final Bronze Age.
Ocnus | Quaderni della Scuola di Specializzazione in Beni Archeologici, 2022
When it comes to the issue of tracking the empirical reality of mobilities, archaeologists are co... more When it comes to the issue of tracking the empirical reality of mobilities, archaeologists are confronted with views that vary widely. In this paper, we suggest a way of conceiving mobility dynamics in contexts of complex interaction, adapted to the multidimensionality and variability of the archaeological record. It will be argued that new research questions must take on board a human-centered (not population centered) approach if we want to avoid naturalizing identities. A polythetic classification of analytical unities will be adopted in order to frame types and processes of movement and interaction in a broader continuum. Hypotheses are assessed on the basis of cross-cultural regularities of material interactions, practice and transmission of know-hows. The field of application of these insights will be the study of bronze swords of Naue II type, a class of the late prehistoric record of the Mediterranean related to long-range connections. The spectrum of interpretations placed on the same set of evidence is illustrative of different takes on movement and of a lack of a critical selfconsciousness.
Mobility and interaction have been primarily analysed from the vantage point of the archaeologica... more Mobility and interaction have been primarily analysed from the vantage point of the archaeological sites representing the main hubs of interaction. However, such hubs were always immersed in a continuous landscape which had a considerable effect on interaction dynamics. An effect that has started to be taken in due consideration only recently. The Roca Archaeological Survey, of which we here present the first preliminary results, tries to integrate our detailed knowledge based on excavations of the site of Roca Vecchia in Apulia, with a systematic multi-period surface investigation able to assess whether and to what extent the surrounding landscape has affected dynamics of interaction recognised in the main site from the bronze age to modern times.
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Books by Francesco Iacono
Through an in-depth analysis of a wealth of data often difficult to access, and illustrated by many diagrams and maps, the book highlights connections and their social implications at different scales ranging from the individual settlement to the Mediterranean. The resulting diachronic narrative explores social and economic trajectories over some seven centuries and sheds new light on the broad historical trends affecting the life of people living around the Middle Sea.
The Bronze Age is the first period of intense interaction between early state societies of the Eastern Mediterranean and the small-scale communities to the west of Greece, with people and goods moving at a scale previously unprecedented. This encounter is explored from the vantage point of one of its main foci: Apulia, located in the southern Adriatic, at the junction between East and West and the entryway of one of the major routes for the resource-rich European continent.
Papers by Francesco Iacono
In order to explore such a theme, we have turned to Salento, an area that has
been at the centre of long-term mobility dynamics since the earliest moments of human occupation. The work of a team from the University of Bologna has focused, in particular, on the surface record of the landscape surrounding the site of Roca Vecchia. This settlement which has produced some of the most imponent bronze-age stone architecture in continental Italy, represents also one of the most important international mobility hubs in the protohistory of the Central Mediterranean, having yielded about half of all the Aegean-type pottery found outside of the Aegean world, inclusive of both direct import and (starting from the Middle Bronze Age) local imitations. Through methods which involved field walking and mapping of visibility through 20x20m units, we have managed to explore a large portion of the territory surrounding Roca Vecchia, recovering over 70.000 artefacts. For the earlier prehistory a potential area of frequentation datable to Upper paleolithic/Mesolithic has been located in proximity of the course of the seasonal river which fed the Tamari lagoon. For later protohistoric times, a dual trend emerges, with a deep hinterland showing very little in terms of early fre-
quentation and a coastal area showing a reversed trend, with abundant finds.
Although any attempt at precisely dating such trends is only tentative at present, it seems that during the peak period of expansion and intense contact at Roca Vecchia, signs of human presence can be identified in a much larger area than the one enclosed by the Bronze Age fortifications.
Earliest results from the initial four years of investigations at Grotta della Lea brought to light both Upper Palaeolithic and Copper-Bronze Age human occupations. This paper is aimed at presenting Grotta della Lea for the first time, focusing on preliminary information about the site formation processes, the characteristics of the stratigraphic succession, and the establishment of both relative and absolute chronologies according to the initial results of a comprehensive AMS radiocarbon dating programme. Central to this research is also the analysis of pottery and lithic artefacts as well as the taphonomic and taxonomic assessment of macro mammal remains.
The study of the lithic industry from the Palaeolithic deposit highlighted the production of shouldered backed bladelets and points on high-quality chert, which are typologically and technologically indicative of an advanced phase of the Early Epigravettian. This attribution is corroborated by radiocarbon dating between 21,821–18,281 cal. BP, aligning with the timeline for the Early Epigravettian in Italy. In the Palaeolithic occupation, the large mammal association revealed an abundance of equids and large bovids, along with several carnivore, leporid, turtle and bird remains. Taphonomic analysis highlighted the occurrence of butchery marks, but also some carnivore activity.
Over the last few decades, Italy has been at the forefront of mass migration flows. Starting from the late 1990s, facilities for the detention and expulsion of undocumented migrants have been established. In this paper, we analyse one of the earliest examples of such structures in the Mediterranean: the former temporary holding facility (or C.P.T. Centro di Permanenza Temporanea) ‘Regina Pacis’ located in south-eastern Italy. In 1997, the structure was repur- posed into one of the largest C.P.T in Italy until its closure in 2005. Through an approach that combines archaeology and ethnography, we aim to understand the role that material culture played in subjugating and controlling the life of the migrants, attempting to evaluate, at the same time, the impact that the facility had on its hosting community.
Through the second millennium BC, Bronze Age communities of Southern Italy have shown a remarkable degree of resilience in coping with changes in both macro-trends of cultural interaction and the landscape. In this paper, we will examine long-term processes of adaptation to shifting historical and environmental conditions from the vantage point of the impasto ware production at the site of Roca Vecchia (Melendugno-Lecce, IT), one of the main hubs of interaction for the Bronze Age of the Central Mediterranean. Sixty-eight ceramic individuals coming from the Middle to the Final Bronze Age levels and seven soil deposits from the site surroundings were analysed by petrography and fifteen were selected for SEM-EDX examination. We explore how changes in the complex history of the settlement and the surrounding landscape are matched in technological choices operated by the community of practice responsible for producing impasto pottery at Roca, in a moment when the long-range connection with the Aegean world was at its historical peak.