I nuovi scavi nella necropoli di Monte Abatone - Cerveteri

Abstract

In the years 2018 and 2019 excavation campaigns were undertaken at the Monte Abatone necropolis, south of the plateau of the ancient city of Caere. The work was carried out as part of a joint project by the Universities of Campania ‘Luigi Vanvitelli’, Tuscia and Bonn with the Superintendency for Archaeology, Fine Arts and Landscape for the metropolitan area of Rome, the province of Viterbo and Southern Etruria. The investigations took place in the western sector of the necropolis, near the Tumulo Campana, where both the new archaeological prospecting carried out by CNR and the IGM frames and satellite images showed the presence of tombs unidentified during the investigations performed on the plateau by the Lerici Foundation between 1956 and 1961. During the new excavations, two tombs discovered by the Lerici excavation were again brought to light, and five new ones were identified. More importantly, however, for the first time the area outside the tombs was investigated, uncovering the mounds and dromoi of the chamber tombs, as well as shaft tombs and quarry areas. For the first time too, for a restricted area, it is possible to reconstruct the ancient funerary landscape of the necropolis, with examples of all the tomb typologies in use at Caere between the end of the 8th and first half of the 6th centuries B.C.E.