The Archaeology of Late Bronze Age Interaction and Mobility at the Gates of Europe: People, Things, and Networks Around the Southern Adriatic Sea By Francesco Iacono. Pp. xvi + 286. London: Bloomsbury Academic 2019. $114. ISBN 978-1-350-03614-7 (cloth).
2022; Archaeological Institute of America; Volume: 126; Issue: 4 Linguagem: Inglês
10.1086/721570
ISSN1939-828X
Autores Tópico(s)Archaeological Research and Protection
ResumoPrevious articleNext article FreeBook ReviewThe Archaeology of Late Bronze Age Interaction and Mobility at the Gates of Europe: People, Things, and Networks Around the Southern Adriatic Sea By Francesco Iacono. Pp. xvi + 286. London: Bloomsbury Academic 2019. $114. ISBN 978-1-350-03614-7 (cloth).Francesca FulminanteFrancesca FulminanteUniversity College London and Bristol University Search for more articles by this author PDFPDF PLUSFull Text Add to favoritesDownload CitationTrack CitationsPermissionsReprints Share onFacebookTwitterLinked InRedditEmailQR Code SectionsMoreFirst of all, I would like to apologize to the author, the publisher, and the readers for the delay of this review. Iacono’s book has been out a while now, but this review has been delayed by COVID-related disruption and new teaching commitments.Iacono’s book is praiseworthy for its historical conclusions about interaction and mobility in the southern Adriatic Sea, in relation to Aegean contacts and also south–north connections along the Italian peninsula, grounded in a sound application of formal network analysis of the material culture of the region. At the same time, the author accompanies the analysis with a wider theoretical background and justification, such as is rarely provided in the formal application of network analysis.Notwithstanding the delay in this review, Iacono’s book is one of the few systematic and comprehensive applications of network analysis to pre- and protohistoric Italy, after the pioneering work by Emma Blake on the relationship between Bronze Age trade networks and Iron Age regional identities in pre-Roman Italy (Social Networks and Regional Identity in Bronze Age Italy, Cambridge University Press 2014). Blake demonstrated that Bronze Age regional trade networks, detected thanks to the analysis of circulation of imports and metal objects, were the means that stimulated and favored the creation of regional and (perhaps) ethnic identities in the Iron Age.While some have criticized Blake’s book, for example in relation to arguments about the introduction of the donkey, her ideas have provided an insightful and revelatory new perspective on the debated topic of ethnic formation in Iron Age Italy. In a way, Iacono’s work represents the continuation of Blake’s work, not only chronologically but also in its recognition of the importance of contacts with the Mycenaeans in the shaping of local power relations and trade networks, which ultimately created social and ethnic identities.In chapter 1, Iacono offers a critical review of previous approaches to interaction in archaeology. His view of reciprocal relations between the eastern and western Mediterranean is influenced by the concept of an interconnected Mediterranean that has been presented by his doctoral dissertation supervisor, Cyprian Broodbank (The Making of the Middle Sea: A History of the Mediterranean from the Beginning to the Emergence of the Classical World, Oxford University Press 2013), and by the idea of a globalized Mediterranean described by Tamar Hodos (The Archaeology of the Mediterranean Iron Age, Cambridge University Press 2020, with earlier references). However, he neglects to recognize that the network perspective—along with the recognition of reciprocal catalyzing interaction—within the Mediterranean has been suggested with reference to east–west relations during the Iron Age and Orientalizing period in my work (F. Fulminante, “The Network Approach: Tool or Paradigm?” Archaeological Review from Cambridge 29.1, 2014, 165–76; The Urbanization of Rome and Latium vetus: From the Bronze Age to the Archaic Era, Cambridge University Press 2014). By returning to the traditional concept of relations and modes of production in classical Marxism and combining it with the (postcolonial) notion of encounter, Iacono looks at “how interaction is embedded in the power dynamics between different groups” (2). Chapter 2 delineates the state of the research in studies of the Bronze Age southern Adriatic, with also a brief outline of connections before the Late Bronze Age.Chapters 3, 4, and 5, as Iacono himself says, represent the “meat” of the book. The author adopts three different scales of analysis, which he terms the Individual Community (indication of contacts in the material culture of the site attested by the presence of imported and foreign objects), the Small-Scale Network (regional formal network analysis), and the Wider Mediterranean Context (broader picture of connections). He then analyzes connections and mobility in the southern Adriatic region with reference both to the wider Mediterranean and to south–north relations, in the Middle Bronze Age (ch. 3), the Recent Bronze Age (ch. 4), and the Final Bronze Age (ch. 5). The analysis highlights significant changes and continuities between the different periods.In the Middle Bronze Age, Apulian communities are generally still small (avg. 3.5 ha) and dispersed, with some larger, nucleated, more stable settlements on the coast. These communities relied on mixed economies (foraging-hunting and agriculture), while more intensive agriculture and accumulation of wealth were possibly practiced in the Tavoliere, and from Trinitapoli north to the Siponto area, where Coppa Nevigata is located. The network analysis of the Apennine pottery shows well-connected communities, although the overall amount of diversity seems to surpass the number of connections. If variability of motif is a proxy for numbers of social units and female mobility through exogamy, we have at Coppa Nevigata a fairly rich agrarian village, with relatively low incidence of exogamy (many motifs were produced but fewer were shared).Northern Apulia in the Middle Bronze Age seems to be particularly connected with the Balkans, but soon early, and mostly occasional, encounters with Aegean seafarers will modify the internal equilibria and dynamics of the region. We know very little about these early encounters: a few foreign objects arrive and are incorporated in daily use or the funerary realm. What seems common is the destruction at the end of this period of some of the most important nodes of interaction with the Aegean, such as Roca Vecchia. Destructions are also attested at Coppa Nevigata, Porto Perone, and Otranto (107–18).In the Recent Bronze Age, there seems to be a limited process of nucleation or at least greater survival of larger coastal sites with fortifications. The greatest novelty is the presence of significant olive cultivation, as attested by palynology, and a greater incidence of domesticated in comparison with wild animal species. Both these elements seem to indicate greater accumulation of wealth. The local networks also show a greater connectivity and interaction, as attested by the larger number of shared pottery types, combined with a greater standardization of production. Interestingly, the sites that are more central in the local regional networks are also those with more imports both from the Adriatic and the Aegean worlds (where imports from the west start to be more common: “westernization of the Aegean”). Together with signs of elaborate feasting at Roca Vecchia and possibly at Coppa Nevigata, and the large apsidal buildings at Scoglio del Tonno and at Broglio, these elements seem to indicate a generalized and conspicuous accumulation of capital (156–60). After the book by Iacono was published, new research combined with reevaluation of older excavations has emphasized similarities between the role of Roca Vecchia and another site in the Gulf of Taranto, Torre Castelluccia, which also has yielded Mycenaean pottery, and which acted as a hub of intense interaction within local trade networks and offered buildings for feasting activity (F. Palazzini and E. Pizzuti, “News from Torre Castelluccia in the Gulf of Taranto: Re-discovering a Key Site of the II Millennium BC,” paper presented at the Annual Central Mediterranean Prehistory Seminar, School of History, Classics and Archaeology, University of Edinburgh, 2021). New developments in this research will be interesting to follow.With the Final Bronze Age, there is a clear decline in Aegean imports and probably in the intensity of connections with the eastern Mediterranean. However, local connections and accumulation of wealth flourish even more. This testifies to the importance of activities in the Adriatic, once seen only as the periphery of the Mycenaean world but now recognized—with its large dwellings with cult and ceremonial functions, technological skills, and the accumulation of wealth—as an equal partner in east–west Mediterranean exchanges and between the south and north of Italy (possibly in search of metals) and the Balkans (189–97). Growth and increased interaction are key in this phase. As Iacono suggests, “the extension in size of the co-residential unit and the possible process of factionalization of king group at Roca might have triggered an increase of exogamy which, in turn, fostered regional interaction” (210).Iacono’s conclusions show that the lesson from ancient Apulia is that connections and interactions are not always linked with greater hierarchy and accumulation of surplus; one can exist without or despite the other. Therefore, even in a strongly connected and mobile world like our own, there is still the possibility for alternative paths of interaction and developments (210–14).Notes[email protected] Previous articleNext article DetailsFiguresReferencesCited by American Journal of Archaeology Volume 126, Number 4October 2022 The journal of the Archaeological Institute of America Views: 290Total views on this site Article DOIhttps://doi.org/10.1086/721570 Views: 290Total views on this site HistoryPublished online July 05, 2022 Copyright © 2022 by the Archaeological Institute of AmericaPDF download Crossref reports no articles citing this article.
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