GEOARCHAEOLOGICAL STRATIGRAPHY AND RADIOCARBON DATINGS OF A DEPOSIT FROM A SITE OF THE POMPEIAN AREA (CAMPANIA, SOUTHERN ITALY)

Abstract

G. Calderoni & F. Russo, Geoarchaeological stratigraphy and radiocarbon datings of a deposit from a site of the
Pompeian area (Campania, Southern Italy). (IT ISSN 0394-3356, 2007).
In 1996 the archaeological excavations at St. Abbondio locality, a site ubicated on the top of a small, 15 m high a.s.l., hill made up by
distinct tephra emplacements and located at the edge of the Roman town of Pompeii, provided new data of great geoarchaeological
concern for detailing the local history of the settlement pattern and of the environmental land exploitation of the Pompeian area far
before the Roman times.
From a geomorphological literature we know that the local relief is a volcanic relict that some 5.5 ÷ 4.5 kyr B.P. limited eastward the
local reach of the coastal plain, on which the Roman town of Pompeii flourished. Briefly, the geoarchaeological analysis of the findings
in a deposit discovered in the archaeological site, in fair agreement with the measured 14C ages, revealed that the site-area, first occupied by an Early Bronze Age settlement, was used as a necropolis in the Middle Bronze Age and then, following a long lasting abandonment, was exploited for intensive farming throughout Hellenistic and Roman times.
The stratigraphic sequence exposed by the archaeologic excavations, included some distinct, rich in artefacts, anthropic levels confined between the tephra ejected by Mt. Vesuvius during the last two huge Plinian eruptions of Avellino (best 14C age: 1410 ± 40 yr B.C.)
and Pompeii (79 A.D.).
The archaeological excavations at St. Abbondio site yielded a reference stratigraphic sequence for the area, particularly valuable
because it uncovered, both prehistorical and historical artefacts which are strictly associated with a changing of land use perhaps
related with palaeoenvironmental changes induced by locally recurrent natural dramatic volcanic activity.