Dep. of Earth Science - Applied Science for Cultural Heritage

Archaeobotany is the discipline that merges botany with archaeology. It is based on the study of plant fossils found in archaeological contexts with the aim to reconstruct plant use and diets of ancient populations, as well as the environment and the climate of the past, focusing on how people have adapted to them and reacted to their changes. Plant fossils include seeds and fruits (carpology), wood and charcoals (xylology and anthracology) and pollen (palynology). In the present study, archaeobotany is applied on the Phoenician site of Motya, a small island set in Westerm Sicily, in the middle of the Mediterranean. Although the Phoenician-Punic period (late 8th century B.C. – 397 B.C.) represents the main occupational phase of the archaeological settlement, the island is known to have been occupied by indigenous populations since the 17th century BC and continued to be inhabited also after the Siege of Motya (397/6 B.C.), despite not recovering its former importance (Nigro and Spagnoli, 2017). Despite of knowledge regarding their use of plants and their impact on the environment being limited, a key-role in the spread of wine and olive oil production is attributed to Phoenicians (Estreicher, 2013). This is reflected by the findings at Motya, were Vitis vinifera (grape) seeds and Olea europaea (olive) wood are among the main findings. The carpological assemblage of the disposal pit 1112, found on the western slopes of the Acropolis and roughly ascribed to the 7th century B.C., reveals a lot about the diet of Phoenicians at Motya. This was comprised of a wide variety of cereals (including Hordeum vulgare, Triticum monococcum, T. dicoccum and T. aestivum/durum), pulses (Cicer arietinum, Lathyrus sp., Pisum sativum, Vicia faba and V. ervilia) and fruits. Among these is also Punica granatum (pomegranate), found in the form of exocarp fragments, which was allegedly brought by Phoenicians to Motya and to Northern Africa around the 8th century BC. Representations of this fruit are also found in the form of ceramic vessels (Nigro and Spagnoli, 2018). In terms of wood species, other than Olea europaea, also Quercus type suber (evergreen oaks) and Pistacia lentiscus (mastik) are widely represented. The presence of evergreen oaks is also confirmed by pollen evidence. Other anthracological remains include small Mediterranean shrubs such as Rhamnus sp. Further analyses will include pollen studies and morphometric analyses on the retrieved grape pips. The preliminary results already show the potential of combining carpology, anthracology and palynology to get an overall image of the paleoenvironment and paleodiets. This has been highlighted by other studies (Sabato et al., 2015), but still represents a novelty in the field.
References
Estreicher, S. K. . Wine. The Encyclopedia of Ancient History (2013), 1-6.
Nigro L., Spagnoli F., Pomegranate (Punica granatum L.) from Motya and its deepest oriental roots, Vicino Oriente XXII (2018), 49-90
Nigro L., Spagnoli F., Landing on Motya. The earliest Phoenician settlement of the 8th century BC and the creation of a West Phoenician cultural identity in the excavations of Sapienza University of Rome - 2012-2016, Quaderni di Archeologia Fenicio Punica (2017).
Sabato D., Masi A., Pepe C., Ucchesu M., Peña-Chocarro L., Usai A., Giachi G., Capretti C., Bacchetta G., Archaeobotanical analysis of a Bronze Age well from Sardinia: A wealth of knowledge, Plant Biosystems - An International Journal Dealing with all Aspects of Plant Biology, 149:1 (2015), 205-215.

Lo studio è incentrato su due obiettivi principali:1. il primo riguarda la ricerca delle geometrie e delle proporzioni impiegate nella progettazione dei monumenti in esame mediante l’analisi geometrica delle planimetrie (ovvero la verifica dell’uso di determinate configurazioni geometriche, correlate a specifici schemi numerici, attraverso la determinazione dell’unità di lunghezza associata, caratteristica di ogni singolo cantiere costruttivo); 2. il secondo prevede la caratterizzazione lito-tecnica delle aree archeologiche in esame attraverso la codifica delle descrizioni delle sequenze stratigrafiche dei sondaggi geologici presenti nel database del WebGIS UrbiSIT e la successiva correlazione con le unità geologiche e le diverse facies alluvionali note in letteratura. Situati in 3 aree di studio - Roma (centro storico); Ostia Antica e Portus/Fiumicino (piana deltizia del Tevere); Villa Adriana (propaggini nord-orientali dei Colli Albani) - i 14 monumenti in esame sono stati scelti tra le architetture più significative della città e dei suoi dintorni , coprendo un intervallo temporale di quattro secoli, dal III-II secolo a.C. al II secolo d.C..

This paper gives a brief overview on the contribution of cataloging while making any attempt of contextualisation and interpretation when dealing with cultural heritage. The work is based on a previously made catalogue of 357 first and second century votive monuments from the area of ancient Liburnia and selected areas of Delmatae, nowadays coastal Croatia and western Bosnia and Hercegovina. The monuments belong to the area of two distinct communities which settled Western Balkans from the Pre-Roman times till the Slavic invasion. The cataloging has a twofold purpose: making a synthesis of scattered publications and attempting to deduce and contextualise the obtained statistics. The later is represented in this paper, correlating to currently established view on political, economic and social situation, trying to understand how much do votive monuments actually reflect those segments. Comparisons are made on the basis of frequency, nature and position of those objects. Liburnian and Delmatian communities show great differences in the way they were accepting Romanisation and understanding the role of autochthone deities. It seems there is a complex relation between syncretism, accepting foreign cults and preserving autochthone deities to the resistance to Romans and social and political organisation. Furthermore, the difference in the popularity of certain gods seems to be related to the landscape and the economy on which the communities subsisted: having female cults dominating in the agricultural, fertile areas and semi-wild pastoral male deity being the principal one in karstic and mountainous regions. Different political situations, such as arrival and settling of Roman legions is reflected in high frequency of monuments dedicated to Jupiter, particularly in the border of  those two mutually hostile communities. Moreover, author observes the differences in the nature of female and male gods: female ones being numerous, attached to a geographically small areas and dominating the Liburnian community while male cults in Delmatian society are less numerous but geographically much more homogeneous.

Keywords: Cataloguing, Votive monuments, Liburni, Delmati, Roman and autochthone cults, Syncretism

This work focuses on the study of paleodiet of selected burials and fauna from Bribirska Glavica, Croatia via stable isotopes of carbon and nitrogen. Carbon stable isotopes in bone collagen can distinguish between two types of plants (C3 and C4) whilst nitrogen isotopic composition gives an estimation of the trophic levels and the amount of protein consumed. The results are compared to several factors such as the burial context, health, time period, social status, trauma, sex and age. An attempt was made to understand the impact of these factors on stable isotopic values and, hence, the choice of diet, contextualising the results within known historical and archaeological data. This research is compared to the study done on the area of Ravni Kotari, geographical area where Bribirska Glavica is situated, extending the paleo-dietary data range to Late Medieval period in the hinterland of Dalmatia.

KEY WORDS: paleodiet, carbon isotopes, nitrogen isotopes, Bribirska Glavica, Ravni Kotari

The approach to the protection of artwork has considerably evolved throughout history; placing side by side the conservation science and the usual methods of restoration has today become unavoidable. Science Applied to Cultural Heritage involves scholars from different research fields making their collaboration of paramount importance for the success of the conservation process and, above all, for the in-depth knowledge of the artwork in all its aspects, from the constituent materials to the realization technique. This article will discuss this topic taking into particular account the restoration of Michelangelo's frescoes in the Sistine Chapel. This was defined as the first modern restoration, because scientific tests have accompanied for the first time any technical intervention on the frescoes, which were returned to their original splendor in respect of the theoretical principles of restoration. In this specific case and in other ones, the diagnostics has therefore become an important aid in Cultural Heritage studies, provided that the choice of the analytical technique is always related to the answer that one is trying to pursue. Applied sciences provide an insight into the history of the artworks, the artists' techniques, the knowledge of employed materials – that allow one to reconstruct the ancient trade routes; all this information can accomplish an unsurpassed knowledge, which is becoming essential for the development, protection and conservation of Cultural Heritage.