A Bright Future for UK-Based Italian Archaeology

The Research Seminar on Prehistoric Italy was held on the 14th of November. The seminar, an informal and friendly event organized on an annual basis by UK research students, is aimed at post-graduate students and established researchers who share common interests in Italian prehistory from the Palaeolithic to the Iron Age. The Cambridge seminar was organised by Andrea Dolfini, with help from John Robb and Mark Pearce, and supported by the McDonald Institute for Archaeological Research.

The first paper, which was delivered by Sue Hamilton and Ruth Whitehouse (UCL), presented a phenomenological analysis of the diffusion of sound through the landscape, while the second talk, given jointly by Keri Brown, Richard Snook and Daniel Kirton (Manchester), focused on the sourcing of clay for pottery manufacture. Andrea Dolfini (Cambridge) spoke on the cultural classification of metalwork in central Italy during the Later Neolithic and the Copper Age and Andrea Vianello (Oxford) on the exchange of Mycenaean and Cypriot products in Sicily during the Later Bronze Age.

Other papers focused on burial and the human body. Francesca Fulminante (Cambridge) presented her just-finished PhD research on the long-debated issues of urbanization and state formation in the Rome territory. Ulla Rajala (Cambridge) presented innovative ethno-archaeological research on the attitudes of Italian archaeologists towards mortuary remains. Isabelle Vella-Gregory (Cambridge) interpreted bronze figurines in Nuragic Sardinia in the light of recent theoretical work on the body. Finally, Elisa Perego (UCL) presented her just-started PhD research on abnormal funerary practices in pre-Roman Veneto. Overall, the questions raised highlight the strong interest in Italian prehistory growing among UK academics and students.

Andrea Dolfini