Italy: Medieval Archaeology

An archaeological study of the Middle Ages appeared in Italy, as in other European countries, between the end of the nineteenth and the commencement of the twentieth centuries. Italy, which was reunited politically in 1861 after 1,300 years of division, was seeking its identity during the era of communes which had defeated Emperor Frederick I of Germany (Frederick Barbarossa). During the Fascist period (1922–1945), these still timid approaches disappeared from the scene due to the fact that they concerned a historical period considered in decline in comparison with the glories of the Roman Empire. However, Paleochristian Archaeology, with its focus on Late Antiquity, during which Christianity had begun, did not undergo any form of reappraisal. Following this interval, it was the historian of law, Gian Piero Bognetti, who in 1958 proposed a re-establishment of Medieval Archaeology. Between 1958 and 1963, he personally undertook excavations at Torcello (Venice) and Castelseprio...

Appendix. Handbooks and Summary Volumes

A history of Italian Medieval Archaeology has until now been tackled by some archaeologists who have been its protagonists; what is missing, therefore, is a detached historical reconstruction which will be the task of a future generation. Moreover, this is not a simple undertaking since there has been a simultaneous development in numerous centers that have not always been attentive to the dissemination of their work.

Since the end of the last century, attempts at a comprehensive history can be found in the handbooks of Sauro Gelichi (1997) and Andrea Augenti (2016). On the phase in the 1970s, one can read the testimonies of David Andrews, Hugo Blake, Gian Pietro Brogiolo, Richard Hodges, Sauro Gelichi, Guido Vannini, and Brian Ward Perkins in the dossier published in the journal European Journal of Post-Classical Archaeologies (1, 2011, 419-498). A reflection on the methods and views of the historical group that referred to Riccardo Francovich and Tiziano Mannoni can be found in “Quarant’anni di Archeologia Medievale in Italia” [Forty Years of Medieval Archaeology in Italy] (Gelichi 2014) and in number XLI of the journal Archeologia Medievale dedicated to Tiziano Mannoni.

Among the volumes on single themes, developed mostly on the basis of material data but also keeping in mind other sources, see those on the castles of the first generation in northern Italy (Brogiolo and Gelichi 1996); the city in the Italian early Middle Ages (Brogiolo 2011); monasteries of the early Middle Ages (Marazzi 2015); the countryside (Brogiolo and Chavarría Arnau 2005); and churches (Chavarría Arnau 2009).

The following contain syntheses on individual themes: the Summer School of Pontignano and the series “Ricerche di Archeologia Altomedievale e Medievale” [Archaeological Research of the Early Middle Ages and Middle Ages] (published by Insegna del Giglio, Florence); “Documenti di Archeologia” and “Progetti di Archeologia” (SAP, Mantua); the volumes of the “Centro interuniversitario per la storia e l’archeologia dell’altomedioevo” [Inter-university centre for history and archaeology of the early Middle Ages] (Brepols); the conferences held at the University of Foggia in southern Italy and the “Giornate Gregoriane” [Gregorian Days] in Agrigento (volumes I–X) (Edipuglia, Bari); and the conferences on the “età romano-barbarica” [Roman-barbaric age] of Cimitile (Naples) and “Archeologia Barbarica” [Barbaric Archaeology] in Milan (Giostra 2017).

Among the occasional conferences, which are useful for the discipline to grow, apart from those at Pavia in 1981 and Pontignano in 1992, it is worth remembering those held in Ravenna in 2004 on cities (Augenti 2006), in Trent on Longobard necropoli (Possenti 2014), and in Rome on manufacture (Molinari et al. 2016).

Triennial updates on research can be found in the proceedings of the eight “Congressi nazionali di Archeologia medievale” [National Conferences on Medieval Archaeology] (from 1997 to 2015), promoted by the “Società degli archeologi medievisti italiani” [the Society of Medieval Italian Archaeologists].