Première campagne de fouilles franco-italienne à Policoro (Basilicate). Compte rendu préliminaire

Abstract

In 2014, the Università degli Studi della Basilicata (Postgraduate School of Archaeology, Matera, Italy) in collaboration
with the École Pratique des Hautes Études (UMR 8546, Paris) carried out a four week excavation campaign in Policoro
(Basilicata, southern Italy) within the scope of a 3-year agreement with the Soprintendenza per i Beni Archeologici della
Basilicata. Three excavation trenches were laid out. The first one (A) was positioned in the courtyard of a building with
portico within insula I in the so-called “Quartiere centrale” on the Castello Hill, partly excavated in the 1960s. This
trench yielded evidence of the production of bronze coins during the 3rd and 2nd centuries BC. In particular, two small
pits dug into the ground contained two types of coin blanks, as well as a coin of the same type as some of the blanks,
slags and scoriae, and terracotta fragments. Moreover, a discarded rim fragment from a matt-painted olla found in trench
A testifies to the production of local pottery on the site during the 7th century BC. Another trench (B) was placed on the
southern edge of the Castello plateau. Here, the outskirts of a Hellenistic living quarter were brought to light. On the
surface, there were numerous Archaic pottery fragments, among others a Milesian oinochoe from the third quarter of
the 7th century BC. In the third trench (C), situated in the cella of the so-called “Archaic Temple” in the Varatizzo Valley,
the excavations brought to light a pebble floor that yielded various pottery fragments from the second half of the 7th
century BC. In light of these promising results, excavations in all three trenches will be carried out in future campaigns.