Pyrgi, harbour and sanctuary of Caere: landscape, urbanistic planning and architectural features

Maria Paola Baglione · Barbara Belelli Marchesini · Claudia Carlucci · Laura Maria Michetti

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Ancient Mediterranean Archaeology and History Classical Antiquity Studies Historical and Literary Studies

Abstract

The overall investigation of the different districts of an Etruscan settlement is an extremely rare circumstance. The study of the urbanistic asset of Pyrgi's settlement and of the arrangement of the sacred areas is favoured by their abandonment after the phase of Romanization and by the possibility of performing large-scale research over its territory. The harbour and the sanctuary of Pyrgi were a fundamental pole of attraction for foreign haunters as the outpost of the metropolis Caere. Their development was strictly linked to Pyrgi's favourable geographic position along the Tyrrhenian maritime routes and to the presence of a water spring. The settlement was founded at the end of the 7th century, and was connected to Caere by means of a large road. The excavations conducted since 1957 by the Sapienza University next to the terminal trait of the Caere-Pyrgi road have brought to light a large sacred district, including the Monumental Sanctuary of Uni-Astarte and a demetriac cult place dedicated to the couple of deities Śuri and Cavatha. The new excavation area (2009-2016) falls in the district between the Sanctuary and the settlement. It includes different buildings (600 BC - 4th century BC) erected along a pebbled road that departs from the Caere-Pyrgi and leads towards the harbour. The buildings, together with votive deposits and a fire-altar, outline a residential quarter that was maybe attended by priesthood, where ceremonial practices were also performed. The new evidence can be related to the Sanctuary itself, shedding light on its overall organisation. The results of recent fieldwork are also contributing to a better knowledge of Pyrgi's urban asset, possible defensive systems (evocated by the Greek name "Pyrgoi") and the topographic relation with the later Roman maritime colony. Thanks to the involvement of scholars from different disciplinary fields, a wide-range research is being carried out to reconstruct the original landscape and the evolution of the coastline, as to figure out the morphology of the littoral and the harbour in the Etruscan period.

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