The general topic of this book is the analysis of Early Iron Age sheet bronze objects in central and northern Italy. The sheet bronze technique flourished during the 9th and 8th centuries B.C. in the areas of the Villanovan culture: i.e....
moreThe general topic of this book is the analysis of Early Iron Age sheet bronze objects in central and northern Italy. The sheet bronze technique flourished during the 9th and 8th centuries B.C. in the areas of the Villanovan culture: i.e. Tyrrhenian Etruria, especially in the south, and Emilia Romagna, in particular Bologna and Verucchio. Main aims of this work is to analyse the major outcomes of the early central and northern Italian toreutic production from the beginning of the Early Iron Age, and to try to investigate, from an Italian perspective, the connections between bronze sheet artifacts produced south of the Alps with comparable models from Central Europe. Other principal purposes of the study are to identify production centers and to define and better understand the circulation of objects and models.
In the first chapter is a brief account of the important works on this topic by German-speaking scholars (G. von Merhart, H. Müller Karpe, A. Jockenhövel), who first noticed the strong connection between the Italic toreutic production and Central Europe. The second chapter is devoted to an overview of sheet bronze manufacture techniques from the points of view of metal composition, hammering of laminas, decoration and assembly, sheet width etc. The central chapters are dedicated to object classification and contextualization: helmets, and shields in chapter 3, and banquet and funerary vessels (biconical vases, cups and bowls) in chapter 4. In the end section bronze armour and vessels are analyzed in their original funerary context (warriors' graves) and then their ideological and symbolical meaning is investigated. The last chapter is entirely devoted to the discussion of economic aspects such as the identification of production centers and workshops, social status of craftsmen, and circulation of goods. I stress the emergence since the 9th century BC of local workshops centered in southern Etruria, especially at Tarquinia and surrounding centres. During the late Early Iron Age (8th century BC) a rising market exchange system can be postulated for small objects such as cups, whose production becomes more and more standardized . These phenomena of production standardization and production increase are related to the urbanization process of Etruria and surrounding areas in the Early Iron Age.
