ARCHAEOLOGICAL METHODS AND APPROACHES:
Ancient Industry and Commerce in Italy

Eric C. De Sena (AAR) and Helene Dessales (EFR)

A successful experiment was recently staged in Rome that merged archaeological methodology with discussions of the ancient economy and brought together archaeologists who focus on the Italian Bronze and Iron Ages and the Etruscan, Roman and Medieval periods. This three-day conference, April 18-20, 2002, was held at the American Academy in Rome and the École Française de Rome, the two sponsoring institutions. Archaeological Methods and Approaches: Ancient Industry and Commerce in Italy involved 29 papers authored or co-authored by 43 scholars from 24 institutions (Italian, French, German, British and American universities; Italian museums and research centers; foreign academies and research centers in Italy) and was attended cumulatively by about 250 people.

The impetus for this conference was twofold: to reinforce the importance of reflecting upon archaeological methods and approaches in research endeavors and to create a forum in which industry and commerce in Italy could be discussed over a broad arc of time, between the second millennium BC and the early second millennium AD. In their opening remarks the organizers, both classical archaeologists, stated their feelings that too many scholars work within "super-specialized solar systems of research that often do not merge into galaxies of knowledge." By calling together prehistorians, Etruscologists, Roman and Medieval archaeologists, who necessarily rely upon very different research strategies in their work due to the different bodies of evidence available for these periods and who rarely compare notes, the organizers hoped to promote greater communication between the fields of study.

Traditionally, scholars have discussed the industry and commerce of specific cultures and periods of time and there have been few attempts to trace the development of productive and distributional systems in Italy for so vast a period. This trend has only helped to broaden the gap between archaeologists working within different chronological parameters; however, the AAR/EFR conference helped to narrow that gap, showing how, for example, there was already a pre-monetary system involving similarly divided units of weight throughout much of Europe in the later second and early first millennia BC, prior to the Greek and Roman systems of coinage (Peroni; Cardarelli and Pacciarelli). There was more common ground than most attendees anticipated.

The conference papers were organized thematically rather than chronologically in order to facilitate methodological and historical comparisons: Textile Production, Supply of Foodstuffs, Commercial Systems, Production and Exchange of Pottery, Production of Glass and Metal, Historiographic Studies and Organization of the Building Industry. Jean Pierre Brun (Centre Jean Bérard, Naples), Andrea Zifferero (University of Siena), Carlo Pavolini (University of Tuscia, Viterbo), Renato Peroni (University "La Sapienza" of Rome) and Roberto Meneghini (Sovraintendenza Comunale di Roma) served admirably as moderators for the sessions.

Several papers were concerned with the manufacture and exchange of craft goods in specific times and places ranging from the South Italian Bronze Age to Molise in the high Middle Ages (Levi and Schiapelli; di Gennaro; Bartoloni et al.; Acconcia; Elia; Cibecchini and Principal; Migliarelli and Vidale; Hugot; Dell'Acqua et al.). Many other papers considered the organization of industries (Gleba; Macheboeuf; Leguilloux; Bonetto et al.; di Fazio; Cifani; Bukowiecki and Cianchi; Bianchi; Pensabene; Barresi and Demma). A small number of presentations took a regional approach, sometimes highlighting the striking variation of production and consumption patterns among geographically associated sites (Raimondo; Istria; Martin). Two papers (Monteix; Gull) considered how past and modern scholars viewed aspects of the ancient economy in light of political, social and scientific agendas, while Olcese discussed the relevance (and irrelevance) of using archaeometric techniques in the study of ceramic production, exchange and utilization.

It is admitted that the majority of the presenters dealt with the question of archaeological methods implicitly in their descriptions and interpretations, while only a few participants presented their research strategies at great length. We learned that most scholars make use of low-level information technology, yet research still boils down to excavation, optical analysis of artifacts and architectural features, development of typologies, spatial analysis and statistics. Less than a third of the studies made use of scientific instrumentation (petrography, chemical analysis, etc.). Not surprisingly, considering the "scientific" paradigm in which we are currently working, none of the papers took a clearly "school-oriented" approach (Processualist, Post-P, Marxist, etc.), although the prehistorians were certainly the most unified in terms of their methods and results. What is important is that research does not become mechanical and that we consciously reflect upon the nature of our bodies of evidence, the development of realistic objectives and the procedures used to achieve valid conclusions.

The success of the conference was not due entirely to the high quality of the papers. The conference sparked quite a lot of discussion and the moderators were hard-pressed to adhere to the time limitations - planned discussion periods of 20 minutes never ran less than half-an-hour. Clearly, both the presenters (many of whom are toward the beginning of their careers) and the audience benefited from these lengthy clarifications and debates.

Work is currently underway to publish the Acts of the conference. This refereed volume will be published in the series British Archaeological Reports and is expected to be in print by December 2003.

Main Page

Conference Program