Salt or fish (or salted fish)? The Bronze Age specialised sites along the Tyrrhenian coast of Central Italy: New insights from Caprolace settlement

PLoS One. 2019 Nov 13;14(11):e0224435. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0224435. eCollection 2019.

Abstract

In 2017, an excavation led by the Groningen Institute of Archaeology and in collaboration with the Tor Vergata University of Rome, took place on two small islands in the Caprolace lagoon (Sabaudia, Italy), where Middle Bronze Age layers had previously been reported. Combining the results of an environmental reconstruction of the surroundings and a detailed study of the pottery assemblages, we were able to trace a specialised area on the southern island, in all probability devoted to salt production by means of the briquetage technique. The latter basically consists of boiling a brine through which a salt cake is obtained. The technique was widespread all over Europe, from Neolithic to Roman Times. Since the evidence points to an elite-driven workshop, this result has deep implications for the development of the Bronze Age socio-economic framework of Central Italy. Pottery evidence also suggests that in the Bronze Age sites along the Tyrrhenian coast of Central Italy where briquetage has already been hypothesised, more complex processes may have taken place. On the northern island, we collected a large number of so-called pedestals, which are characteristic features of briquetage, while chemical analyses point to salt or fish sauce production, like the roman liquamen, in a Middle Bronze Age domestic context.

Publication types

  • Historical Article
  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Archaeology*
  • Fish Products
  • Food Preservation / history*
  • History, Ancient
  • Humans
  • Italy
  • Seafood*
  • Sodium Chloride, Dietary*

Substances

  • Sodium Chloride, Dietary

Grants and funding

This work was supported by The Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO Free Competion grant 360-61-060). The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.