This volume brings together leading scholars of Etruria to provide up-to-date findings from the key archaeological site of Kainua. Located in what is now the Italian town of Marzabotto, Kainua is the only Etruscan site whose complete urban layout has been preserved, making it possible to trace houses, roads, drainage systems, cemeteries, craft workshops, and an acropolis.
Under excavation since the 1850s, Kainua offers a trove of insights into Etruscan culture and society. The volume’s editor, Elisabetta Govi, and her fellow experts examine the material evidence underlying our understanding of the history, economy, religion, and social structures of Kainua, including trade routes that linked the city with the wider Mediterranean. Particularly exciting are recent discoveries of sanctuaries dedicated to Tinia and Uni, analogous to the Greek Zeus and Hera, which provide new information about Etruscan cults. Kainua (Marzabotto) also draws on the latest research to reconstruct the city’s foundation rites, a sacred charter, and urban plan. Finally, the authors explore the site’s archaeological history, discussing new knowledge made possible since the introduction of modern techniques of remote sensing and 3D modeling.
Kainua (Marzabotto) is a practical and easily accessible summary of knowledge about this Etruscan city. Marzabotto is still a model for understanding various aspects of Etruscan cities, particularly those founded in later periods. Through the study of material culture, understood in its multiple aspects, the history of the city and its social components, the development of domestic and religious architecture, and the city's social and economic organization are reconstructed.
The material in Kainua (Marzabotto) is a gold mine for archaeologists and students of ancient architectural history as well as for Etruscologists. The work of Elisabetta Govi and her predecessor, Giuseppe Sassatelli, has gone a long way toward making Marzabotto understood as a more complex place than it had originally been thought to be. This is the first comprehensive study in English of this critically important gateway Etruscan community of the Bologna area.
Elisabetta Govi is a professor of Etruscology at the Alma Mater Studiorum–Università di Bologna and the director of excavations at Marzabotto (Kainua). She directs several research projects on the Etruscan territory of the Po Valley.
- List of Illustrations
- Preface (Elisabetta Govi)
- Introduction to the Volume: Kainua-Marzabotto, the New Face of the City (Elisabetta Govi)
- Abbreviations
- A Note on Terminology
- Album of Maps
- Part I. Discovery and Archaeology of the City
- 1. The Role of the City in Nineteenth- and Twentieth-Century Scientific Debate (Giuseppe Sassatelli)
- 2. The Etruscan National Museum “P. Aria” (Federica Timossi)
- 3. Investigating the City: An Integrated Approach (Elisabetta Govi, Andrea Gaucci, Simone Garagnani, and Federica Boschi)
- Part II. The Planned City and Its Territory
- 4. Founding and Refounding of the City (Elisabetta Govi)
- 5. City and Territory: Trade Routes and Cultural Connections (Stefano Santocchini Gerg)
- 6. The Settlement of the Territory (Tiziano Trocchi and Paola Desantis)
- 7. Environment, Landscape, and Economy (Antonio Curci and Marialetizia Carra)
- Part III. Living in the City
- 8. Sacred Architecture and Landscape (Elisabetta Govi)
- 9. Cults, Rituals, and the Offering System (Riccardo Vanzini)
- 10. Writing Practice and Society (Andrea Gaucci)
- 11. Household Archaeology and Society (Giacomo Mancuso, Chiara Pizzirani, and Bojana Gruška)
- 12. Art and Artisans: Metal Production (Giulia Morpurgo)
- 13. From Clay to Vases: Operative Workflow (Chiara Mattioli)
- 14. Carved Stone Monuments (Giacomo Mancuso)
- 15. A World of Images: Attic Pottery (Vincenzo Baldoni)
- Part IV. Dying in the City
- 16. Funerary Practices (Chiara Pizzirani)
- 17. The Necropoleis: Tomb Structures (Chiara Pizzirani)
- 18. The Tombs of Sasso Marconi (Matteo Tirtei)
- Part V. The End of the Etruscan City
- 19. The Celtic Period (Giulia Morpurgo)
- 20. The Roman Period (Alessandro Campedelli)
- Appendix A: Inscriptions from Kainua-Marzabotto (Andrea Gaucci)
- Appendix B: List of Publications and Excavations (Giulia Morpurgo)
- Appendix C: Chronology of Kainua
- Bibliography (Compiled by Stefano Santocchini Gerg)
- Index
